That all said- this whole conversation just feels weird. Having a “talk it out” post is strange when it is member-member and not member-mod. Most of us are adults and I think we can self moderate. Ash or myself haven’t crossed any line or broken any rule, correct? So why the call-out? Have we been reported by other members or something?
Sorry for the call-out - this was trying a different tactic with sorting out issues. Obviously, you had something to say about it, but you also can self-moderate. So we can move on from that now. I also said that in the heat of the moment with being tired and upset that this forum took a turn the past 48 hours so...
Ash actually has continually reported Skip - sometimes for ridiculous reasons - which is why I tagged him. As stated, I think the fact that people like Fatality, Mike, and Epcyclo lasted a while shows I don't play favorites. I don't know why he feels the way he does - or thought I was going to ban him for a difference of opinion but whatever.......
I know Skip. I've hung out with him while enjoying some drinks - so I know he's not this dastardly contrarian that some people claim he is. So when people report him for "disagreeing" and posters think he's trying to troll, I know that's not his intention and that some are looking too much into it.
Unrelated now and to paint a clear picture -
This started all because we tried to prevent a dogpiling. Whether it was Spatula's intention or not, we didn't want the thread to devolve into that. It's been 3 years since this ride was announced. We all knew this ride was gonna be bad due to Hollywood's version, but because of different factors - the convo was "How bad is this going to be?". For 3 years - you've had myself, mod teams, and insiders say things along the lines of "this is going to be rough", "Universal knows they may take a hit on this", "This is the last of screens/3D rides" etc etc.... So for Tuesday, we felt posting negative Twitter reviews over and over was not ideal for the discussion. Our request wasn't that crazy. Granted Spatula clarified it was due to link limits - we still stood by our decision and tried to let the discussion continue. However, instead of moving on - we had a group of users push back as if we were trying to stifle the negativity.
We keep saying this over and over that there's going to be two sides to every discussion. Using Spatula again, he stated "Guess what!? Lots of people thought the same thing. Guess what? Check out my post to like ratio." as I was somehow crazy and isolated in my line of thinking. The thing is... I wasn't, as there was also a group of users who didn't think the same thing. As Andy said, there's oil and vinegar - and in this case, where there were people who thought we were hard for stopping the Twitter postings, there were people that thanked us for stopping it.
This is nothing new, though.
I remember a big one last year or so was that people don't like the "insider riddles". That's fine. You don't have to. But some people do - and posting riddles isn't breaking rules. I feel like some users want this board to align with a lot of their own personal preferences, creating this perfect theme park bubble. It's a natural thing to want, as people prefer to be in their comfort zones. While this board is public and free for you, it is not a democracy. You're going to have to make some concessions. When the mod team steps in, it's not because we're trying to jerks to push our own agendas, it's because we've seen this play out before. Sometimes, it doesn't go to plan - like now - but the goal is to make sure we facilitate healthy discussions.