Should 'excessive hyperbole' as a moderation option exist?

[S019]

Yes, it’s a valid way to moderate the forum, getting rid of it allows for the extremists to voice their reprehensible, extremist views in extraordinarily offensive ways. A way to enforce civility and restraint must remain.

[S019]

So, as someone who has actually had a post moderated for "excessive hyperbole," I support this rule staying in place. My post deserved to be infracted, and if posts of that nature remained on the forum, the forum would be a much worse place.

[S019]

My deeply held beliefs, posted in good faith, are incorrectly moderated as "excessive hyperbole" all the time. Most Atlas mods pretend that roughly a third the country and their opinions just don't exist, and that attempting to argue them must be just "trolling" or "hyperbole."

Yup trolling as an option can be cut down too. There are some scenarios where trolling is evident but saying MLK is not an important holiday is not trolling.

It is an important holiday though, MLK was one of the key leaders in the fight for civilian rights, to say that he isn’t important is akin to saying that civil rights aren’t important, which is a disturbing and inappropriate viewpoint.

[S019]

It, along with trolling, should be removed as a category, and I have said so in the past.

So, then how exactly are the moderators supposed to regulate bad content? We can’t make it even harder for bad content to be infracted.

[S019]

It, along with trolling, should be removed as a category, and I have said so in the past.

So, then how exactly are the moderators supposed to regulate bad content? We can’t make it even harder for bad content to be infracted.

They could change your password.

This is quite frankly a troll suggestion, and as such I don't need to provide any further comment

[S019]

It, along with trolling, should be removed as a category, and I have said so in the past.

So, then how exactly are the moderators supposed to regulate bad content? We can’t make it even harder for bad content to be infracted.

Just because you personally think content is "bad" (and let's be real, you really just mean content you disagree with), doesn't mean it's actually bad and needs to be removed.

That's true. I wouldn't want S019 anywhere near moderating tools.

I don't want him anywhere near the Post button.

Surprised why people hate me, when people like Yellowhammer are far worse, but whatever...

[S019]

It, along with trolling, should be removed as a category, and I have said so in the past.

So, then how exactly are the moderators supposed to regulate bad content? We can’t make it even harder for bad content to be infracted.

Just because you personally think content is "bad" (and let's be real, you really just mean content you disagree with), doesn't mean it's actually bad and needs to be removed.

That's true. I wouldn't want S019 anywhere near moderating tools.

I don't want him anywhere near the Post button.

Surprised why people hate me, when people like Yellowhammer are far worse, but whatever...

YH is an outright chad and the hate he gets is among the most unmerited in the forum. He does not use bigoted language. He stays polite. He simply expresses views that are very different than yours, and you for whatever reason cannot accept that.

For the record, I also disagree with YH on certain issues. I think his stance on the Confederacy is unmerited and wrong, and that if it is truly liberty he seeks to focus on, the American Revolution or the Texas Revolution are far better exemplars of those principles. I think he takes a slanted and ignoble view of the values that America still stands for today, and I think his refusal to fully align himself with the Republican Party, despite it being a far better representation of the principles that I believe we both stand for, is also foolish and stuck in the past. But do I hate him for any of that? No, because mere disagreement is not a cause for hatred, when that disagreement is not truly evil (ie, being a Communist). It's a lesson most of this forum could stand to learn. A hundred more posters like Dule, lfromnj, and YH would make this forum an infinitely better place.

The Texas Revolution was literally driven by slaveholding US transplants. It was really no secret that the occupation of Texas was a plot by the slaveocracy to snatch one more slave state. Also I'd argue that being a Neo-Confederate and supporting a nation that stood for slavery is evil, that might just be me though, but then again, it might not...

It, along with trolling, should be removed as a category, and I have said so in the past.

So, then how exactly are the moderators supposed to regulate bad content? We can’t make it even harder for bad content to be infracted.

Just because you personally think content is "bad" (and let's be real, you really just mean content you disagree with), doesn't mean it's actually bad and needs to be removed.

That's true. I wouldn't want S019 anywhere near moderating tools.

I don't want him anywhere near the Post button.

Surprised why people hate me, when people like Yellowhammer are far worse, but whatever...

YH is an outright chad and the hate he gets is among the most unmerited in the forum. He does not use bigoted language. He stays polite. He simply expresses views that are very different than yours, and you for whatever reason cannot accept that.

