The staff think it is worth having a gentle reminder about a few things concerning "personal attacks" since we've had several reports concerning them recently. Here goes:
1) Personal attacks aren't against the rules.
2) No seriously, they aren't.
3) Go check: https://atheistforums.org/rules.php
4) See? Told you.
Please don't report posts that you think are "personal attacks", because even if they are, we don't care. It also wastes the staff's time by making us all read the report, and then have a discussion about the report which basically goes like this:
"Yeah, this isn't against the rules. No action."
"Why do people keep reporting posts like these?"
"I dunno. Do you think we should tell them again?"
"Yeah. Tiberius, get off your ass and make an announcement thread."
So there you go. Please stop reporting "personal attacks".
WAIT!!!
Ok, it's not that simple. Personal attacks aren't against the general rules, but they are against the rules in the Introductions forum. You can report personal attacks there, because we don't want new members being insulted the moment they arrive. Welcomes should be friendly!
Oh yeah, and whilst personal attacks aren't against the general rules, "flaming" is, but flaming has to occur over a series of posts that are entirely or mostly comprised of insulting language directed at a member. Most personal attacks that people report don't qualify as flaming either.
The staff do have a lot of reports to go through though, and it's always beneficial if the reports we have to deal with are about rule violations that actually exist, as opposed to someone just getting offended and using the report button as a way to silently retaliate. In fact, that kind of behavior is actually against the rules ("Report System Abuse") because it becomes a hassle to deal with. We don't want to discourage people from reporting posts, but at the same time we can't just let members abuse the report feature.
If you are going to report a post, please do the staff a favor and make sure it's actually against the rules before reporting it.
Thanks!
1) Personal attacks aren't against the rules.
2) No seriously, they aren't.
3) Go check: https://atheistforums.org/rules.php
4) See? Told you.
Please don't report posts that you think are "personal attacks", because even if they are, we don't care. It also wastes the staff's time by making us all read the report, and then have a discussion about the report which basically goes like this:
"Yeah, this isn't against the rules. No action."
"Why do people keep reporting posts like these?"
"I dunno. Do you think we should tell them again?"
"Yeah. Tiberius, get off your ass and make an announcement thread."
So there you go. Please stop reporting "personal attacks".
WAIT!!!
Ok, it's not that simple. Personal attacks aren't against the general rules, but they are against the rules in the Introductions forum. You can report personal attacks there, because we don't want new members being insulted the moment they arrive. Welcomes should be friendly!
Oh yeah, and whilst personal attacks aren't against the general rules, "flaming" is, but flaming has to occur over a series of posts that are entirely or mostly comprised of insulting language directed at a member. Most personal attacks that people report don't qualify as flaming either.
The staff do have a lot of reports to go through though, and it's always beneficial if the reports we have to deal with are about rule violations that actually exist, as opposed to someone just getting offended and using the report button as a way to silently retaliate. In fact, that kind of behavior is actually against the rules ("Report System Abuse") because it becomes a hassle to deal with. We don't want to discourage people from reporting posts, but at the same time we can't just let members abuse the report feature.
If you are going to report a post, please do the staff a favor and make sure it's actually against the rules before reporting it.
Thanks!
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