Meta Comment Deletion What Fors? April 2, 2014 2:12 PM Subscribe

Starting this "me too" thread for anyone having their comments quixotically deleted from the main metafilter thread.

This is just to get some opinions on the moderation here and if enough people chime in about unwarranted (random?) comment deletion maybe one of the better moderators will give a reasoned reply.

I would like Metafilter to improve in this area because censurious tendencies are counter productive to information!

posted by Colonel Panic to Etiquette/Policy at 2:12 PM (852 comments total) 11 users marked this as a favorite

the main metafilter thread

I think you'll need to be more specific, which thread?
posted by soelo at 2:15 PM on April 2, 2014 [11 favorites]

I would like Metafilter to improve in this area because censurious tendencies are counter productive to information!

This was actually on my todo list as an email to you, but, okay: you need to stop leaving noisy/baity comment in Metafilter threads, something that seems to be a significant part of your activity here lately.

It's not random deletions, it's you specifically having some sort of room-reading or impulse-control problem with how you interact here, and you need to work on it. Please find a way to seem more like you're trying to join conversations in progress in good faith and with care and less like you're chucking driveby bait into threads.
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:18 PM on April 2, 2014 [46 favorites]

maybe one of the better moderators

Lake WoebeMeta, where all the moderators are above average.
posted by Dip Flash at 2:19 PM on April 2, 2014 [99 favorites]

This is just to get some opinions on the moderation here and if enough people chime in about unwarranted (random?) comment deletion maybe one of the better moderators will give a reasoned reply.

What will your response be if the bulk of the opinions you receive are actually about "maybe it's not the moderators, maybe it's you"?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 2:25 PM on April 2, 2014 [33 favorites]

I read 'quixotic' as meaning overly romantic and mysterious, so every time one of my comments is deleted I assume the mods are coming on to me.
posted by Think_Long at 2:27 PM on April 2, 2014 [39 favorites]

The acts of deletion were quixotic?
posted by kagredon at 2:30 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

I'm a huge fan of the moderation here. I've had one comment deleted that I know of, and it was a good deletion given the context, and Jessamyn sent me a short note about it despite that not being what they usually do. I've learned a lot from the moderator discussion of how, why, and when they delete, and while the lack of them moderating things exactly as I want them to sometimes stings, and in more difficult threads I take regular breaks, that's more a part of being part of an incredibly diverse community like MeFi and having the mode of cultural change be beanplating than anything else.

I'm not a huge fan of claims of anti-censorship on the internet. Websites are not public utilities which are required to tolerate anything anyone writes, and if one wishes to have a free-for-all there's always YouTube Comments, Newspaper comments, or even your own blog. Using "censorship" to mean "some of my one liners keep being deleted" dilutes what censorship actually means as a means of pervasive, inescapable social control on the part of a powerful entity like a government or company.

I also think all of the moderators are the better moderators, though I'll admit to a soft spot for Cortex's funnier deletion reasons, and gnfti has a nifty name.
posted by Deoridhe at 2:31 PM on April 2, 2014 [45 favorites]

Here's my opinion: the moderation here is usually pretty fine.

And the mods will generally give reasoned replies if you just ask them questions like a human being, you don't need to lure them out with smelly bait such as what you posted here.
posted by Too-Ticky at 2:32 PM on April 2, 2014 [4 favorites]

This advice from DirtyOldTown is worth repeating (and in fact, I have it on a Post It next to my desk): I find it helpful to think of being deleted less as being struck down by authority and more like having a friend say, "Dude... be cool."
posted by mochapickle at 2:34 PM on April 2, 2014 [43 favorites]

Huh, the online Meriam-Webster dictionary listed "capricious, unpredictable" as a secondary definition for quixotic. I was only familiar with the word being used to mean "foolishly impractical especially in the pursuit of ideals."
posted by Area Man at 2:36 PM on April 2, 2014 [14 favorites]

"maybe I didn't get into dartmouth because I didn't have an African name"

You said that? For real? That's shit you should keep inside your own head.
posted by rtha at 2:39 PM on April 2, 2014 [159 favorites]

The longer it took for you to write a comment, the more time you spent thinking about it, and the more it relates to the topic or topics at hand as if you were actually communicating with others in an attempt to potentially foster dialog in good faith, the more likely your comment will not be deleted. Or at least, that's been my experience with some measure of truthiness.
posted by oceanjesse at 2:41 PM on April 2, 2014

Oh, and...don't be offensive.
posted by oceanjesse at 2:42 PM on April 2, 2014

This is just to get some opinions on the moderation here and if enough people chime in about unwarranted (random?) comment deletion maybe one of the better moderators will give a reasoned reply.

