The Ethics of Two Way Ignore

Eyes of Nine said:

Cliques? really?

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Other definitions include emphasis on the "exclusive" part - suggesting active exclusion. I don't think that happens here. That would require folks to actually know each other, and then to actively exclude others from something. I'm not sure what that would be in an ENWorld context.

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I could probably come up with at least half dozen notable groups around ENWorld that I would casually refer to as "cliques". Cliques aren't necessary exclusive in the sense that you need a membership card to get it. It can just be a scenario where a few main people get most of the attention. That is absolutely the case here; there are certain topics that will attract groups of people that can dominate the discussion. It's not that they're specifically excluding new people, but rather that a few people can post so much that outside opinions get lost. Sometimes it's intentional, sometimes it's not. Even in purely social threads like the Hive it can be hard for a poster who's completely new to the site to jump in and join a conversation with people who have known each other for years, even if the group does their best to be accepting. Honestly, cliques are kind of inevitable for a forum this large and old.

One thing that I do find interesting is that some of what I would call cliques here aren't necessarily friends. There's a couple of topics that tend to pull in the same groups of people that are very adversarial with each other, to the point of excluding outside voices from the discussion.

Deset Gled said:

One thing that I do find interesting is that some of what I would call cliques here aren't necessarily friends. There's a couple of topics that tend to pull in the same groups of people that are very adversarial with each other, to the point of excluding outside voices from the discussion.

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Good observation. Sometimes the line between "clique" and "fight club" can be a little hazy.

Gradine said:

My block list tends to be populated by people who are clearly anti-inclusive and have a bone to pick about it but are clever enough to avoid drawing the attention of the mods by using dog-whistles and innuendo and sealioning. The sort of folks who always pop in threads with even a whiff of diversity or inclusion to decry it as being woke (pejorative) without actually calling it "woke" (pejorative).

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I am so behind the times. I do not even recognize some of those terms.

FrogReaver said:

High blocks are viewed negatively. Should high likes be viewed positively?

Maybe going by high likes instead of high blocks would be a better metric?

Maybe a like/block ratio would be an even better metric?

Anyways, just spitballing some ideas here.

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My personal experience, not to be taken as more than an anecdote.

Years ago, before the big database loss, I was more fiery in my approach. I got likes at a much higher rate then I do now. But a good number of them were by posting arguments to whichever side I supported in those big debate threads, which would often garner a number of likes from those who's who agreed with that side. So a good number of those like came from "those five people on this thread" and "these nine people on this thread" and so forth. I wasn't farming likes intentionally, I didn't even realize until after I lost months and months of likes in the database loss and afterwards was trying to figure why my like tally was growing so much slower than previously. I believe it's because the high-tension debates attract a lot of likes and I wasn't doing as many of those.

While I am occasionally still in a debate, I do try to be a lot less zealous then back in that period. I got likes faster, but in retrospect I don't know that was a good indication of what I brought to the forums as a whole.

I'm not saying it's a useless metric - there's a lot of great posts around, and I try to respond positively when I see them. But likes by itself isn't an unalloyed measure of how much good you have brought to ENWorld.

Deset Gled said:

I could probably come up with at least half dozen notable groups around ENWorld that I would casually refer to as "cliques". Cliques aren't necessary exclusive in the sense that you need a membership card to get it. It can just be a scenario where a few main people get most of the attention. That is absolutely the case here; there are certain topics that will attract groups of people that can dominate the discussion. It's not that they're specifically excluding new people, but rather that a few people can post so much that outside opinions get lost. Sometimes it's intentional, sometimes it's not. Even in purely social threads like the Hive it can be hard for a poster who's completely new to the site to jump in and join a conversation with people who have known each other for years, even if the group does their best to be accepting. Honestly, cliques are kind of inevitable for a forum this large and old.

One thing that I do find interesting is that some of what I would call cliques here aren't necessarily friends. There's a couple of topics that tend to pull in the same groups of people that are very adversarial with each other, to the point of excluding outside voices from the discussion.

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Maybe clique isn't the best term, but I don't have a better one. There are people who get very active about specific topics and are on the same side, but outside that don't have any cohesion and can be positive, negative, or indifferent about other topics on our site.

Easiest example would be that there are a number of people who are very [pro|con] about non D&D 5e. These posters might be pro 4e, those might be pro PbtA, and there might (or might not) be any overlap with those pro Pathfinder, but outside those categories don't particularly group together.

