I suppose I should cut Kos some slack. Normally, I’d say that it almost looks like he’s working really hard at not getting it. But having had the experience of being a new dad, I know having a newborn in the house means everything else takes a lower priority, and sometimes that includes things like sleeping, showering, eating, etc. So I’m tempted to excuse this slapdash follow-up to his original slapdash post in response to the death/rape threats against Kathy Sierra.
I don’t disagree with anything Lindsey wrote. I disagreed with using a bloggers threats as an excuse to foist upon us all a “Blogger Code of Conduct”.
That’s what I was saying. 1) There are assholes that will 2) email stupid shit to any public figure (which includes bloggers, but 3) that won’t be stopped by any blogger code of conduct.
You see, stupid asshole psycho threatening emailers don’t care about codes of conduct. That’s all.
Glad to know that he doesn’t disagree with what Lindsey said. But there’s a few points being missed here, and I would miss them too if I were blogging in between diaper changes, late night feedings, and suffering sleep deprivation.
Basically, the recommendations put forth aren’t for the “stupid assholes” leaving rape threats and death threats in comments — not private emails, but public comments on blogs. They’re for the stupid assholes who allow those comments to remain on their blogs.
First, the “code of conduct” he refers to isn’t being “foisted” on anyone. It’s entirely voluntary. At last count, there are over 70 million blogs out there. There’s little chance of anything being successfully “foisted” on anyone, let alone being enforced. (By what authority?) Kos, and any other blogger can simply ignore it. (And Kos might have done well to do so in the first place.)
Second, nobody’s said that “stupid assholes” are going to stop making threats because of a code of conduct.
Assholes tend not to follow any code of conduct, and deeply resent any suggestion or expectation that they should. They tend to reject any notion responsibility to or for anyone but themselves.
The recommended code of conduct here doesn’t apply to the assholes making the threats. It applies to those of us who (a) operate blogs and (b) chose to follow the suggested guidelines. Like the first one:
Take responsibility not just for your own words, but for the comments you allow on your blog.
Yes, you own your own words. But you also own the tone that you allow on any blog or forum you control. Part of “owning your own words” is owning the effects of your behavior and the editorial voice you foster. And when things go awry, acknowledge it. It would have been far better for Chris to have deleted the post, and said explicitly on the blog that it was unacceptable, than to have silently shut down the blog and removed all entries and comments without explanation.There’s an attitude among many bloggers that deleting inflammatory comments is censorship. I think that needs to change. I’m not suggesting that every blog will want to delete such comments, but I am suggesting that blogs that do want to keep the level of dialog at a higher level not be censured for doing so.
This whole thing started with comments posted about Kathy on someone else’s blog.
The threats against Kathy, the picture of her with a noose around her neck, appeared on someone else’s site, someone who defended his decision not to remove those comments, instead putting the responsibility on the commenters, and eventually removing the sites altogether rather than remove the comments.
(Actually, Kathy has said that the comments came from participants in the sites where they were posted; people who actually had author privileges on the blog, not random commenters, but this applies all the same.)
In all fairness, I can understand why this might be cause for concern for a blogger of Kos’ status. After all, how many comments does his site get on any given day, counting front page posts and member diaries? Far too many for Kos to keep up with, and probably too many even for his “trusted users” or others with administrative capabilities to keep up with. The idea of taking responsibility for comments on a blog that size, given the possibility that some like the ones Kathy received might escape notice and actually result in someone getting hurt or killed would be enough to keep anyone up at night.
This may be a weakness of bigger, highly trafficked blogs. I keep going back to Clay Shirky’s scenario of the top-tier blogger who has more comments than she can monitor or respond to. Further down the Long Tail, where bloggers have less traffic and more time to read their comments and interact with readers, this is a somewhat less daunting task. For example, I don’t have much trouble keeping up with my comments on a daily basis, and I’m somewhere around the base of middle of the Long Tail.
But, like it or not, those of us who blog probably do have some degree of responsibility for the comments we alllow to be posted and to remain on our sites. At least one blogger has been sued for comments made on his blog. That was over alleged defamatory comments and inaccurate information. The lawsuit was later thrown out, but it’s not hard to imagine a victims family or estate bringing a lawsuit against a blogger who allowed comments containing death threats to remain on his or her blog.
