board77

Just so people don't think I'm overreacting: there are two reasons why a false invocation of such a power makes someone a pariah, in my view. Not only does it slander the accused, of course, but it makes the system less trustworthy for HONEST accusations of RL transgressions. In other words, it harms an innocent person immediately, and many others down the line.

We would have to amend Article 5 Paragraph 9. At the very least, this should be added to the immediate ban offenses, with a suggestion that the term of the ban upon review be 10 years or more (certainly life in Web terms).

Ax and Cerin, I wouldn't be opposed to specifically stating that such conduct is grounds for an immediate ban, but I do think that an argument could be made that such a situation would be covered by the provisions in articles 3 and 5 that specify that a person can be banned if they engage in "Threats of real life violence or other criminal acts against members." But I agree it would be better to spell this out specifically.

Another issue that I wanted to comment on is the question of temporarily suspending access to ToE until this issue is resolved. I wanted to make it clear that there IS support in the Charter for doing this, but the authority is vested in the Rangers to do this, not in this committee (though arguable this committee could be said to have the power to review such action. Article 3, ¶5: Special and Emergency powers of Rangers includes the following statement (which I can take credit for suggesting now that I see it):

Quote:

Extraordinary Powers of Rangers
Recognizing that unforeseen events may occur which require a quick response, Board77 Rangers are expected to use their best judgment in emergencies, and to take whatever action they believe necessary to protect the board. An emergency would be an event which threatened real and immediate harm, but which is not otherwise addressed by this charter. In such an event, the Ranger(s) in question would be expected to explain the circumstances and consult with the board membership as soon as possible. Such measures are temporary by their nature and subject to review by the standing Committee for Charter Amendments.

I will be here in a bit to comment, however, our internet is going to be down for a bit today - we've got the cable people coming to fix our cable cause it keeps messing up, and our internet comes through our cable.

Just wanted you guys to know that I am still making an effort on this, just that I will be unavailable for a few hours.

Even I would, at this point, support the Rangers doing exactly that.

Voronwe wrote:

Ax and Cerin, I wouldn't be opposed to specifically stating that such conduct is grounds for an immediate ban

Just to be clear, I believe Ax and I were saying that if it were later found that there had been a false accusation of RL harmful conduct that kept someone out of ToE, the person who had made the false accusation would be subject to a permanent ban.

Is that what you understood? The article you cited doesn't seem to me to apply to what Ax referred to as such 'perjury'.

In other words, we weren't referring to banning the person accused of the RL harmful conduct. That wouldn't be a matter that would fall under the purview of the board if it happened elsewhere.

I apologize if I have misunderstood you.


Thank you for that clarification on the Rangers extraordinary powers as they apply to this situation. That is indeed an excellent provision, as we see now. It is nice to know we are on firm footing here.

Thanks for checking in, Estel, and letting us know!

Cerin, sorry to be unclear. I did understand that you and Ax were talking about banning someone for intentionally lying about another member engaging in harmful real life activities. What I meant in my unusually terse and ambiguous comments is that a argument could be made that such a false accusation could be considered a form of a threat of violence against the other member. But I agree that it would be better to state specifically that such a false accusation would be grounds for immediate banning.

Thank you, Voronwe.

While we wait for the final refinements of the preliminary ballot, can we get working on the other parts of the Charter that will need amending?


There's this, which will have to be deleted, I think:

The following provision from Article 2, section A, para 1 (Members Rights and Responsibilities):
(You have the right) to post in our Thiking ofEngland forum (a forum restricted to those who are 18 years of age or older) once you have met the eligibility requirements.


Ax, there's that business we were talking about earlier about critical communications to Rangers. Is that something we're going to be able to do in time for this amendment. I don't have a clue, so is that something you could work on and let me know what 'email the Admin. acct.' needs to be changed to throughout?


And then there's this, pertinent to what we were just talking about with the false accusation:

We would have to amend Article 5 Paragraph 9. At the very least, this should be added to the immediate ban offenses, with a suggestion that the term of the ban upon review be 10 years or more (certainly life in Web terms)


Rangers and former Rangers, will there need to be something added to Ranger duties for all this, or will that be covered in the instructions given in this amendment?

Thanks!

From Article 3 Paragraph 3:

Quote:

If a member does have a concern or objection to a particular volunteer, these must be sent by email to the Administrator account, where they will also be forwarded to the Mayor so that the Mayor together with current Rangers can review them for merit.

Suggested change to add:

The Mayor shall acknowledge the receipt of the email via an email to the member.