...

maybe I didn't get into dartmouth because I didn't have an African name

lol if you said that and it got deleted then that was no random deletion, colonel

this case actually shows the moderation policy works fine
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 2:46 PM on April 2, 2014 [31 favorites]

Let me be the first MeFite to declare that Colonel Panic is a troll who should go to Reddit where he'll be appreciated.

Note: I am NOT a Mod, just a civilized person who is thankful that MeFi is NOT a "Free Speech" pile of horseshit with a pony hiding in there somewhere.
posted by oneswellfoop at 2:50 PM on April 2, 2014 [13 favorites]

This is pretty vague as you don't say what thread you're talking about or what the comments were, and the phrase "one of the better moderators" is not particularly helpful (although I appreciate you being vague here! This does not seem like a productive area for discussion! Please please please let's not have it!)

If you're looking for a groundswell of popular support, which it sounds like you are when you say "This is just to get some opinions on the moderation here and if enough people chime in about unwarranted (random?) comment deletion maybe..." , I'm not sure you're going to get the outcome you want. Odds are good that a few people will come in and agree that the mods delete too much or that they delete anything that doesn't toe the party line or that Metafilter used to be better because there are people who are on record as having these opinions, but a vague MeTa looking for everyone to jump in and agree with you based on the disingenuous "I just want what's best for Metafilter!" doesn't seem like it's going to garner tons of support.
posted by Mrs. Pterodactyl at 2:51 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

I would like Metafilter to improve in this area because censurious tendencies are counter productive to information!
posted by Colonel Panic to Etiquette/Policy

Ninja words:
Did you mean censorious?
censorious
adjective
°Addicted to censure and scolding; apt to blame or condemn; severe in making remarks on others, or on their writings or manners.
°Implying or expressing censure.

/pedant
posted by Cranberry at 2:53 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

Pony request: A feature that will scan the text of a proposed MeTa for context and keywords.

If the proposed MeTa includes anything like "the moderation here is unfair, and my only proof is that my comment/s was/were deleted," the poster is presented with a quiz that says, "On a scale of 1-10, with 1 being 'because the mods are known enemies of free speech and/or personally biased against me' and 10 being 'because I was kind of an asshole,' how would you rate the reason you are creating this MeTa?" And it would only let you successfully create the post if you chose... I dunno, greater than 7?

I'm not sure if I've ever had a comment deleted here, but if I have, I have a totally unshakable trust in the moderators that makes me absolutely sure they made the right call. Yay, mods! *pompoms*
posted by divined by radio at 2:54 PM on April 2, 2014 [9 favorites]

especially one that's so obviously shaky from the start

....and posted by someone who clearly loves nothing more than to stir shit up. I will fall out of my chair if he actually comes back to this thread.
posted by rtha at 2:55 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

I read 'quixotic' as meaning overly romantic and mysterious

I read 'quidnunc' as meaning overly romantic and mysterious.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 2:58 PM on April 2, 2014 [26 favorites]

I generally don't like to dig through comments as some sort of "gotcha" for posts, but I must say your posting history has some borderline noise/derail comments, so I could see that the more offensive/noisy ones would get deleted.

To me, some of your comments often read knee-jerk one-liners, often contrary for the sake of being contrary. Perhaps it's the inconsistency of capitalization and punctuation that adds to my sense of drive-by commenting.
posted by filthy light thief at 3:02 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Starting this "me too"

Sorry, guy, you're on your own here.
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 3:02 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

Who's quixoting whom?

