No, no, dialogue should not be smothered, but civility should be maintained and personal attacks should be discouraged. A[nother] flagging system is a good idea.

I spoke to another editor about this before, so I knew that you guys were working on it, but I saw a NP page tonight that had largely fallen into personal rivalry and attacking when a really important issue was at stake and should have been the centre of discussion. I thought it was worth flagging again. (Excuse the pun.)

I can indeed, Ryan: http://www.nowpublic.com/opinions/911-license-kill

I'll bet I'll the class snitch now! ;)

Thanks for raising this generaldecay. I was rather dissapointed to have to wade into that one too. I dont have anyway to moderate these things other than to make comments to bring such things to a halt.

I see that this sort of thing is continueing though on  another thread here.

http://www.nowpublic.com/opinions/us-responsible-1-million-iraqi-casualties

I have seen this tactic before and so took a screen shot of it as I have seen these type of comments show up on some of my articles only to disapear soon after.

Thanks for the hard work guys  

Hi everyone,

Thank you for being attentive and concerned users of our site. In light of this growing problem, we are developing a Flaming policy which will be clear and precise and have specific ways of dealing with abusive posts and posters. 

This policy will be in the newsroom and accessible to all of our users, and should be up by next week. We will inform all of our users when this happens. If you have any questions or concerns about this, please email me directly at kfontana[at]nowpublic[dot]com. 

Good to see you are all still fighting the Devil, Witches, and the

American inquisition is still supported. Ofcourse your argument is an

old Cathoilc one. If you dont condem what we call terrorists/ witches,

you are in League with the Terrorists/Devil, if you dont believe in the

Terrorist threat/Witches, you are a tool of the Terrorists/Witches.Nice

little catch 22 there guys. 

America is in the state it's in now because it abandoned the

Catholic Faith and flung itself into the arms of the evil god hating

Messianic Pentecostal Protestant Loonies :) LOL by pacific

This is a quote of the type that i have been fighting with no help from the editors since I became a memeber. Anti American hate splashed all over the site and I get an Email revoking my wrangler status. the quote that the above poster pacific who has even insulted phrolens religion. It is deeply disturbing that my opinions mostly defending my country from false story after story. I challenge anyone to take any of my posts and show were I expressed hate for a country or religion or any person. I am not the only one that has been fighting the Anti American sentiment that the editors have ignored to this day. but today without warning send me an email revoking my wrangler status. they can have the wrangler and stick it were i would rather not say. But it is well known that the Anti American  and anti christian pure hate has been totally overlooked by the editors leaving it up to us to counter. thanks very much.

Thank you for posting here, gmony. As I stated above, we are in the process of bringing our Flaming policy into full light. In the meantime, those who are flaming or participating in abusive posts are being dealt with on an individual basis.

I would like to let you know, gmony714, that SthPacific is being handled in the exact same way that you have been dealt with, and that we are well aware of all behaviours and are treating them equally. 

I also sent you a personal email response to your concerns about your Wrangler status. I will reproduce part of it here, so other users can benefit from the policies before I post them here early next week in full.

"You are part of a community here at NowPublic, and when you
are commenting on a story (whether employing sarcasm or not) you are bound to
the understanding that you are part of that community. As a wrangler, as well,
you were selected to be a pillar of this community, which means you are to
command respect as well as give it.

 When you bait someone you are part and parcel of that abusive
behaviour because you encourage that person to continue. As far as flaming goes, baiters
are as guilty of encouraging flame wars as those who dole out abuse directly.
The Flaming Policy that we are about to put into effect makes this abundantly
clear. As this is a public forum, your decorum needs to
reflect the fact that you are part of a community that includes a diverse array
of people. You may find your exchanges to be in "good humour" but many in the community have made it clear that
they do not see it that way." 

Ultimately, as the policy will outline, the decision to revoke status or site membership falls to the Editorial staff. We are more than willing to reinstate status or membership, as well, should behaviours be modified to the betterment of all involved.

Well Thanks for you personal response Katlin. But I feel that this only addresses part of the problem. Again I find people posting fake articles and claiming that they are news. Here

http://www.nowpublic.com/politics/do-we-want-ignoramus-president

How do you propose to deal with this type of use here at Nowpublic.? Surely this is supposed to be a news site. and should not be used for other purposes.

By allowing this type of stuff to gain visibility on Nowpublic, it can only bring the site into disrepute.

I think that the main focus should be on maintaining the site intergrity as a valid and impartial news site, that can be trusted to deliver factual information.

Thanks for your personal reply

Sth Pacific.  

Here's another interesting piece:

From gryphon: 

"Moonwolf also suffers from a

Moonwolf
also suffers from a psychological disease (see his profile) that
prohibits him from rational thought.  I'm happy to see that sick people
have a voice here, but I would use caution in taking him seriously. 

I certainly don't comment on any of his stories.  It would be
inappropriate and frankly lend him more credibility that he deserves." This was dropped on me out of the blue and is an obvious and very direct and inexcusable personal attack, the kind which I have never perpetrated on anyone, and it is not the first such attack from gryphon, and their have been many from Joelrose as well. No Wrangler removal action against those two and yet I have my Wrangler status removed even though I had told Kaitlin I would comply with her wishes. Seems a rather uneven application of these "standards", and suggests other personal reasons.   

And here's an interesting "headline" from one of the Editors here!  Some example she is setting!

Personal inflammatory attack directed at a public figure, and an article that contains no substance but just more vitriol. Policing the new policy should be very interesting when Editors bait and flame in what they pass off as "stories"!

From PEP:

"Clinton Refuses to Step Up; Chooses Leftist Robot Dance in MoveOn Ad Flap"

 Would anyone in Editorial care to respond please?

Or here's another one by a Wrangler, joellerose:

1

indierockcafe

Do We Want An Ignoramus for President?

Inflammatory, defammatory?  You bet.  What Kind Of President Do We Want and then a discussion of the pros and con's without the villification in the title and the rest of the "article" might be ethical journalism, but this most certainly isn't! 

Hi moonwolf, gmony and Sth,

Please be assured that all people who are flaming are being dealt with equally (this does not mean in exactly the same way; thank you gmony for drawing my attention to that wording. Everyone is different so they are being treated in separate but equal ways). Let us do our jobs, and appreciate that we are doing the best we can. There is no bias here--all flamers are being treated equally despite their leanings.

Moonwolf--this applies to gryphon's comment. Wholly inappropriate. Is being dealt with. 

As for stories about public figures, that is not flaming. Flaming concerns personal attacks on other users of the site. It is not public figures I'm concerned with here, it's other users. Just as you have the right to post about Bush and your negative opinions on him, so does joellerose have the right to do so about Hillary. Hillary and George can take care of themselves. Now, if joellerose openly attacks you personally in a comment, that would be flaming. I am watching for this behaviour and am taking appropriate steps when it occurs.

Thank you again for your concerns; trust they are being addressed as best and as quickly as they can. In the meantime, consider that your time might be better spent posting good news--which is, for all of you, your greatest strength--than by searching for other users to skewer.

Thanks for your reply Katlin. This is hardly a case of Hunting for users to Skewer :) The board was flooded with the same article and bumped up by the same users. After I had finnished posting articles I looked at the top story to find it was not news at all. It should never have even made it onto the page.

When I requested some varification the poster jellyrose provided a fake link and claimed it was his evidence. The link loaded Castlemedia spyware into my browser.

When I pointed out to him that this had nothing to do with the subject he had posted about I got the usual rehtoric. See Link. I dont appreciate being called a liar.

I fail to see why when this little group  is subject to mild peer reveiw they wilt like flowers and resort to personal attacks.