Speedy mod response, because it's another opportunity to talk about how overworked they are and skirt the 'maybe telling everyone to report everything all the time means not all reports need to be tackled immediately' statement:
I think the reasoning is quite simple.
On any given day we might log on and see lets say 10 open reports.
This morning I log on and see over 70 reports...
That is just kinda stressful and will take so much longer to work through than a dozen open reports.
It is very much a case of, if the pile becomes too big no one feels like diving in anymore because there is seemingly no end in sight...
Not to mention if it hadn't been locked and if some reports hadn't already been dealt with that number could have easily shot past 100 and then all bets are off as to when we would actually get around to dealing with them all...
We're still collectively chipping away at them as we speak and once we bring that number down to a manageable level we might reopen the thread, but the larger the pile is the longer that will take...
In an ironically more chill world, that thread would've been full of memes and maybe dropped off. Instead, staff are having to mill through nearly 100 reports and having to address this with a big statement because people who are constantly online can't just not be at 11 all the time.
In short, just go outside.
It's not stressful and not work. You volunteered for this, you tell people to report everything they see and now you complain that it happens? It's "stressful" to see that you might be asked to do something you say you want to do? You're "collectively chipping away" at reports towards some unclear goal of a "manageable level"? I legitimately don't understand this.
I don't know what the reports look like but if they're all coming from the same thread they're easy to handle. Go post in the thread telling people to stop reporting things they dislike. If there's a legitimate issue that warrants a ban aka not "this triggered the staff or a protected member" then working through the reports (lol) to ban them properly is not a time sensitive issue. And especially not one that warrants shutting down the discussion for hours or days so you can do something that should take minutes to do.
A hundred reports from the same thread tells you one of two things immediately. Either someone actually did make a terrible post that needs to be actioned in some way and it's being reported by tons of people or people are being snitches and reporting everything as they argue with each other. The latter requires no action other than you telling them to stop, the former is not a time sensitive issue.
It seems remarkable that the extensive staff that has been assembled continues to have a fundamental misunderstanding about what a discussion forum is for and what their job should be towards it. It is not a process for you to weed out bad actors for an eventual utopia of purely productive discussion. It is not about achieving some measure of "justice" that requires you to punish everything that upsets you. It is not about getting butthurt that you're an idiot so the staff tools are there for you to remedy your personal failings by banning people.
No "big statement" to "address this" is needed either. The staff do not have to COMMUNICATE a proper view about any subject let alone all subjects. The role of the staff is to maintain the barriers of the discussion which is about actions on the fringe. It is not about imposing a correct view onto a thread and then actioning anyone who departs from it. Another fundamental misunderstanding. I can't even imagine the ungodly process that leads to the staff believing it needs to issue a "big statement" because people are stupidly reporting posts that upset them as the staff has told them to do and then in the drafting of this "big statement" the staff only briefly touches on the problem (people reporting things) and instead spends the other 99% of the massive text outlining a number of social theories and evidence weighing about an episode by celebrities at a film awards show. I can't say for sure who on the staff has so clearly lost the plot (other than Nepenthe, but she may have never had the plot to begin with) that this kind of thing becomes a feeling of necessity by the staff but I must urge that someone involved take a look at this if they happen to read this post.
Also, you can just quit. I know you'd lose your power to enforce your worldview on a discussion forum that purports to be about video games but that's not actually that important. ResetERA.com only has the value you grant it and for much of the staff this seems to be an incoherent mix of THE MOST IMPORTANT THING IN THE WORLD and also an insufferable burden that harms their mental health.
But I digress, let's get back to this ongoing social experiment.