"Look there, Sancho Panza, my friend, and see those thirty or so wild giants, with whom I intend to do battle and kill each and all of them, so with their stolen booty we can begin to enrich ourselves. This is noble, righteous warfare, for it is wonderfully useful to God to have such an evil race wiped from the face of the earth."
"What giants?" Asked Sancho Panza.
"The ones you can see over there," answered his master, "with the huge arms, some of which are very nearly two leagues long."
"Now look, your grace," said Sancho, "what you see over there aren't giants, but windmills, and what seems to be arms are just their sails, that go around in the wind and turn the millstone."
"Obviously," replied Don Quijote, "you don't know much about adventures.”
posted by drlith at 3:03 PM on April 2, 2014 [15 favorites]

This is just to get some opinions on the moderation here

I think the moderation on the site is just fine. They have a complicated job, and they do it with a degree of grace and good humor rare in this fallen world stained with murder and corruption.

I have very rarely seen a "why was my comment deleted?" thread that made me think worse of the mods or better of the complainer, especially after the deleted comments are aired.

The mods are hardworking, friendly, and respond to contact notices really quickly.

Those are just some of my opinions on MetaFilter moderation and moderators.
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:05 PM on April 2, 2014 [26 favorites]

I try to view everyone here as their best selves.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:07 PM on April 2, 2014 [79 favorites]

Without getting into the pile on, my two cents on the question of moderation here is this: I do not always agree with the moderation, which is to be expected: they're better at it than I am. That said, the philosophy behind the moderation is always, every time, about making MeFi awesome.

And they largely succeed.
posted by Mooski at 3:11 PM on April 2, 2014 [17 favorites]

maybe one of the better moderators will give a reasoned reply

See, this is an example of when we in the UK would use the "How Rude!" flag.
posted by billiebee at 3:12 PM on April 2, 2014 [25 favorites]

I think the moderation on the site is just fine. They have a complicated job, and they do it with a degree of grace and good humor rare in this fallen world stained with murder and corruption.

Me too! Thread working as intended.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 3:12 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

See, this is an example of when we in the UK would use the "How Rude!" flag.

Tags:
stephanietanner
posted by Talez at 3:17 PM on April 2, 2014 [18 favorites]

See, this is an example of when we in the UK would use the "How Rude!" flag.

The polite parts.
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 3:21 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Odds are long Colonel Panic comes back to this thread at all.

Poor show, chap. =\
posted by carsonb at 3:24 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

>maybe one of the better moderators will give a reasoned reply

See, this is an example of when we in the UK would use the "How Rude!" flag.

I think that's a typo, and it was supposed to be "maybe one of the butter moderators will give a seasoned reply." Some nice garlic butter, perhaps with a little salt and herbs would be very nice on toasted bread tonight.
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:25 PM on April 2, 2014 [15 favorites]

Odds are long Colonel Panic comes back to this thread at all.

Perhaps he has at last realized his fatal error and is busily adding debug messages to his log.
posted by Celsius1414 at 3:26 PM on April 2, 2014 [13 favorites]

Not-piling-on, genuinely-curious question here - there seem to be more and more of these types of threads on MeTa, lately. As in, if you were to info dump it and graph it, I would imaging the past 6 or maybe 12 months would show an exponential spike upwards in the trend of these kind of "my comment got deleted for Reasons" posts. Is it just me, or do mods sense this too? Is it perhaps indirectly correlated to growth in the user base? Could you perhaps predictably chart the expected point at which a new mod would be needed based on this? If cortex could get right on this, that would be great, k?
posted by allkindsoftime at 3:28 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

Well, I don't think comment deletions here are random. Perhaps some of them are done hastily, or shouldn't have been done, but there is some rationale to these deletions too. Messaging the mods to ask why a comment was deleted should be the first step.

I tried doing some moderating elsewhere. It's hard. You can make all the policies you like, but it will always be a matter of making tough judgement calls in deciding what things fall under those policies, especially for borderline deletable comments. (The egregious stuff is easy).
posted by thelonius at 3:29 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

I try to view everyone here as their best selves.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:07 PM on April 2
Sometimes that's a scary thought.
posted by St. Alia of the Bunnies at 3:29 PM on April 2, 2014 [9 favorites]

This is just to get some opinions on the moderation here

Here's my opinion: the moderators here do an overall great job, and though I sometimes feel I would have made a different decision in their place, I've never once felt that they were anything other than sincere and transparent in their decision-making.