For the record, I also disagree with YH on certain issues. I think his stance on the Confederacy is unmerited and wrong, and that if it is truly liberty he seeks to focus on, the American Revolution or the Texas Revolution are far better exemplars of those principles. I think he takes a slanted and ignoble view of the values that America still stands for today, and I think his refusal to fully align himself with the Republican Party, despite it being a far better representation of the principles that I believe we both stand for, is also foolish and stuck in the past. But do I hate him for any of that? No, because mere disagreement is not a cause for hatred, when that disagreement is not truly evil (ie, being a Communist). It's a lesson most of this forum could stand to learn. A hundred more posters like Dule, lfromnj, and YH would make this forum an infinitely better place.

Dule and lfromnj does not deserve to be thrown into the same bad as YH.

And if you're saying that being a communist automatically makes one "truly evil", then having strong pro-Confederate sympathies, which, whether you admit it or not, is essentially being on the side of the people who waged bloody a war in order to secure their right to own other people, is truly evil too. Would anyone believe a guy saying he'd be rooting for the Axis powers during the WW2 that he's not essentially pro-Nazi?

The difference is, there are legitimate reasons to support the Confederacy's right to secede. There is none to support the Nazis. Yes, the Confederacy wanted to secede so that they could continue to own other people, a despicable practice which we can all agree is despicable. But fundamentally, there are two major distinctions to understand:

1. The Confederacy was right to assert that they had the right to secede. The United States is a voluntary union of 50 different nations come together. The Confederacy's secession was illegitimate not because they simply tried to secede, but because they didn't let everyone (ie African Americans) vote on whether or not to. Otherwise, I'd perfectly agree with their right to secede, even if I didn't agree/fair terms could be agreed on.

2. Confederacy romantics like YH tend to do so not as an expression of true hatred, but generally as a result of disillusionment with more socialistic aspects of the current US and a misunderstanding of the truth behind the Confederacy's rhetoric of freedoms and liberty. If YH supported the Confederacy because he thought owning slaves was funny and wanted to kill black people, I'd judge him, and I'd judge him just as hard as I would any communist or other tyrant. But it is an important distinction for me that YH supports certain aspects of the Confederacy mainly as a mix of a protest against certain US policies/a mistaken belief that the true reasoning behind the Confederate secession was actually to ensure their individual freedoms against centralized government. YH is reaching the wrong conclusion (sympathy for the Confederacy) but for the right reasons (strong beliefs in individual freedoms and personal liberty). Even if I don't agree, his beliefs are worthy of debate, and I deeply respect the courage it takes to articulate them. No matter your disagreements, you cannot say that he is a racist, you cannot say that he is a bigot, and you cannot say that he goes along with the crowd. Those are all qualities to be prized and valued, under any fair measurement, so yes, without a hint of a doubt I say YH is one of my favorite posters on the site.

So what I get from this is that breaking up the union is good and that the Southern secessionists were doing the right thing. Have you even seen the Southern Democratic platform in 1860, or have you even heard how some of the Fire Eaters spoke, a lot of was based in protecting slavery, especially since after the 1850's, and events like Bleeding Kansas and the Ostend Manifesto enraged Northerners, the Southern elite knew that it would be much harder to get new slave states. Also you do realize, that once one state seceded, then secession was now legitimate, and New England could have broken off for minor disputes with like New York. Many consider the Civil War as the true test of representative government, and if the U.S. had lost that war, it's very possible that democratic forms of government could have been discredited in much of the world with the excuse that it could lead to agitators getting too much power and then pushing for disunion.

[S019]

It, along with trolling, should be removed as a category, and I have said so in the past.

So, then how exactly are the moderators supposed to regulate bad content? We can’t make it even harder for bad content to be infracted.

Just because you personally think content is "bad" (and let's be real, you really just mean content you disagree with), doesn't mean it's actually bad and needs to be removed.

That's true. I wouldn't want S019 anywhere near moderating tools.

I don't want him anywhere near the Post button.

Surprised why people hate me, when people like Yellowhammer are far worse, but whatever...

YH is an outright chad and the hate he gets is among the most unmerited in the forum. He does not use bigoted language. He stays polite. He simply expresses views that are very different than yours, and you for whatever reason cannot accept that.