From Article 5 Paragraph 9:

Quote:

Offenses for which the maximum penalty for a first offense is an immediate ban
- Spamming the board with ads;
- Spamming the board with pornography;
- Hacking the board;
- Refusing to abide by the Decision of the Jury in a Hearing [maximum penalty is
mandated by Article 3];
- Threats of real life violence or other criminal acts against members [maximum
penalty is mandated by Article 3];
- Deliberately introducing a virus to members of the board.

Suggested change to add:

- Falsely accusing a member of real-life actions in order to deny them access to the Thinking of England forum.

(add) This would need to be added to the list of things that trigger extraordinary ranger powers in Article 3 paragraph 6 as well.

Actually, I would like to discuss the possibility of penalties for perjury in general (hearings, et al) down the line, but it can wait...

Thanks, Ax!

Cerin wrote:

Rangers and former Rangers, will there need to be something added to Ranger duties for all this, or will that be covered in the instructions given in this amendment?

There will, but it's trivial and needn't slow down proceedings. The most likely place to add it is in the "How to be a Ranger" Thread and possibly in the Ranger Handbook.

Thanks, Alatar. Would you have time to write down your thoughts about what you think should be added?

The polls seem to have been steady for awhile. I'm not sure if I should bump them again.

These are the totals as of now:

Require explanations 28
Do not require explanations 14

Allow public statements 23
Do not allow public statements 15

Danger to community 18
Uncomfortable with person 13
New standard based on Charter 5


For those who wanted a straw poll, has this served the purpose you had in mind?

Let's bump 'em one more time and look again tomorrow evening...in the meantime, I think perhaps we can start voting on the ballot elements at hand...if there is no objection...

I was thinking we'd plan to start the vote at 12:00 pm tomorrow (Central Time, I think that's 5:00 GMT?)

Estel said earlier she was planning to comment later today.

Please note that I've changed the wording of three questions.

Quote:

Question 5. The instructions for the objection procedure in the petitioner’s threads in ToE will conclude with this sentence:

Please do not collude to deny access to the petitioner for inappropriate reasons.

I deleted 'solicit objections from other members' from the above sentence.

Quote:

Question 19. Members should

B. voice their objections by posting a brief explanation in the thread. The first poster to object in the thread will contact two or more Rangers and ask that a mediator be assigned to follow the process and verify that all of the objections are within the stated guidelines.

I replaced the former phrase with 'are within the stated guidelines' as there is now a choice of options for the standard.

Quote:

Question 21.
Note: This provision will only apply if option B of Question 19 is chosen.

If a member does not wish to make their objection publicly, they may submit it by PM/email. A Ranger will announce in the objection thread that such an objection has been received.

I also changed the terminology here because there is now a choice of options for the standard.

Sorry about that. Today ended up being busy in other ways. I think, however, that I'll just leave the ballot as is, as my previous suggestions about what I wanted with the options I had tried to come up with were ignored.

Estel, nothing you suggested was ignored. I believe I addressed all of the comments you made, explaining why one of them could not be incorporated in this round of balloting.

However, if you feel that your suggestions weren't given the proper attention, then I ask that you please point out which of your suggestions I failed to address and let's address them to your satisfaction, rather than your going off in a snit.

This is a serious matter; nothing could be worse for the future of your forum than a lingering doubt about the validity of the outcome because of vague, unsubstantiated complaints that things weren't handled properly.

So please, IF you perceive a problem with the way I'm handling things, be specific and let's deal with it like a couple of adults. If you can't be specific, then I'll take that as admission that you don't have a valid complaint.

Committee members, I've made a few more refinements to the ballot by combining some questions at the end of the ballot into a new Question 19 and 20.


I also had a concern that hadn't occurred to me before, which resulted in this addition:

At the end of the deliberation period and regardless of its outcome, a Ranger will supply the petitioner with the text of any objections lodged against them. If the applicant has been rejected, they may reapply at the end of the designated period, and the process will be repeated.

I got to thinking that what if, in the model where objections are made on the board, someone received three or four objections, not enough to keep them out but enough to poison people against them. Is there any chance their membership in that community isn't ruined from the start by the stigma of whatever those complaints were? So I thought the only fair thing would be, if the community is going to be aware of what was said about them, that they be aware also of the complaints that were raised and which they will no doubt have to deal with the residual effect of. Of course, they won't know who said what, but at least they'll know where they stand.

What say ye?

I can see how that might cause problems Cerin. In Wilma's hypothetical case it would discourage her from making her objection to a guy who hit on her and a M77t. He's surely going to know who objected if he sees the objection adn has an idea of who's in ToE.

This reminds me of current law, where the criminals have all the rights. I'm not sure I want to see that happen here also. At what stage do the current members get consideration over and above a potentially harmful new member?

Just to clarify, I'm not calling anyone a criminal... before I get accused of it.