I try to view everyone here as their best selves.

And honestly, that's probably the source of most of my aforementioned disagreements. I wouldn't be as good at doing that.
posted by solotoro at 3:29 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

I hate threads like these because they make it impossible to have real discussions about moderation policy since they are patently ridiculous objections.
posted by Justinian at 3:32 PM on April 2, 2014 [14 favorites]

Is it just me, or do mods sense this too?

I haven't noticed a lot more of them, I've just noticed that the ones we do have seem to get off on the wrong foot more often. Since we added the "I need to talk to the community, not just the mods" checkbox, a lot of people email us when they have questions that just need a mod answer and I think this means that we don't get as many "Hey I was just wondering..." sorts of polite MeTa threads. So we get more "Fuck your checkbox!" sorts of posts and they can get bumpy sort of quickly because, as Justinian points out, we're not really having a nuanced talk about moderation. Though we could turn this into one, certainly.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:35 PM on April 2, 2014 [26 favorites]

MetaTalk: Fuck your checkbox.
posted by Horace Rumpole at 3:38 PM on April 2, 2014 [78 favorites]

Can I call dibs on "Fuck Your Checkbox!" as the name of my autobiography?
posted by dotgirl at 3:38 PM on April 2, 2014 [16 favorites]

Check your fuckbox!
posted by neroli at 3:43 PM on April 2, 2014 [56 favorites]

yes Colonel Panic is back and if there was consistent moderation many of the comments above would be deleted, and maybe some have. Maybe the moderators who have replied could speak to that. It would be interesting to know as a partial answer to the post, which as i said, is to try to understand why some comments are deleted and other comments are left standing.

As for the moderator replies, thank you, but at least one of them is puzzling:

"We've deleted a few of your comments just in the past two hours. Please feel free to let us know if it was the "who needs the facts" comment in the weather thread or the weird racist-sounding "maybe I didn't get into dartmouth because I didn't have an African name" comment in this thread? You seem to be trolling. If you're not trolling you may have to adjust your joke-o-meter a little."

Ok that reply is a fabrication for both examples.

Jessamyn you may not have a record of what you deleted but if you do please review. If you do not then you really discredit yourself by responding with sort of what you think i said (totally not verbatim).

My reply to the weather post was almost exactly this :

Still a lot of theory in that report so i am not drinking the Kool Aid. And the use of past tense for the here-and-now statuses is kind of spooky.

That was my take on the weather post. Not trolling simply my opinion. Why would that be deleted?

My comment to the college application post was similiarly mild. The fact that you trumped it up here is telling:

My comment almost verbatim and in its entirety:

Count all the I's in that essay. Back in the day there was not so many I's in team. Maybe thats why i got rejected by Dartmouth. Probably didnt help i wasnt named Kwasi.

So if you want to delete that on account of the allusion to the ethnicity of the name why wouldnt the other comments with actual allusions to race be deleted?

if i dont reply to rest of these responses for awhile or or if it all its not because i am intimidated by the overwhelming rebuke i am recieving here. I dont seem to have as much time as the rest of you.
posted by Colonel Panic at 3:44 PM on April 2, 2014

Perhaps he has at last realized his fatal error and is busily adding debug messages to his log.

Maybe he needs to work on his Guru Meditation Number!
posted by RogerB at 3:45 PM on April 2, 2014

the main metafilter thread

The One True metafilter thread.

In all seriousness, though, can a mod or the OP clarify - were these deletions from MeTa threads, or from the blue? The expectations are radically different.
posted by corb at 3:46 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Dude, when was your day? Pretty sure I used a lot of I's in my college app essays in the mid-80s. Dartmouth let me in anyway. And don't worry: They let in plenty of people who were convinced that any student who was not white and male must've been admitted to the detriment of the school, and they were happy to say so to my face.
posted by rtha at 3:49 PM on April 2, 2014 [20 favorites]

Probably didnt help i wasnt named Kwasi.