For the record, I also disagree with YH on certain issues. I think his stance on the Confederacy is unmerited and wrong, and that if it is truly liberty he seeks to focus on, the American Revolution or the Texas Revolution are far better exemplars of those principles. I think he takes a slanted and ignoble view of the values that America still stands for today, and I think his refusal to fully align himself with the Republican Party, despite it being a far better representation of the principles that I believe we both stand for, is also foolish and stuck in the past. But do I hate him for any of that? No, because mere disagreement is not a cause for hatred, when that disagreement is not truly evil (ie, being a Communist). It's a lesson most of this forum could stand to learn. A hundred more posters like Dule, lfromnj, and YH would make this forum an infinitely better place.

The Texas Revolution was literally driven by slaveholding US transplants. It was really no secret that the occupation of Texas was a plot by the slaveocracy to snatch one more slave state. Also I'd argue that being a Neo-Confederate and supporting a nation that stood for slavery is evil, that might just be me though, but then again, it might not...

It, along with trolling, should be removed as a category, and I have said so in the past.

So, then how exactly are the moderators supposed to regulate bad content? We can’t make it even harder for bad content to be infracted.

Just because you personally think content is "bad" (and let's be real, you really just mean content you disagree with), doesn't mean it's actually bad and needs to be removed.

That's true. I wouldn't want S019 anywhere near moderating tools.

I don't want him anywhere near the Post button.

Surprised why people hate me, when people like Yellowhammer are far worse, but whatever...

YH is an outright chad and the hate he gets is among the most unmerited in the forum. He does not use bigoted language. He stays polite. He simply expresses views that are very different than yours, and you for whatever reason cannot accept that.

For the record, I also disagree with YH on certain issues. I think his stance on the Confederacy is unmerited and wrong, and that if it is truly liberty he seeks to focus on, the American Revolution or the Texas Revolution are far better exemplars of those principles. I think he takes a slanted and ignoble view of the values that America still stands for today, and I think his refusal to fully align himself with the Republican Party, despite it being a far better representation of the principles that I believe we both stand for, is also foolish and stuck in the past. But do I hate him for any of that? No, because mere disagreement is not a cause for hatred, when that disagreement is not truly evil (ie, being a Communist). It's a lesson most of this forum could stand to learn. A hundred more posters like Dule, lfromnj, and YH would make this forum an infinitely better place.

Dule and lfromnj does not deserve to be thrown into the same bad as YH.

And if you're saying that being a communist automatically makes one "truly evil", then having strong pro-Confederate sympathies, which, whether you admit it or not, is essentially being on the side of the people who waged bloody a war in order to secure their right to own other people, is truly evil too. Would anyone believe a guy saying he'd be rooting for the Axis powers during the WW2 that he's not essentially pro-Nazi?

The difference is, there are legitimate reasons to support the Confederacy's right to secede. There is none to support the Nazis. Yes, the Confederacy wanted to secede so that they could continue to own other people, a despicable practice which we can all agree is despicable. But fundamentally, there are two major distinctions to understand:

1. The Confederacy was right to assert that they had the right to secede. The United States is a voluntary union of 50 different nations come together. The Confederacy's secession was illegitimate not because they simply tried to secede, but because they didn't let everyone (ie African Americans) vote on whether or not to. Otherwise, I'd perfectly agree with their right to secede, even if I didn't agree/fair terms could be agreed on.

2. Confederacy romantics like YH tend to do so not as an expression of true hatred, but generally as a result of disillusionment with more socialistic aspects of the current US and a misunderstanding of the truth behind the Confederacy's rhetoric of freedoms and liberty. If YH supported the Confederacy because he thought owning slaves was funny and wanted to kill black people, I'd judge him, and I'd judge him just as hard as I would any communist or other tyrant. But it is an important distinction for me that YH supports certain aspects of the Confederacy mainly as a mix of a protest against certain US policies/a mistaken belief that the true reasoning behind the Confederate secession was actually to ensure their individual freedoms against centralized government. YH is reaching the wrong conclusion (sympathy for the Confederacy) but for the right reasons (strong beliefs in individual freedoms and personal liberty). Even if I don't agree, his beliefs are worthy of debate, and I deeply respect the courage it takes to articulate them. No matter your disagreements, you cannot say that he is a racist, you cannot say that he is a bigot, and you cannot say that he goes along with the crowd. Those are all qualities to be prized and valued, under any fair measurement, so yes, without a hint of a doubt I say YH is one of my favorite posters on the site.

