Final Note On Vocation Station Controversies

[Aloysius]

During the recent controversies on Vocation Station, the moderating team has been displeased with the tone expressed by both sides.  It is not our place to determine who "started it" or place blame, but we stepped in with a change in rules and a few interventions to attempt to set the tone back on course so that Vocation Station can be a safe, loving place for people to discuss their vocational discernment.  

 

Phatmass believes in a light-touch moderation policy, feeling that Christian charity and humility should inspire all to quell controversies and make peace on their own, and therefore we were not able to go back through the history of all threads involved to edit/warn every post that was problematic; and of course, there were many out of line posts that skirted the line and were not found to necessarily be direct violations of the rules.  As always, we tried to keep edits and warns to a minimum, but have communicated with all parties about things we found problematic; please note: just because you did not see someone publicly edited, it does not mean we did not communicate with them or warn them.  Even if you were not contacted, please take this as a notice for everyone on the boards that you should make a conscious effort to refrain from confrontational tones in the future... if you feel that a post is being confrontational, rather than responding in kind please use the report button to make us aware of the problem (we will not always edit in response to your report as we don't like to micromanage charity in conversations, but it is good to make us aware as we will sometimes privately communicate with a member asking them to soften their tone or be more charitable)

 

In order to keep pointless unpleasantness off of the boards and avoid full out derailments of the purposes of a phorum with constant battles over rules and moderation (something that quite commonly happens on the internet, public battles over moderation and rules turn into civil wars on forums and such a thing would do nothing to glorify God or foster vocations), we have always forbidden public discussion of moderation decisions, any and all frustration when you disagree with a moderator decision must be expressed through private communication.  I personally know the frustration this can cause (you should see my own warn log, I have been on the other side of this before), but I hope everyone can try to let cool heads prevail and look towards the future of the board as we believe that with the new rule against debate and confrontation the Vocation Station will be able to get back on track now.

 

I hope this will be the last we have to say on the subject.