Dude, I guesstimate this gem got flagged 1,298,034 times. In fact, I'd like to ask the mods to restore the comment to the thread just so I can go flag it as hard as possible and get it deleted again. Because Jesus Christ.
posted by FelliniBlank at 3:50 PM on April 2, 2014 [134 favorites]

Exhibit A in my presentation that complaining about comment deletion almost never makes me like the moderators less or respect the complainer more, Your Honor.
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:53 PM on April 2, 2014 [35 favorites]

Though we could turn this into one, certainly.

I wish you the very best with that. I suspect cortex may have an easier time parsing those stats I mused about.
posted by allkindsoftime at 3:53 PM on April 2, 2014

show us on the doll how long you've been silenced
posted by trunk muffins at 3:54 PM on April 2, 2014 [154 favorites]

Well that escalated quickly. I guess the question now is can we make this thread about something else, or is we gonna have to beat him up first?
posted by Mooski at 3:55 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

More seriously, we just had a similar deleted-comment airing-of-grievances thread, and it was one of the longer and more acrimonious MeTas I can remember. Anyone who wanted to complain about overstrenuous moderation could have done so - and, in fact, can still do so - in there. It hasn't been that long. I don't see any pressing need for yet another one of these threads, especially one that's so obviously shaky from the start.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 2:53 PM on April 2 [2 favorites +] [!]

Well then how i do say this without a trace of meta-snark: This answers my question about other people questioning how and why comments are deleted. i should have searched more before before posting. (I did try!).
posted by Colonel Panic at 3:56 PM on April 2, 2014

...because i am intimidated by the overwhelming rebuke i am recieving here.

Sometimes one is rebuked because one is acting badly.

I dont seem to have as much time as the rest of you.

I'm surprised with all the time you're saving not using your shift key.
posted by Celsius1414 at 3:56 PM on April 2, 2014 [23 favorites]

if there was consistent moderation many of the comments above would be deleted

I am not a moderator but I can answer this question. Metafilter, Metatalk, and AskMetafilter have different, but generally internally consistent, moderation guidelines. Comments in Metatalk generally don't get deleted because this is the place where we hash out site policy. I think comments can be deleted here for outright attacking another user? But other than that they stick around.

Comments in Metafilter that are fighty or offensive get deleted because the purpose of Metafilter is reasonably civil discussion. People can certainly argue but it should be arguments made with a good-faith effort.

Comments in AskMetafilter are aggressively moderated because the purpose of AskMe is to ask and answer questions. Comments that don't answer the question are generally deleted.

This is not "random" at all.
posted by muddgirl at 3:59 PM on April 2, 2014 [32 favorites]

That was my take on the weather post. Not trolling simply my opinion. Why would that be deleted?

People here have a very sore spot about people who try to bring opinion and emotion into a debate involving the very facts you denigrate.
posted by Talez at 3:59 PM on April 2, 2014

And for what it's worth I would have flagged your comment as "noise" because it doesn't make any fucking sense. I hate comments that try to be coy when stating an opinion. I wish people would just say what they mean. Mefites should thank their stars that I'm not a moderator.
posted by muddgirl at 4:01 PM on April 2, 2014 [11 favorites]

Préparation : piments doux sautés

Goes well with an IPA or strong red, as one in every handful will be very spicy.
posted by the man of twists and turns at 4:02 PM on April 2, 2014

The only comment I remember having deleted (and there were probably a couple others) was a copy-pasta of the entire treaty of westphalia into one of the infinite Sarah Palin threads before the 2008 election.

It was a justified deletion, imho.
posted by kaibutsu at 4:07 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

Hmmm, this seems weirdly familiar. NiceKitty, is that you?
posted by Hermione Granger at 4:13 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

I would bristle whenever people bring up some tense or application of "censorship" when it comes to MetaFilter's moderation policies, but my spikes get too sodden from feeling so very sorry for them.
posted by batmonkey at 4:14 PM on April 2, 2014

From now on, every time a comment is deleted, I'm going to imagine a mod knocking it over in a joust.
posted by 4ster at 4:15 PM on April 2, 2014 [19 favorites]

if i dont reply to rest of these responses for awhile or or if it all its not because i am intimidated by the overwhelming rebuke i am recieving here.