So what I get from this is that breaking up the union is good and that the Southern secessionists were doing the right thing. Have you even seen the Southern Democratic platform in 1860, or have you even heard how some of the Fire Eaters spoke, a lot of was based in protecting slavery, especially since after the 1850's, and events like Bleeding Kansas and the Ostend Manifesto enraged Northerners, the Southern elite knew that it would be much harder to get new slave states. Also you do realize, that once one state seceded, then secession was now legitimate, and New England could have broken off for minor disputes with like New York. Many consider the Civil War as the true test of representative government, and if the U.S. had lost that war, it's very possible that democratic forms of government could have been discredited in much of the world with the excuse that it could lead to agitators getting too much power and then pushing for disunion.

1. Lmao no, the Texas Revolution was a revolution against new centralism in the Mexican government, which is why it was joined by several different other federalist revolutions across Mexico. It just happened to be the only one that succeeded.

"The conservatives' attempt to impose a unitary state produced armed resistance in regions that had most favored federalism. Centralism generated severe political instability, armed uprisings and secessions: The rebellions in Zacatecas, the Texas revolution, the separation of Tabasco, the independence of Coahuila, Nuevo León and Tamaulipas that formed the Republic of the Rio Grande, and finally the independence of the state of Yucatán."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralist_Republic_of_Mexico

Those slaveholding racists in Yucatan!

2. Did you read what I said? Because that's not what I said, lol.

I explicitly said the secessionists were wrong! My entire comment was explaining why I believed YH was wrong, but respected him for it anyway because of the underlying principles he fights for. It's annoying as hell when you won't provide even the most baseline respect and read before you respond.

Nah, it's just that folks are calling BS on the idea that there is any underlying "principle" driving YH's Neo-Confederate views beyond his own racism (and rightly so).  What you're doing is basically like if someone said "Guys, stop calling the Neo-Nazi poster an anti-Semite.  Can't you see he's just motivated by a deep-seated commitment to anti-Communism and that he only wishes the Axis Powers had won because the Nazis were so staunchly opposed to the German Communists?  I don't agree, but I respect him for standing on principle.  Why won't anyone treat me with respect when I say this?"  

What you're arguing is - whether you realize it or not - a pretty absurd position that most folks would likely agree doesn't merit serious debate because it's so self-evidently lacking in any basis in reality that it's not worth it.  With all due respect, it'd be like if I said "1+1=2" and you said "No, it's eleventy-twen!  Debate me, you coward!"

Not all views deserve to be shown the curtesy of being treated like legitimate positions.  "Neo-Confederates usually aren't racists" isn't a position that merits serious debate because it's so self-evidently absurd and frankly, the fact that you subscribe to it raises questions about your own views.  

To be clear, I'm not calling you a racist and I say all this not as a personal attack, but to try and help you understand where everyone else is coming from and what folks are likely to take away from your posts in this thread.  I genuinely hope you take this post in the spirit that it is meant.

1. As with a lot of these things, it's very situational for me. If you generically told me that someone thought the Confederacy should have won, I'd dismiss them as a die hard racist. I do believe the Confederacy was a fundamentally racist state, and I don't believe that they used states rights or any of the other conservative principles they claimed to espouse as anything more than shield for slavery (with the occasional exception, ie Lee). But I also know Yellowhammer, and I know that he is not a racist. As someone who starts from the same principles and starting place as I believe he does (but reaches a different conclusion) I understand how he got to his beliefs. Does that make them right? No, and if he were reading this I would tell him that if it was state's rights the Confederacy was upset about, they should have seceded in 1828 and not 1860. You made a poignant analogy to Nazi Germany, which I did find thought provoking. And to them, I think I'd say the same. Of course, this depends greatly on the person. I've spoken to actual neo-nazis before, and I doubt there's any personal hope of redeeming them. But if you told me that someone wanted the Americans and the West to win WW2, but also rooted for the Nazis to kill as many communists as possible on the Eastern Front, that's a position I'd deeply understand but also do my best to dissuade from by pointing out the Nazi's own socialist influences and horrors at home (assuming this person was not a genuine anti-semite, just as I know that Yellowhammer is not a racist).


