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Helping teach cj how to be less abrasive in posts
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From: cj , 100 months, post #1

Following is a copy of some text that was viewed as a bit abrasive by some. I've removed the poster's name, as it's not relevant to this exercise.

Since, I'm trying to do better at addressing these minor (and well, every) concern, I'm open to suggestions for smoothing my posts.

I have a feeling that I probably should have dropped the first two declarations, and reworded / merged the second and last paragraph and just dropped the rest. But... well, that's what I ended up with.

Let me know what you think... how I should have / could have done better.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"Any more transformations in this series?"

Wow! Seriously? You're asking that question in a very active thread where the last post was only hours prior to yours, about a show that for most of us was just recently discovered?

Please, have a little patience... or better yet, BE AN ACTIVE PARTICIPANT in the community... Watch it yourself, and then YOU tell us what transformation content you find!

Name Removed I'm sorry that I'm ranting on your post. We are here to help one another. Your post just appears to come from the position of someone who wants all the reward without any of the work... impatient and a bit like a lazy leach. Perhaps your post was an error, or you were tired and just not paying attention. I don't know. I hope it that you're not lazy, or maybe just didn't pay attention to the fact that most of us are still actively going through the videos to find the TF's content.

But I still stand by the suggestion that you could help find the content and let the rest of us know about where to find it. Thanks.

From: cj , 100 months, post #2

Oh... and Thank you!

From: guest (barackobrahma) , 100 months, post #3

Im a little lost... are you ok?

From: guest , 100 months, post #4

I haven't had any problems here. I guess going by what you've posted, take longer to reply. Read what you're replying to a couple of times and take your time. Then after writing it, read back what you've written at least once, preferably twice.

Count to 10 before hitting "Post Message".

YMMV but I think you'll find you will have what you feel are more moderate answers if you do this.

Proviso: I'm going to go on the assumption this is the real cj, I have no idea if user names can be protected here or not or whether anyone can use them.

From: cj , 100 months, post #5

barackobrahma -- Yep, I'm okay. Thanks for asking.

guest (post 4) -- That actually does work. Most of the time, I do this. And that post was the third attempt. Guess I should have done it once more.

I've let the post sit in a text editor for an hour or two a few times... and there are several times that I decided my post was horrible, and that I'd be better off not posting.

Guess I just need to hone that a bit more.

Thanks for the suggestion, I'll be doing more of this for sure.

From: cj , 100 months, post #6

"more of this"

Meaning more of the waiting and re-reading before posting... not the self-improvement threads.

From: guest (barackobrahma) , 100 months, post #7

Hmmm... now I get it.

I think that it�s tough to understand others' feelings in a text-based environment. That's why early users adopted smiles... they can help! =]

And, it's an exercise... not everyone are lazy, trying to hurt you, and so on. Of course those exists... but you can't presume that you have found in the first or second message. Usually, that needs time to be observable. Have people in good faith... think that they are trying their best, and even doing that, communication between humans is subject to and inherently noise, limits of language and cultural background. A joke to a spanish guy can be a serious offense to a canadian, and so on. In an international forum like this, Im really amazed that this doesnt happen more often.

From: guest (Comeonman) , 100 months, post #8

To respond back to the other thread that responds Cj is only volunteer. Volunteer or not Cj is and should be held to higher standard, he and all other mods are representatives of this board and should be held to higher standard than Joe Schmo.

Cj,

And good place to start is lay off the all caps and bolded words, those come off abrasive and make things appear more "mean"

From: guest , 100 months, post #9

I have long thought that cj is pretty respectful and is doing a good job on this site. however, i do believe that the response this time came off as extremely sarcastic and rude. A more appropriate response imo would be "I'm sure some more will turn up soon and it would be helpful if you tried looking for some clips yourself!"
The caps and the bolded are very aggressive as well as the assumptions that the poster is "tired" or a "lazy leach". If it were me, I would have been very angry. Sometimes people are just excited so you don't have to go off on them -- just ignore it :)

From: guest (KJ) , 100 months, post #10

I get put out with many here who are apparently too lazy to look up anything for themselves, or take the time to read through the threads for their answer.

Keep up the great work cj

From: cj , 100 months, post #11

The Bolding has been mentioned to me before... but I still didn't really get that others read that as abrasive. I usually do the bolding to help a certain item stand out in a large field of text.

I will again keep an eye on the use of bolding, and cut-back on the all-caps too.

How do the Posting Guidelines read with their All-Caps and Bold-faced words... did I use them appropriately to properly convey their message, or is there some over-kill that needs to be addressed in the formatting?

Thank you for helping this old dog learn to a better poster.

And thanks, everyone, for your support.

From: guest , 100 months, post #12

I think a lot of people have this sense of immediate gratification/feedback when they spend too much time in a text environment so they assume they're "being present" or something when they just prod everyone every few hours b/c they don't understand that people will post to a forum like this when they find something, but I think they don't realize they come off as annoying in many ways so I can understand the frustration of having to school someone on something for the umpteenth time.

cj provided some good guidelines for when it's okay to bump and when it's not and about being patient for new posts. I'd probably eventually rant when people don't check themselves.

If you're worried about people's responses (and I personally think some are a little too thin skinned but barak's right about emoticons), I'd just keep it to a curt quote and link. If that's too rude for the oversensitive, well, they need to learn that most mods on most forums (I've seen on the internet, anyway) tend to be very direct and to-the-point

My humble 2 cents.