Look now, here's the thing. If you want to yell at the mods and having 'tude, that's your prerogative, but if you do that, ya needs to come correct. Meaning you gots to have an understanding of what's expected here, how the mods do their job and what you den done did that was actually ok and not against the rules of Metafilter and social situations.

I gotta tell ya, that doesn't seem to be happenin' on your part.

I dont seem to have as much time as the rest of you.

Son, I've been on the phone getting cover photos and getting develops to fix a website, building a couple of ads, recording audio and editing a short film today. This is probably a lighter day than most people here, so either get your ass in this here kitchen and roll up your sleeves or get out. Brandon ain't got time to wiping noses today.
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 4:22 PM on April 2, 2014 [24 favorites]

I will imagine it as:

Cortex heading outside to the Metatalk garden with his spade, grumbling, cos that's another one he has to bury. There are many holes.

Jessamyn pushes the comment inside a helium balloon and releases it, sits back in her chair and watches it rise and rise and rise until she loses sight of it. There are many balloons.
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 4:23 PM on April 2, 2014 [46 favorites]

From now on, every time a comment is deleted, I'm going to imagine a mod knocking it over in a joust.

...and reading 'knocking it over in a joust' gives me a visual of Jessamyn and cortex standing in front of an early 80's video game cabinet, slamming repeatedly on the Fly button and trying to knock posts out of the sky.

And since I'm on my second glass of wine, that probably makes a lot more sense to me than anyone else. I'll just be reading for the rest of the night.
posted by Mooski at 4:23 PM on April 2, 2014 [10 favorites]

Made sense to me.
posted by mudpuppie at 4:25 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Brandon, can you bake me some cornbread when you have a minute? I have a sudden yen.
posted by Deoridhe at 4:31 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

I try to view everyone here as their best selves.

Just to be clear: I am capable of being way way way better than this.
posted by Lentrohamsanin at 4:31 PM on April 2, 2014 [19 favorites]

I now cannot stop thinking about a Public Service Announcement campaign with slogans like "Lost your keys? Check your fuckbox!"
posted by Flunkie at 4:31 PM on April 2, 2014 [10 favorites]

Now I've got "Man of La Mancha" stuck in my head. It wouldn't be so bad, but it keeps bouncing back and forth between different singers. And between English and French. And I can't stop banging my teeth together like castanets, and it hurts.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 4:31 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

Check your fuckbox!

[sighs]
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 4:33 PM on April 2, 2014 [6 favorites]

Count all the I's in that essay. Back in the day there was not so many I's in team. Maybe thats why i got rejected by Dartmouth. Probably didnt help i wasnt named Kwasi.

you know, in that last really long, hard debated thread about over moderation, i really went to bat for the original comment in question, even though it was somewhat ill-thought out

i can't even be bothered to go to the ball park for this one
posted by pyramid termite at 4:34 PM on April 2, 2014 [25 favorites]

I had a job one summer, years ago, doing tech support for Micron computers in a warehouse call center in SE Portland, and it was a pretty lousy job even when the HVAC was functioning correctly, but one thing it did have was a Joust cabinet up in the break room. Not set at free-to-play, which is sort of absurd because it's not like we had enough slack time to put many quarters into the thing in any case, but at least it was there, as an escape, as something to actually enjoy for fifteen minutes while trying to clear some of the Windows 98 support walkthrough echoes out of your head.

I'd go up there and make it last as long as I could. I was younger than most of the folks who worked there, and awkward and inward and not great at socializing even when there was nominal social time to speak of, but I could play Joust with other people and just enjoy doing a simple, fun thing for a little bit. It got to the point of being meditative.

Eventually they got rid of the Joust machine, replaced it with Dig Dug. Eventually the summer was over, I went back to school, I graduated, I got another call center job, I got married, I got laid off, I got an insurance company job, I started moonlighting for Metafilter, I bought a house, I quit my insurance job and went full time here. It's been a good happy upward arc.