Fun fact, a Southern state did come quite close to secession in the late 1820's and early 1830's. It was South Carolina, who had decided to nullify the Tariff of Abominations/Tariff of 1828. Had the U.S. government decided to actually force SC to accept the Tariff by force, it could have very well turned into a Civil War. In fact, had Henry Clay not negotiated a compromise, that's likely where we were headed. And not hard to believe that the rest of the South comes to SC's aid in such a war, especially since the Tariff largely benefitted Northern industrialists.

2. In this regard, I think we'll just have to agree to disagree. I don't find it to be as ridiculous of a question as you might think, because many of my political beliefs are so fundamentally centered on the ideas of liberty, and contained within that idea the ideal of local autonomy and state's rights. Like I said before, my issue is not with, say, the idea of an state being able to secede, but with the reality of how the Confederacy did it (not letting AAs vote, using force to pressure opponents, etc etc). Furthermore, the rhetoric the Confederacy used was specifically aimed at people of my general political leanings -- conservatives who valued property rights, local autonomy, etc etc. Personally, my objection to that comes down to the fact that I don't regard owning another person simply on the basis of their birth or race to be any sort of legitimate property right, and that 50% of the population enslaving 40% is fundamentally wrong to me, the exact sort of tyranny of the majority that Madison sought to protect against in the constitution. From what I know and have seen of Yellowhammer, I (perhaps wrongly: I do not know any man's personal thoughts) believe that he simply falls prey to that rhetoric, as part of a more general anti American sentiment. For me, that was really hit home when I saw him argue against that ISIS woman being returned to the US -- I don't know any simple neoconfederate racist who would argue against delivering a brown woman to her likely death/decades in jail, but it makes perfect sense in context of YH's genuine attitudes and political beliefs.

Yet, secession was still a fringe view even in 1860, largely driven by inflammatory Fire Eaters. Many rich Southerners actually voted for Bell, because they had no desire for secession. In 1860, the South still had a majority on SCOTUS and close to half of the Senate seats, so no, it wasn't just Southern conservatives driving this, it was the most radical members of the upper crust of Southern society, politicians, who were also planters.

3. You're right, most neo-confederates are racists. But Yellowhammer isn't.

Citation needed.

4. Of course, and much appreciated! I totally understand where you're coming from, but in the end I guess I just see things differently.

You're definitely overlooking something here...

[S019]

YH is an outright chad and the hate he gets is among the most unmerited in the forum. He does not use bigoted language. He stays polite. He simply expresses views that are very different than yours, and you for whatever reason cannot accept that.

For the record, I also disagree with YH on certain issues. I think his stance on the Confederacy is unmerited and wrong, and that if it is truly liberty he seeks to focus on, the American Revolution or the Texas Revolution are far better exemplars of those principles. I think he takes a slanted and ignoble view of the values that America still stands for today, and I think his refusal to fully align himself with the Republican Party, despite it being a far better representation of the principles that I believe we both stand for, is also foolish and stuck in the past. But do I hate him for any of that? No, because mere disagreement is not a cause for hatred, when that disagreement is not truly evil (ie, being a Communist). It's a lesson most of this forum could stand to learn. A hundred more posters like Dule, lfromnj, and YH would make this forum an infinitely better place.

I find it highly amusing that you’re trying to give a lecture on not letting political disagreements drive hatred, yet have also staked out the position in other threads that you believe being a communist should be grounds for execution.

Perhaps you’re just not the right carrier for this message.

I don’t believe that being a communist alone is grounds for execution. What I believe you are referring to is my saying that the actions of Pinochet in the 80s were justified due to their crisis circumstances, which I believe they were. Even then though, yes, I do hold communists of all stripes in contempt. Communism is an ideology built upon theft, evil, and base ludditism (labor theory of value). My general stance on “acceptance” is that I consider near all non fascist/communist ideologies open for debate, but that I consider those two ideologies to be so fundamentally evil as to be unworthy of respect.

Yet defending/supporting the Confederacy is considered acceptable. You may recognize that the Confederacy was bad, but those who you defend don't. So, I'm not sure how defending the Confederacy is acceptable...