DBF banning thread, part 2.

[Rhinestone]

OCCUPY MUMSNET continues......

Justine, that was a little topical joke, please don't ban me!

Right, have just read th eother thread and seen it is true.
Shall be bumping up some of her best threads if I can find them and then will go and hide permanently on the blogging section, and ignore the rest of the site.

MNHQ I can't believe you have banned her.
Ugh.

I don't honestly believe there's a 'party line' on any issues in Feminism.

What I do think there is, is a tendency for regulars to feel like a group united against the constant trolling. I know I do it myself: I'll disagree strongly with someone else's views, but when the trolls kick off, I will refer to 'us' and I will object to the posts about rape as a joke. I can see why that makes the section feel like a very tight-knit entity, but if the trolls were sorted out, and if it wasn't considered absolutely fine to make personal attacks on 'the feminists' as a group, I think we'd be less inclined to respond as a group.

I don't enjoy being shouted down by loud/arrogant posters, but the shouting down recently has come from people who simply wish to give a kicking to someone, so they come over on the feminism thread to do so.

haven't seen a bf/ff bust up for yonks... reckon it's mostly MN lore these days. have always wanted aibu ditched, i think it's had a bad effect on the whole site, but it's so many people's favourite sport.

agree with soupdragon.

We're all grown-ups (most of us). if we see nastiness and unpleasantness, we should call it when we see it. There are thousands and thousands of posts, no way MN can police them all to ensure "consistency." If lots of complaints are made about a partic person constantly breaking the rules, they act. They have to.

I think people are confusing agreeing with opinions with condoning the expression thereof.

it's not much of an open letter if you can't post it on here... just more yakking amongst pals, surely? (unless Justine is Val's FB friend?)

Blimey. I read quite a bit of the first thread before bed last night and am now at work so have come to the last pg of this one. So, sorry if this has already been explained/answered - are DBF and Valhalla the same person? If so, then she helped me a lot with some particularly dog phobic issues I have. I don't agree with her stance on things, but I do admire her consistency and passion.

Noone is disputing DBF views but they way she put them across was unnecessary.

Several other rescuers who are as involved in rescue as DBF just stayed away as there was no point in trying to post with DBF aggressive posting style. She is not the only one with the information although I doubt the others will come back.

She also accused a very well known lawyer in the dog rescue area as being "unknowledgeable and not a rescuer" and posted saying she was not who she was - without any evidence. The poster no longer posts and so the doghouse has lost a valuable source of information.

Why is it that DBF's post always end up about her and her style rather than the important point of dog welfare - I think she shots herself in the foot.

The recent post where she helped rescue a dog was actually done after MN had asked her to tone it down as her tone was much gentler and got excellent results - I think that speaks for itself.

But I bet she will be back - new name new ip address and off it all goes again

Narky yep, sure.
Aitch - you're prolly right. But I have to ask her first out of courtesy.
Avon - yep, same person.

I have a headache

Ephiny
Why was the OP in the wrong place? Why should she not post about her excitement that her dog is having puppies? Where on MN or on the Doghouse topic does it state that allowing your dog to have puppies is a BAD BAD thing to do?

your stance is based on a false premise. she wasn't banned for what she said. she was banned for repeatedly flouting the guidelines.

What is DBF's FB name?

DH should have been the right place to ask about whelping. There was one other contributor to the thread (IIRC) who got it more or less right - sort of 'oh dear.... here's some whelping advice'. You can combine constructive help with education - a lot of it is about starting from where the poster is at not the 'you should have thought of that before'. Thing is, people don't know what they are ignorant about till someone tells them the first time. And that first time should never involve a beating.

maryz, there are warnings at the top of all sorts of topics, not just AIBU.

I agree with LemonDifficult's post at 00:11 too.

Banning DBF will undoubtedly be a loss to mn. Her knowledge of rescue was invaluable on many threads and she has helped many mners and many dogs on here. It's a great shame that someone so experienced in a particular area of dog welfare cannot post on here any longer.

She is of course entirely to blame for the situation. Only 5 days ago on a Dog House thread she alluded to being under threat of being permanently banned and yet was unable to resist making personal insults on the recent TLES thread.