I'm now just slightly worried I'm going to wake with a start to find that I was daydreaming in the middle of a round of Joust.
posted by cortex (staff) at 4:38 PM on April 2, 2014 [123 favorites]

also, it's been my experience that when someone tells you "there's no i in team" they're probably trying to take advantage of you
posted by pyramid termite at 4:42 PM on April 2, 2014 [27 favorites]

my theory on what causes these deletion complaint threads
posted by invitapriore at 4:43 PM on April 2, 2014 [11 favorites]

I only ever played Joust on my graphing calculator. I miss graphing calculators. Do the kids still use those, or do they all just have laptops with MATLAB or something?
posted by lesli212 at 4:45 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

When I temped in the clerical office of the radiology department at our local hospital, at night I would close my eyes and see the color-coded filing system in my mind. Then I would fall asleep and dream about filing records, usually in the pull-shelves we had for that day's patients, which actually had a slightly different system than the long-term storage in the back.

That's a long-winded way to set up this question: Do the mods here dream about modding? Or does day-to-day tasks of moderating provide more variety than I'm imagining?
posted by muddgirl at 4:45 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

One time, I posted a comment and I realized it was kinda sour and didn't contribute at all. I probably would have tried to delete it or get it deleted myself, had someone not flagged/deleted it. I like the moderation here!
posted by destructive cactus at 4:46 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

In my experience, the mods are quite gracious about acting quickly on "I am an idiot. Please delete this crappy thing I just typed" requests.
posted by FelliniBlank at 4:48 PM on April 2, 2014 [7 favorites]

"Probably didnt help i wasnt named Kwasi."

You don't know ka-ra-te; you also don't know Kwasi.
posted by klangklangston at 4:50 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

Do modroids dream of electric, uh, comments I guess?
posted by FAMOUS MONSTER at 4:51 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

I'm now just slightly worried I'm going to wake with a start to find that I was daydreaming in the middle of a round of Joust.

Every time I run across a busy-ish street to get the bus, I always get on the bus wondering "what if this was the time I got hit by a car and everything from hereon out is the delusion of a dying mind?"

So far either I've been lucky or the death throes of my consciousness are playing out what appears to be a thankfully ordinary life.
posted by griphus at 4:53 PM on April 2, 2014 [13 favorites]

recreational math

wat
posted by Mooski at 4:55 PM on April 2, 2014 [23 favorites]

Do modroids dream of electric, uh, comments I guess?

Do Modroids Dream of Electric Deletes?, I'd say.

Although... all deletes... are electric.

There's also The mathowie in the High Castle and "We Can Banhammer It for You Wholesale."
posted by GenjiandProust at 4:55 PM on April 2, 2014 [7 favorites]

my theory on what causes these deletion complaint threads

I was hoping that was just a picture of the moon, but instead it was one of those comics I never understand.

I only occasionally dream about work. Mostly when I do, I dream about real life situations that sort of act out some of the things that happen at work, at least on the nights I work evening shifts. Often I dream about library conferences.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 4:57 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

In my experience, the mods are quite gracious about acting quickly on "I am an idiot. Please delete this crappy thing I just typed" requests.

Seconding this. Sometimes I fly off the handle, realize I did wrong, and tell the mods I've screwed up, and they've always been good about deleting my derail before it worsens.
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 4:57 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

Fave My Tears, the MeTa Read
posted by griphus at 5:00 PM on April 2, 2014 [22 favorites]

I wanted to do some recreational math

Vance, is that you??? (Vance is my baby brother, who is the only other person I've ever known to talk about doing "recreational math". Don't get me wrong, I'm not a math-hater, but there are other ways I'd choose to recreate.)
posted by hapax_legomenon at 5:03 PM on April 2, 2014

I'm not Vance, and I am a math dunderhead, but I find algebra very relaxing.
posted by FelliniBlank at 5:05 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

Imho the mods here do a very sane and balanced job in what is sometimes a rabbly-type mess.

I hope to one day meet them all. Hug those who want it and buy them all dinner and drinks.

The mods are a HUGE part of what makes metafilter work for me. So bless them. Bless them all.

And I say this as someone who has had a small number of Mefi posts and comments deleted And on reflection always thought the deletions were a good call
posted by Faintdreams at 5:05 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

Every time I run across a busy-ish street to get the bus, I always get on the bus wondering "what if this was the time I got hit by a car and everything from hereon out is the delusion of a dying mind?"