From: Holly Dunn , 100 months, post #13

Wow. CJ, It seems like you are nice to everyone.

You go out of your way almost every day to participate in nearly every thread.

From what I have observed going on, on this site, in my opinion, is that the spammers and attackers are criticizing you and baiting the entire forum.

I think most, if not all, of the dedicated forum participants value your efforts, posts, and deletions.

You have opened yourself up for public criticism many times, so if dedicated users think you could use some improvement, they could easily tell you and put their name on it.

Anyway, I think these anonymous posts are an effort to run you off just so people can post OT mean and hateful stuff. My observations are that the majority of the trusted users (even those who post anonymously) value the fact that you comment so much in a positive way and make an effort to keep this board on topic.

From: Holly Dunn , 100 months, post #14

Regarding the actual question...CJ... maybe your rant was a little bit out of hand. But I have wanted to do the same, and there are so many posts like that.

Your points are valid. There are so many posts that just mention something without any mention to what kind of TF it is. It makes people who come her.. for an efficient way to search for transformations... to waste a lot of time.

Anyone who reminds people of the rules is a jerk. But without rules, this is an insult and spam forum.

Be who you are in the name of the cause you believe in.

From: cj , 100 months, post #15

Thanks guest. I tend to agree with your observations, and thanks for the kind words. I've been thinking a bit that I just talk too much, myself. Most of the time now, when I pause before posting, I'll go back and chop out paragraphs before submitting. Trying to be more brief and to the point when modding. Good to see that I'm not alone in that idea.

Holly, thanks for noticing, and for the compliments. Perhaps there are some trying to run me off... but they're likely to lose interest long before I do. :-)

I will always strive to be myself... but that doesn't mean that I shouldn't seek to improve who I am. :-)

From: guest (Franklin) , 100 months, post #16

Cj, I have voiced some frustration in the past about snide comments on people who post new threads when an old one exists. You said at the time you would work on it and I think you have. I also think you have a pretty good gut feeling about what you should and should not post already, based on ehat you've said in this thread.

Two pieces of advice:

1) You already said you do it... when you know you're posting based on emotional reactivity instead of logic - just let it sit for a few hours. A lot of the time, like in the quoted post, you tend to assume you know the other persons motives. Often when someone does something annoying, we assume its because of a character flaw. In this case you assume the person posted like they did becsuse they are a lazy leach. There could be a lot more to the story, like maybe this is their first day on the internet! Maybe they just misread something in the thread, etc. When you assume you already know their motives and blame it on a flaw in their personality, like that they're lazy or entitled, you dehumanize them and therefore justify your rudeness and snide posts in response. This works to make you feel like the bigger person and like you have a right to be rude, but... In the end, this eye for an eye mentality will only contribute more negativity to the community as a whole - as seen in multiple complaint posts by people whose feelings you have hurt. Yes, you can just call these people "trolls," but again that is dehumanizing and doesn't leave you any room to accept your portion of the responsibility.But it does look like you have accepted some responsibility though and are looking to use this as a chance for personal growth. No one can ask for or do more than that.

Secondly I will tell a story. Once I was in a theater watching an R-rated film. Halfway through a baby started loudly crying and the parents didn't seem concerned at all. There were some whispers and it was obvious that everyone was rightfully upset with the parents. Eventually a man decided to voice the displeasure everyone was feeling. "Shut that baby the f--- up or get the f--- out! I will spank your g--d--- child myself if I have to!"

Suddenly the whispers changed. We were no longer upset with the parents, but with the shouting guy who had the gall to threaten a child. Yes, he voiced what everyone was thinking, but by saying it he actually turned himself into the bad guy.

You're a mod here. If an usher had walked into the theater and calmly asked the parents to leave, everyone would have been happy. But if it had been an usher who had the bilent outburst, it would have been even worse. With power comes responsibility. People don't want to see someone with power losing control in that way because they don't know what they might do to set you off. When you react to someone's 10 word post with a three paragraph rant, you're turning yourself into the bad guy and going from the high ground to the low.

Keep up the journey and remember that we don't ever stop growing, friend!

From: cj , 100 months, post #17

Thanks Franklin. That was a great post, with a perfect story to boot.

I'm still making assumptions... I'm wondering if I do that more now than I used to. Either way, I'll continue working on that aspect when reading posts... especially so when I write posts.

I have to try to remember that even when I'm not moderating, that I'm still seen as a representative of this site. That's something that I don't often consider unless I am moderating.

With any luck, my own growth will continue in a positive direction. Thanks again Franklin.

From: Alias , 100 months, post #18

You could do what I often do, open notepad and write a scathing, vicious rant tearing someone's post to shreds, and then close it without saving. It helps release that emotional outburst by putting it down, but there isn't that chance of sending it without calming down first.

I recommend Notepad because I've done it in the text box here a few times and hit 'Post' instead of 'Cancel' more than once. D:

From: cj , 100 months, post #19

Good advice (and warning) Alias, thanks.

From: barackobrahma , 100 months, post #20

CJ, you are doing a good work, besides all that... and I can just concur with what others said here, that we are grateful for having you doing your un-paid job, to keep our life better... we dont wanna found unrelated transformation stuff here, or replicas of old posts when we came here. We wanna see new content about transformation.

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