Label your tolerance level for abusive comments.
Explicit labeling of “danger zones” is probably not going to take off (I can’t imagine sites labeling themselves “flaming encouraged”), but the idea of sites posting their code of conduct might gain some traction given some easily deployed badges pointing to a common set of guidelines, as Kaylea suggested. But even absent such a mechanism, self-identifying your level of tolerance, as blogher does, seems to me like a really good idea. We’re going to kick around some design ideas here at O’Reilly, and may have something to present in the next week or two.
In the meantime, The BlogHer Community Guidelines are a good place to start.
Deploying moderation mechanisms like slashdot’s might also help. I know that there are lots of nasty comments posted on slashdot, but I never see them, because they are below my threshold of visibility. I’d love to see the major blogging platforms offer comment rating systems that would allow automatic moderating down of nasty comments. (Of course, many blogs don’t have enough comment volume for this to work, but there are enough sites with large commenter communities where this could be a big help.)
In my work, I regularly advise people to have a comment policy posted prominently on their blogs at the very least, usually right above the comments form, stating what kinds of comments will not be tolerated, as well as the intention of the site owner to remove any comments that do not abide by the comment policy. (I don’t have one for this blog, but perhaps I should devise one.)
And, like I’ve already said, deleting comments from your own blog not censorship or a violation of free speech.
I don’t know what standard of integrity includes allowing people to post death threats against other people in a forum you own, any more than I can imagine leaving comments on my blog containing the kinds of threats (throat slitting, etc.) and images that were directed at Kathy Sierra. Free speech? Deleting comments is no violation of free speech. First, no one has a “right” to threaten anyone. Second, no one has “right” to do so on my blog or anyone else’s. If I delete their comments, they can start their own blogs in about five minutes. They can take it to another forum where that’s tolerated. Obviously, those forums exist.
And let’s remember that Kathy’s address and other contact information was also posted. Couple that with the threatening comments, and it’s an invitation to more intense harassment, if not to carry out earlier threats. And anyone who read those public comments could choose to carry out those threats because (a) someone posted Kathy’s address in a comment and (b) someone knew of those comments and allowed them to remain posted for all to see. Again, if we can tolerate this then we lose any moral ground to complain when someone like Michelle Malkin or Stop the ACLU posts someone’s address for the thinly veiled purpose of encouraging harassment and violence. We also lose any right to dismiss as disingenuous their claims of not “condoning” the inevitable death threats that result from their actions.
I’ve removed comments from my blog in which people have posted their own contact information: email addresses, home addresses, phone numbers, etc. Granted, there’s less of a case to be made for protecting people from themselves, if they don’t know the dangers of posting their personal information online already, but I’d rather not end up feeling responsible for the consequences. Is it really too much to expect bloggers to remove comments in which people reveal someone else’s private information?
Consider eliminating anonymous comments.
When people are anonymous, they will often let themselves say or do things that they would never do when they are identified. There are important contexts in which anonymity is important, for example, for political speech in repressive regimes. But in most contexts, accountability via identity changes how people behave. Requiring a valid email address for comments won’t prevent people who want to hide their identity from doing so, but it’s one more indication that accountability is valued.
Again, in my work, I’ve advised people to consider eliminating anonymous comments as a means of establishing some accountability; that is, making people more responsible for what they say. At a minimum, that means requiring a name and email address. Of course, people can simply use bogus names and email addresses, but it sends a message about accountability. That’s something I do on this blog.
The next level would be requiring users to register before they can leave comments, and even confirming their registration (and the validity of their email addresses, etc.) before they’re allowed to leave comments. This can obviously create something of a barrier to participation, but sometimes it’s necessary.
Earlier I referenced the rather romantic notion of the blogosphere as a kind of Hobbesian “state of nature.”
The “natural condition of mankind” is what would exist if there were no government, no civilization, no laws, and no common power to restrain human nature. The state of nature is a “war of all against all,” in which human beings constantly seek to destroy each other in an incessant pursuit for power. Life in the state of nature is “nasty, brutish and short.”