Maybe "similar advocates" might be a better term. But at this point I'm just splitting hairs.

FrogReaver said:

Question for you and others that use it this way. How often do you block/ignore the person raising points you mostly agree with when compared to those you don’t?

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Well, some are clear ones I disagree on - similar to @Gradine 's reasons- ones that feel like they are being anti-inclusive / railing against more inclusive systems, but in a way that doesn't cross the line in terms of the rules of the site (though a couple I see have since been banned, so potentially did cross that line) - and I just don't want to read those sorts of views.

Others it is their relentless negativity on some topics, and the way they express it - e.g. as an example that hopefully doesn't cause an issue - Micah comes across as often negative on certain topics, but I find the way they express them a reasonable way, that even if I disagree with some of their opinions, they don't cross into the relentless negativity I see from other posters that seem to want to drag people's joy down. Micah states their preferences / why they aren't happy, but they don't suggest others are wrong to be happy, whereas others seem to basically accuse those who are happy of being badfunwrong (and use specific terms sometimes that are very much attacking, but won't list them here). Some of those I may agree with their general position in terms of whether I'm happy or not, but I don't like they way they tar those on the opposite side.

One other person I have on ignore, I don't know if I disagree or not with their opinions, as I find their way of communicating so opaque that I just don't understand their posts, and it takes time away from reading posts I do understand. I don't think they're communicating wrong as such, just a way that clashes with the way I read posts, and so makes my life easier to not see them as such.

And another general statement I guess, I come to Enworld (similar to going to other spaces for other hobbies / interests like Doctor Who, board gaming etc) as I like the hobbies / interests, and want to come to a space where I can talk about these things, share excitement around new products, see what people's reactions are to new products out to see if I will enjoy them or not, or to see if other's shared my reaction.
I don't want to come to these sites just to see people arguing with each other on how their subjective opinion is more right than the other person's subjective opinion, to see certain dogwhistles or the like.
If I have ability to try and tailor the experience to minimise the latter stuff then I will look to use it - noting I still unfortunately see a lot of the arguing going on, but at least can remove the dogwhistling more successfully.

Blue said:

Maybe clique isn't the best term, but I don't have a better one. There are people who get very active about specific topics and are on the same side, but outside that don't have any cohesion and can be positive, negative, or indifferent about other topics on our site.

Easiest example would be that there are a number of people who are very [pro|con] about non D&D 5e. These posters might be pro 4e, those might be pro PbtA, and there might (or might not) be any overlap with those pro Pathfinder, but outside those categories don't particularly group together.

Maybe "similar advocates" might be a better term. But at this point I'm just splitting hairs.

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Definitely have seen that behavior, I know who the folks are who will generally post in a way I'll probably agree with, as well as the opposite.

I guess the part I was working against in the term clique is that in my mind a clique is active exclusivity. And I guess I'm not even sure what someone could be excluded from? The Heathers in the movie Heathers are a clique, as are the Plastics in Mean Girls. I don't think folks here are at that level, or even close...

Similar mindset or similar worldview I guess. Doesn't feel as negative as clique. I mean, folks who like avocado toast - are they a clique?

Just a reminder...

FrogReaver said:

Question for you and others that use it this way. How often do you block/ignore the person raising points you mostly agree with when compared to those you don’t?

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Probably 100% of the time. I don't block people because I disagree with them. I don't even block abusive posters--I let the mods take care of that. Toxic posters just hasn't been enough of an issue that I've needed to bother blocking truly toxic people. They tend to be quickly booted from the site.

A good example is that there are some people, especially during the OGL drama, who incessantly posted on how much they hated D&D. There posts were almost cut and paste jobs. And they did it in nearly any thread that had anything to do with D&D or WotC. So, like most threads. And people would inevitably take the bait and thread would get over-run with the same arguments choking out whatever the original topic was supposed to be. I've blocked people on both sides of the debate, just so I could actually read and engage with the thread's topic.

It did mean that I may have missed out on their posts on other game systems, which I likely would have found interesting. Most who I've put on ignore have been un-ignored. I only have two people on ignore. I should probably unignore them but they've been such long-time, consistent participants in such negativity and thread derailment, that I'm inclined to ignore them indefinitely.