I had some disagreements with you all in that BET fashion thread (no biggie -- I can see both sides), but I'm a little miffed that stars appear to be lost because of it...
@lastsinglestanding: Damn, to whom does one beg and plead? I'm pissed, I want mine back, and I want all the other fabulous people who were unstarred to get theirs back too.
@14Kgold was unstarred for disagreeing!: To be clear: You guys were destarred for being assholes who wouldn't let up. Say your piece politely and move on. That didn't happen.
@Jessica: We weren't being assholes for addressing the issue. The issue was real, or else 12 or so starred (some of the legendary) commentors wouldn't have been demoted. We were also being polite, no one was calling anyone else names--but just because you disagree doesn't mean that we have to drop a conversation we think is important. Your snarky comment about this not being a democracy is far more rude than anything on the race-oriented threads.
@Jenna: It does, and I'm quite in agreement with it; I promoted many comments in that post because I thought they were good and important, and many of them said what I would have said but much more eloquently. I certainly don't promote more than most people, and save it for things I think are very worthy. If you disagree as to what's worthy, that's your perogative, but it remains a disagreement about quality, not quantity.
@Jessica: Yup. People were being ridiculous and were thread jacking, were refusing to let it go, and were frankly coming across as whiny. Pick your fights, guys. This really wasn't that big a deal. Who cares if Tavi doesn't know who Travis Barker is. Hell, I wish I didn't know who Travis Barker was. Also, not knowing what the BET is is NOT a race issue. At all. People are determined to be oversensitive and pick fights.
@BabyJane: It's the latter, okay, but very targeted, and only on particular posts. Of the people unstarred over today's kerfuffle, how many are minority?
@14Kgold was unstarred for disagreeing!: Honestly, I'm not even going to get in to that aspect of the debate. I didn't take away anyone's star on that thread, so I can't speak for whomever did. I will simply say that we have been asked to more closely moderate everything from thread jacking to personal attacks to lack of capitalization in a commentor's post. In other words, we have been asked to pay more attention to the rules and regulations.
@14Kgold was unstarred for disagreeing!: You promoted at least a dozen comments that were variously repetitive, thread-jacking, and which betrayed little knowledge on the part of the commenter of basic grammar and spelling. Several were all three. Most, you didn't even bother replying to--you just promoted, and then promoted some more. You gave us more than sufficient grounds for rescinding your starred status. As it happens, I didn't de-star you, and I don't think anyone was wrong to criticise Tavi's gaffe. But at a certain point you, like an unfortunately high number of other commenters on that post, lost any sense of perspective and any sense of what reasonable criticism means. Perhaps like Tavi, you should interpret this as an opportunity to live and learn.
@Liniang: What I said. You honestly don't understand, or you're looking for debate? My response is to comments like this:
It smacks of willful ignorance and a thinking person cannot ignore the racial element because of the way writers dismiss major events that have a majority people of color audience. Comments like this aren't made in a vacuum.
(introverted_innovator, for reference's sake)
What absolute nonsense. She doesn't know what the BET are. I didn't. There are likely thousands upon thousands of people that still don't. It's not a race issue. It's a "I am not aware of that one particular award ceremony" issue.
@Jessica: I made one primary comment about the casually racist implications of three specific sentences in Tavi's post. And I even clarified that I was blaming Tavi's hometown environment (which I grew up next door to) more than her.
My other comments were about Travis Barker's daughter's shoes and the fact that the BET awards have been terrible for years.
How is that "not letting up"?
I mean, you do realize that you just demoted an disproportionate number of commenters who are women of color for objecting to racially offensive content on the blog you run? That sets a rather pointed precedent for your regime as EIC.
@MizJenkins: And perhaps one about which someone at Gawker Media, the umbrella organization, might be concerned about -- it is, after all, a national organization with a reputation to protect, and I'm sure they wouldn't want national print media to get hold of something so distasteful -- and might want to be alerted ...?
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Apologies for this not being a democracy.
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what?
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It smacks of willful ignorance and a thinking person cannot ignore the racial element because of the way writers dismiss major events that have a majority people of color audience. Comments like this aren't made in a vacuum.
(introverted_innovator, for reference's sake)
What absolute nonsense. She doesn't know what the BET are. I didn't. There are likely thousands upon thousands of people that still don't. It's not a race issue. It's a "I am not aware of that one particular award ceremony" issue.
#groupthink (Edit comment)
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My other comments were about Travis Barker's daughter's shoes and the fact that the BET awards have been terrible for years.
How is that "not letting up"?
I mean, you do realize that you just demoted an disproportionate number of commenters who are women of color for objecting to racially offensive content on the blog you run? That sets a rather pointed precedent for your regime as EIC.
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Just, you know, wondering.
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But you're right, it's not a democracy, it's a CHEEROCRACY!
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Is it seriously an offense to promote people without replying? I thought Jez wanted to minimize the "THIS!" and "WORD!" replies to comments?
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