Sure, some people think that’s the way it should be. But the other side of the coin is that when we start blogs or comment on blogs we are to some degree joining a community. In doing so, it’s arguable that we enter into a kind of social contract.
The agreement with which a person enters into civil society. The contract essentially binds people into a community that exists for mutual preservation. In entering into civil society, people sacrifice the physical freedom of being able to do whatever they please, but they gain the civil freedom of being able to think and act rationally and morally. Rousseau believes that only by entering into the social contract can we become fully human.
In other words, in a community people assume a certain degree of responsibility to and for one another. Doing so, as with the suggested blogger “code of conduct,” is entirely voluntary, and is a matter of whether you value the benefits of doing so above the consequences of not doing so.
Or not. Nastiness and brutishness may what some people prefer. But that doesn’t mean that the rest of us have to accept it.
Glad you posted this here. I had listed your diary as an Update to an earlier post about Kos’ response, but it’s good to see it here at BT too.
And people, a small plug for The Republic of T, Terrance’s blog. Go read all his stuff over there. You won’t be disappointed.
Thanks. Reading Kos’ response, my first reaction was “What is he talking about?” Emails?
Again, it could be a combination of being busy with a new baby and just not having read much about the whole affair. But for some reason he’s not saying that.
I can’t speak directly to the issue of Kos and how he views threatening speech in blog comments, but I’d like to describe how I view this sort of thing, and how I deal with it.
I set up a small group site recently for fellow alumni of a very progressive, alternative school we attended back in the ’60s and ’70s. It is a members only site so there are no “drive by” attack messages of the sort that happened to Kathy Sierra or which seem to occur with alarming regularity across a wide spectrum of blogs. But a big part of the reason I set up this alumni group site was because previously there had been another group site, also members only, where there were people actually attacking fellow alumni for bringing up unpleasant subject matter.
You see, at this school we all went to, Summerlane School in upstate NY and later Green Valley School in Florida, the fellow who ran the place, the head honcho, Reverend George von Hilsheimer, was a violent sexual predator, a serial rapist and a pedophile who raped and brutalized countless underage female students, as well as some staff women as well. And when it turned out that on this previously existing group website this creature was still actively verbally attacking and attempting to intimidate and discredit his own previous victims, myself and others were astonished to find that he had defenders who joined in his scurrilous attacks, not precisely along the lines of the attacks described against Ms Sierra, but nevertheless ugly, vicious and ignorance/denial based attacks, as though these people had so much of their own identity invested in their reverence for this abusive figure that they perceived challenges to him as challenges to their own moral and ethical integrity. And of course because von Hilsheimer himself was then and remains now unrepentant for his crimes, his loyal supporters are likewise intransigent in their ability to be civil toward those who accuse their “hero” of malfeasance.
So I started a new group site, and I made promises to members that no comments would be allowed that were threatening in nature or that attempted to discredit or demean people speaking of their experiences as targets of abuse. Interestingly none of the aforementioned “blame the victims” crowd have sought to join our new site, and I intend to keep it that way.
Now I’m an almost fanatical enthusiast for free speech no matter how ugly, but my idea is that while people are free to be as ugly and hateful as they choose to be that the rest of us are free and fully justified in refusing to provide them with a platform to spout their crap. So whether it’s cartoon geeks like Imus or Coulter or Limbaugh, Malkin and that ilk, or whether it’s cowardly ignorati sociopaths commenting on blogs, I simply will not host such rhetoric. And I’m all for shaming blog hosts who refuse to remove such postings from the comment sections on their own blogs.
If BooMan allowed such vicious drivel on this site, I’d not participate here at all.
As for expecting apologies from folks who engage in such behavior, or thinking bloggers who host such comments owe us, (or owe the people attacked by such comments), apologies, well that’s another story. If someone like Kos has an epiphany and wants to apologize for cavalier and insensitive remarks, great. But does he owe anyone such an apology? I don’t see it that way.
And for those who may be defending Kos’ view on this, I suggest it’s likely that at least some of them might have the same problem so of my former schoolmates might have; they have so much invested in their looking up to this man, they’ve sort of conflated their own identity with that of the “great man”, so to speak, that they are simply not able to accept the simple idea that maybe there is validity to at least some of the criticism.
