Editorial responsibilities

[Deleted]

David,

Yesterday a thread entitled Scottish Independence and relating to forum and club members and created by Glenn was locked by Phil after a number of contributions including one from myself. Colin had complained that he did not expect to be confronted with that subject on this site but opened it anyway and complained. Phil's reason for the lock down was that the site should not contain political or religious comments.

Seeing that the thread had been locked down by Phil I created a new thread entitled Religion explaining amongst other things that P5(B)'s were a religion for many of us and suggesting that the Scottish debate was as emotional as the P5 vs 3. 8 Mkll debate.

This morning I find that my thread has been deleted as has the thread locked down by Phil. As I explained to Colin in the thread that has been removed banning subjects does not make them go away. It just places them in the spotlight.

In my publishing experience a lock down may be considered justifiable by moderators/ editors provided reasons are given. It is also fair for reasoned discussion to take place as to why.

Should you feel the need to wipe out members text for any reason then it would be appropriate to say that you have done so and give the reasons again also allowing reasonable discussion. It is unprofessional to just scrap text and say nothing. This appears to be what happened and I make the assumption that it is you who did it?

As I said later last evening my best wishes to all members on both sides of the border and I look forward to seeing many of you at the National rally in a few days time.

Sincerely,

Peter

[David]

T'was I Peter.

Hands up, I should have put an explanation but things here are a bit hectic at the moment and hopefully the 'norm' (whatever that is) will be resumed shortly.

Politics, religion and probably football are best left to other more suitable forums and looking at the responses some agreed. Let's not forget this forum is worldwide, so imagine what 'can of worms' we could open......

So, hope that explains.

[Deleted]

Aug 31, 2014 14:09:16 GMT David said:

T'was I Peter.

Hands up, I should have put an explanation but things here are a bit hectic at the moment and hopefully the 'norm' (whatever that is) will be resumed shortly.

Politics, religion and probably football are best left to other more suitable forums and looking at the responses some agreed. Let's not forget this forum is worldwide, so imagine what 'can of worms' we could open......

So, hope that explains.

Agreed and para two is very appropriate as I, for one, often forget the sheer scale and power of the net.

In May 2012, I posted some pics of my car and mentioned in the comments(tonque in cheek) that Chris Evans might be interested. If you search Rover P5b Chris Evans,you will get images of my car and the postings on the forum. Unfortunately, Chris seems to prefer the Coupe!

 

[Deleted]

Appreciate the Shakespearean touch David.

[Warwick]

The thing we all need to remember is that it's quite risky to discuss sensitive, contentious, political, or controversial topics via a medium such as this. In fact the topic need only be sensitive, contentious, political, or controversial to the reader.

Raw text on a screen is completely devoid of the body language and facial expressions that often convey half of the meaning in a face to face conversation. The shrug of a shoulder, the slightest raising of an eyebrow, or the hint of a smile can all vastly change the meaning of the spoken word.

All these are missing from a written passage and so it is very easy to cause offence when none was intended. Smiley faces and other emoticons go a little way to help, but even these can sometimes be misconstrued; and many of us don't even use them. Even something as simple as a missing or misplaced comma can sometimes dramatically alter the meaning of a sentence. You need only look at a legal document to see how seriously this is viewed. Lawyers avoid all punctuation other than the full-stop, in case a simple typographical error misplaces a comma and the document's meaning is changed.

Another difficulty when interpreting what was meant by someone's post is that most of us don't actually know each other, and have never even met. We have no way of determining what the writer meant, other than to read the cold hard words. And those words are unlikely to be the result of careful consideration, re-reading, fine-tuning, and rewriting as would be the case if the writer was preparing an essay or article for publication. Instead, most of what we write here is just rattled off as if we were having a face to face conversation with a friend. That can be quite disastrous, but it's surprising how infrequently we come unstuck due to a poor choice of words, or the invisibility of the smile on our face at the time.

And then there are the cultural and language differences which can alter the meaning of the written word. Even though we all appear to be using English, it's our own version of English through which we interpret what has been written. Some of us are lucky enough to have a bit of an understanding of some of the nuances of the other versions of English; so that helps.

So we all need to bear these things in mind when we write, when we read; but more importantly, before we respond to something written by someone else. And we need to spare a thought for our moderators, who all do a fantastic job that is occasionally made difficult for them ... by us.

[djm16]

I admit I was surprised and disappointed by the locking of the Scottish Independence thread, not least because I was looking forwards to hearing some considered opinions for and against.

I readily acknowledge that I do not own the forum and post here as a guest. I also completely respect that the moderators act in what they believe to be the best interests of the club and its members, and will not try to subvert their actions by posting similar threads.

However, if in this usually very polite and restrained forum, we are not able to discuss other things non Rover related in a mature manner then I have misjudged the membership.

[Deleted]

Sept 4, 2014 5:34:26 GMT djm16 said:

I admit I was surprised and disappointed by the locking of the Scottish Independence thread, not least because I was looking forwards to hearing some considered opinions for and against.

I readily acknowledge that I do not own the forum and post here as a guest. I also completely respect that the moderators act in what they believe to be the best interests of the club and its members, and will not try to subvert their actions by posting similar threads.

However, if in this usually very polite and restrained forum, we are not able to discuss other things non Rover related in a mature manner then I have misjudged the membership.

In my experience, discussions re politics/immigration/EU/Religion et al on forums ALWAYS end in a bun fight! Let's just keep to Rovery things!

[Deleted]

Have you settled yours with Alan Richard?

Before " Chris Evans" gets hold of it!!

Agree Warwick's comments entirely.

DJM 16's feelings are reciprocated but agree the editorial right to make and enforce editorial policy assuming editorial policy has been approved by the club and reasons for implementation are given when questioned.

[Warwick]

I hasten to add that I don't actually know what started all this. I didn't see the original posts or what they contained, or who said what about whom, or if in fact anyone did. All I know is what I've learnt from this thread; so I'm speaking very generally.

Like djm16, I'm interested to hear a discussion of the pros and cons from both sides of the argument. But my fear is that doing it here, under the constraints I've mentioned, is fraught with the danger of misunderstanding.

Perhaps I should reveal my position. English on my father's side and Scot on my mother's. And if you go back far enough, there's Flemish in there somewhere too.

[David]

Sept 4, 2014 5:34:26 GMT djm16 said:

I admit I was surprised and disappointed by the locking of the Scottish Independence thread, not least because I was looking forwards to hearing some considered opinions for and against.

I readily acknowledge that I do not own the forum and post here as a guest. I also completely respect that the moderators act in what they believe to be the best interests of the club and its members, and will not try to subvert their actions by posting similar threads.

However, if in this usually very polite and restrained forum, we are not able to discuss other things non Rover related in a mature manner then I have misjudged the membership.

The 'problem' with such posts, as in the Scottish will they/won't they question is, as Warwick pointed out, it didn't take long for it to descend in to a bit of a 'bun fight' as Resurgam mentioned.

I agree that if you got a group around the table at a pub, then I am sure it could be discussed sensibly and with due humour and gravitas.

The problem here is we have potentially over 1,800 forum members wanting to get around the 'pub table' and it only needs one wrongly positioned word, or inappropriate humour, to cause issues.

Personally I was interested to know people opinions as I have a Scottish heritage, but sometimes, as in the case of politics and religion,  things are best left alone.