You post on mn you stick to the rules. If you are repeatedly warned about your posting style and fail to take heed then you have to face the consequences of that behaviour.

BF/FF section is fine these days.

People asking for advice are given the relevant advice, not lectured about what they should be doing or have done. The raging arguments get saved for raging argument threads (easy to spot). And even some of the threads that would always have descended into raging rows don't always now, as everyone has made a big effort to remember that being calm and friendly is far more effective than being rude. This is not true of the advice given to dog owners IMO.

I also think those saying DBF had great moments should bear in mind that there are plenty of other banned posters who also had great moments (I even remember having a decent chat with DaftPunk before she said my family should have been turned away at the border...) it doesn't mean they get to ignore the rules or repeated warnings.

You say rescue dog like they're a different species and not the result of people's 'excitement at (their) dog having puppies.'

They can give all those puppies to 'good homes' but what happens to the dog if they can't be arsed to put in the effort of training it or get sick of it for any number of reasons, the most common being that they haven't really thought through whether they should take the dog in the first place? It gets passed on to a friend, then a friend of a friend (by now having developed behavioural issues as a result of the stress) and eventually will end up at a rescue centre - if it's lucky a no kill one.

Or the puppy's owners get excited at the idea of their dog having puppies. And within a couple of years the original owner is not responsible for three puppies they found good homes for, but 10 dogs that are all ready to carry on breeding.

What was the OP meant to do, abort the puppies?

No. Obviously. It is usually suggested in such circumstances that the poster home the pups through a rescue centre that can carry out home checks and will guarantee a place for the dogs to come back to (and a second chance at a home) if the new owners decide they don't want them anymore.

Funnily enough the posters don't tend to want to give up the £££ (per pup for pedigrees) that they're being paid.

Mary - but people have been helped to rehome.
And I for one am quite happy to talk about getting a dog from a reputable breeder - its what I did - if I happen to see a thread where its relevant, and have never been beaten up by the 'orthodox' for doing so. Its not DBFs fault if people with differing views don't voice them enough.

"a tendency for regulars to feel like a group united against the constant trolling"

See the problem is with this, that you do come across as having a party line because you are determine as a whole that you are not going to let the troll shout you down. The agression has then the scope to increase and for the already intimidated this is more then enough to make them run and hide.

I agree with this statement "if the trolls were sorted out, and if it wasn't considered absolutely fine to make personal attacks on 'the feminists' as a group, I think we'd be less inclined to respond as a group. " but not even that happening would entice me to venture into the feminism topic or ask the simplest question that has been bugging me for a while and should really be answered by that section. In fact i don't think money could entice me to be brave enough. So my question goes unasked. However, solving the troll issue should be sorted out. Urgently.

Unfortunately the distinction between troll and emotional vampire is one where by the more obviously attacking and destructive are banned and other less obviously destructive are allowed to continue. Bit like dealing with verbal and physical bullies. The verbal bullies will always inflict more damage because it harder to prove. Hearsay.

And today is yet another day that I am not sat in MNtowers having to sort out this chaos and can step away from the computer knowing that whilst mn is a fabulous place, it is not the be all and end all. Life is more then that.

darkness - I do see that it's a problem. But I know I and others begged MNHQ to do something about trolls and repeated attacks, and they insist they can't do anything.

I could be wrong, but I don't think I'm a very shouty poster most of the time. I've never been warned by MNHQ (I anticipate ...). I spend a lot of time in that section answering questions, and it very often then turns out that the person asking isn't actually interested, they're trolling. Usually during the process the poster will express disbelief at how stupid/ignorant I am. When it turns out it's a genuine poster, it's brilliant. When it turns out to be a troll who then goes on to make ruder and ruder comments until he or she is deleted/banned/goes back to crow all over one of the MRA forums, I feel shit. Wouldn't you?

I don't want to feel as if we have to be united as a group. But personal attacks are banned unless they're in the plural, so we get a lot of personal insults about 'you feminists' or 'the posters on this thread', or whatever. If you get insulted as a group, you can't really respond any other way, can you?