I was a student at Green Valley School in Orange City, Florida and Summerlane in North Branch, N.Y. I don’t know much about the initial Kathy Sierra story, but I do know about the Reverend George von Hilsheimer because he raped me in 1969. I know at least 7 other girls, now women, who were also raped by him. Sometimes repeatedly over a span of years. The Reverend wasn’t alone in his use of underage girls…there was also rape and abuse by other staff.
I don’t mean to hijack this diary for myself…. I’m a reader not a writer, but when I saw the Reverend’s name in your post..I couldn’t hold back. He is unrepentant and attempts to discredit his victims who speak up.
Hey someoneelse. This is the second time I’ve posted something here at Booman Tribune that has elicited response from someone from my old alma maters Summerlane School and Green Valley School. The first was back in June of last year, and that connection resulted in my reuniting with countless old friends I’d not been in touch with in over 30 years.
You’re right of course about other staff people at Green Valley besides George von Hilsheimer being active sexual predators targeting underage, troubled students. Green Valley was probably the only school in the US in the late 1960s where the “Academic Dean”, (a hollow title since there was in fact no real academic program), one Ronald E. Nowicki, was openly cohabitating and having sex with his 16 year old, “troubled youth”, student girlfriend. And of course there were also a bevy of shrinks and probation officers from the Dade County Juvenile authority who regularly visited the school and forced themselves upon some of the very girls they themselves had sent to Green Valley in the first place.
So not only was von Hilsheimer a pedophile, he was also a pimp for his friends and associates, permitting these Dade County officials to prey upon the girls placed in his care without restraint, as well as staging orgies where he invited selected friends to avail themselves of sex with several of us favored students. Having been involved in these fleshpiles myself as a student, I am even now embarrassed to say that it took me quite a few years afterward to realize how ugly and predatory all this was to so many students duped into participating or otherwise physically forced by rape.
I don’t know for sure who you are “someoneelse”, but we have a group website now, members only. The link is here Maybe you are already a member but if not please feel free to apply to join us. We require you provide your real name to us, and we maintain a site free of intrusion by those who would continue to attack the victims.
I was also a student at Green Valley and I learned recently of all the crimes that were committed by George Von Hilsheimer. I can’t believe the statute of limitations in Florida can keep that child abuser out of prison. And I can’t believe how he is allowed to pontificate among psychologists without challenge to his criminal past and gross professional incompetence.
Yes greenlover. It is astonishing that in Florida, (indeed in most states I think), even if you’re a member of the clergy as the Reverend von Hilsheimer is, unless your rape victims were under 13 years of age, the statue of limitations runs out on you after a certain amount of years and you face no legal jeopardy.
I know personally of at least 5 women he forcibly raped when they were children between 1963-65 in New York state,, (one of them just 14 years old), and my understanding is that the statute of limitations on clergy in that state never runs out.
I don’t know who you are greenlover, but in case you aren’t aware, von Hilsheimer’s license to practice psychology was revoked by the state of Florida in the late 1990s. (Link here and here).
Greenlover, if you’re not already a member, we have a group website, members only, where we’ve been building a great little community of alumni. Please join us. The site is here.
I guess the original diary has been hijacked already, so I’ll add that he likes to call himself Dr. Von now. He may have lost his license to practice psychology, but not his nerve. He must think he is impervious to the law, as he continues to tout himself as an expert on behavior, diet, allergies and even dogs.
I just don’t get it…
as I commented in Kos’ post:
I’ll add that this is a self-selective process: people read and utilize sites that fill their needs. If someone wants to run or comment on a site that doesn’t follow common decency and wrap themselves in the flag of free-speech anonymity, they’re going to.
Whether or not any code of coduct or ethics exists.
I don’t imagine that there are many website/blog operators or commentors who are lacking in the knowledge – either common sense or technical expertise – of how to utilize the internet in an ‘ethical’ manner. They either choose to do so or the choose not to.
Mommas, don’t let your babies grow up to be bloggers.
Phoodle is a word guessing game for people who like to eat. The goal is to find a five-letter word that has something to do with food in six tries or less. The game, which is about food, was based on Wordle, which is a popular online word game. The game can be played online for free. In the game, there is a daily task that can only be done once a day.