Too much moderation on these boards?

From An Example Of What Won't Be Preached Here: My guess is that admin3 is Fred Williams (that is another plus for - We make explicit which admin is also which member). True - His extreme version of creationism does not at all go together with evolutionary considerations. But that is the essence of most of the creation/evolution debate. If you totally suppress such considerations then you have no debate at all.The two extremes of moderation are:1) None - Pretty much have chaos with what quality input there is being buried in the blather.2) Extreme moderation (example: the so called "Baptist Board", which I don't offhand have a link for) - All messages are submitted to the moderator(s) and are not even seen unless approved, and then they are often heavily moderator edited/censored. Debate input from one side is heavily suppressed.Here at we try to achieve something in the middle. With very rare exception (and such is mostly for spam) moderators do not edit messages for content, and messages and topics are not deleted. We try for total transparency in what happens here.Re: Spam - I would love to wipe the spam topics/messages from the record as they are totally irrelevant clutter. But to do such would be to leave gaps in the topic or message listings, which could raise questions about "what was deleted?". Thus, to totally document our lack of censorship, we must preserve the garbage.Re: Promoted or rejected "Proposed New Topics". Again, total disclosure and preservation. The PNT's remain as clutter in the forum topic listings. BTW, one feature that I really liked in the pre-dBoard version of the forum, was the "Proposed New Topics" archive. There the promoted or rejected topics could be removed from normal view, but would be preserved elsewhere in case someone wanted to look at them. Percy, does that archive still exist? If so, link please.Re: Why the "Proposed New Topics" (PNT) forum. - We have decided that in order to aid in a quality debate happening, we should at least try for extra care in that there is a reasonably quality topic title and initial message. Without the PNT process, we would at least sometimes have redundant to other current topics topics, misplaced (wrong forum) topics, garbage topics, and most importantly, poorly defined topics.We have seen such topics started, that have vague or not relevant topic titles. Then the initial message may actually have a good topic theme presented, only to have the originater shoot-off somewhere else later in the same message. Unmoderated, we can have massive topic drift within the message 1 of a new topic.Bottom line in regards to the PNT - We are trying to at least get the topic off to a good start. Ideally (and it is rather a fantacy) this will help the contributing members do quality messages down thread, and will make moderating easier and better. After all, it's pretty hard to do a good topic if no one can really figure out what the topic is about.Adminnemooseus (running in the babble mode?)

In my previous message (to which this message is a reply) I stated that we strive for total transparency and disclosure at .There is a significant exception to this policy. It is the existence of the "Private Administration Forum" (PAF), which is not only "topics and messages by admin only", but also is totally hidden from the view of the general membership. This forum is an alterative and improvement to the previous "admins needing to communicate by e-mail". The reasons for it's private nature are:1) It gives the admins a place to discuss moderator procedures and issues, free from the clutter of non-admin input. This, in itself, could be achieved via a public forum with "topics and messages by admin only", but...2) Keeping it non-public eliminates it's content from triggering non-admin comments in the various public "Suggestions and Questions" topics.Trust me, there are heated debates about moderation issues in the PAF. But I do think the general forum interests are best served by keeping some of such out of sight of the general membership. It's not that we don't also have public versions, such as the General discussion of moderation procedures series of topics. As you can see via the cited, such public discussion (and other non-relevant blather?) is now approaching a total of 1800 messages. And there is also no shortage of other public moderation issue topics.If you want to be able to see and post at the PAF, volunteer to become an moderator/admin. If we find you to be workable as such, your into the PAF. Please make any such offers via e-mail, either to me or one of the other admins. My e-mail address is available at the bottom of this and any other Adminnemooseus or Minnemooseus message/moosage.All considerations of possible new moderators are kept private, discussion of such being either in the PAF or by e-mail. If you are accepted to become a moderator/admin, then a public announcement will be made. If you are rejected, there will be no public announcement unless you choose to do such yourself.Adminnemooseus

Somewhere in the distant past (3 years ago?), probably somewhere in the Change in Moderation? topic (recommended reading, BTW), there was discussion of "is lax forum guideline enforcement for creationists actually an anti-creationist bias?". In other words, are we being unfair to the general creationist perspective if we alow certain creationists be behave like idiots, when we don't alow such of the evolution side?Such is where quality creationist moderators can be most useful. To moderate bad creationist behaviour without such being interpreted as anti-creationist bias.Adminnemooseus

I am trying to come up with my response to this, but it's (mostly) not going to be until at least tommorrow.The short version (pending later refinement and elaboration):1) I remind all that this is a topic about moderation procedures.2) As such, I would have preferred that Jar had posted his message as being from AdminJar.3) I do have a certain agreement with what Jar said, but disagree with how he said it. Also see my other messages upthread.Adminnemooseus

This goes back to the Jar statement: I was looking at this statement as pertaining specificly to the creationism/evolution debate. It was not pertaining to such debate. The specific issue has already been much discussed by others, and I have nothing to add.I did make the previous statement: The agreement I was thinking about is that relevant specificly to the creationism/evolution debate. I do think that many of the creationism side are indeed "handicapped and unable act differently" in that they have a major disconnection with the world of science. For a scientificly oriented creationism/evolution debate to happen, the moderation efforts must be tolerant in regards to to this situation.Adminnemooseus

Please give us links to those sites. I, and I strongly suspect the other admins, are interested in how creationism/evolution debates get moderated elsewhere.Adminnemooseus{Added by edit: I have just "bumped" the Links to other Evolution/Creation debate site topic, and added my list of forum sites there. - Minnemooseus}Edited by Adminnemooseus, : Changed ID.Edited by Minnemooseus, : See above.