Oh, thank heavens it's not just me.
posted by zombieflanders

Eponysterrifying.
posted by sweetkid at 5:10 PM on April 2, 2014 [25 favorites]

I don't always do recreational math, but when I do it's in the service of nostalgia for university days so intense that it can only be done on a TI-89.

Stay wistful, my friends.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:11 PM on April 2, 2014 [4 favorites]

"I was hoping that was just a picture of the moon, but instead it was one of those comics I never understand."

This week's episode of Klang Explains the Joke: Roast Beef (the cat) has died and gone to Hell, where he sees a pay phone, and attempts to call his roommates. Philipe (the otter) picks up, but instead of hearing Roast Beef, he hears a telemarketer with a credit card offer. Thus, telemarketers are really pay phone calls from friends in Hell.

The implication being that deletion complaint posts are MeTa FPPs from a terminal in Hell.
posted by klangklangston at 5:12 PM on April 2, 2014 [35 favorites]

Any metafilter thread that results in me saying "oh man, I should read more achewood" is a good thread in my book.
posted by Phredward at 5:16 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

hey now that we're talking about Achewood

I got the two volumes printed by Dark Horse and if you are an Achewood Fan I really, really recommend them. I already owned all the self-published ones, and I got Worst Song, Played On Ugliest Guitar for Christmas, read it on Christmas day, and ordered the second one immediately thereafter. There's annotations to almost every strip, and essays and the books themselves are just really well-made little hardcovers.
posted by griphus at 5:19 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

(The Great Outdoor Fight hardcover is great too -- mine is even autographed! -- but the two compilations are so much more than I expected.)
posted by griphus at 5:20 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Is this the thread where I can get my fuckbox checked? I've been meaning to check that fucking box.

I enjoy the phrase and shall employ the phrase.
posted by vrakatar at 5:22 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

On the subject of whether I think moderation is too heavy, or if the deletions are quixotic I think the answer's a big no.

There's only one time when I've noticed one of my comments being deleted: I'd posted a really shitty joke in a thread where it didn't belong whilst I was in an odd mood at the end of a busy day at work. On my cycle home I realised how shitty it was, so I rushed back to sort it out, only to find it had magically disappeared. So no, I think the system works just fine.
posted by Ned G at 5:24 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

I must say, for a GRAR DELETED ALL MY LIFE thread this is a gem: no vicious arguments, no good folks quitting in despair, just a soapbox ranter confronted by a crowd of happy folks going "Nope, sorry, we think the moderation is ace!" and making funny jokes. Well done, all!

> Every time I run across a busy-ish street to get the bus, I always get on the bus wondering "what if this was the time I got hit by a car and everything from hereon out is the delusion of a dying mind?"

Oh, thank heavens it's not just me.
posted by zombieflanders at 8:06 PM on April 2

Personal to zombieflanders: For you, it is true. This thread, this site, all the things and events around you are nothing but the delusion of a dying mind. Fortunately, you will resist this revelation and go on happily until
posted by languagehat at 5:25 PM on April 2, 2014 [47 favorites]

Is this the thread where I can get my fuckbox checked?

no, you need to see a professional groinocologist
posted by pyramid termite at 5:38 PM on April 2, 2014 [17 favorites]

> no vicious arguments, no good folks quitting in despair, just a soapbox ranter confronted by a crowd of happy folks going "Nope, sorry, we think the moderation is ace!" and making funny jokes.

Challenge accepted?
posted by Sunburnt at 5:43 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

I love the moderation here. I used to do a little part time moderation on a small site and it was goddamn hard and I wasn't very good at it, so I find the smoothness and grace of the moderation on metafilter extra impressive. Why, just this morning I was noticing a depressing and awful comment on a thread - one where I'd thought "I could flag this, but it's just someone giving their true, real, ignorant opinion so it probably won't do any good, I'll just feel glum about humans instead" - and when I looked again, it had been modded away as if it had never been, and I felt loved.
posted by Frowner at 5:48 PM on April 2, 2014 [20 favorites]

I only ever played Joust on my graphing calculator. I miss graphing calculators. Do the kids still use those, or do they all just have laptops with MATLAB or something?

Judging by a recent trip to Best Buy, they use literally the same calculators that were in use 15 years ago, for the same prices I remember from high school.
posted by Pope Guilty at 5:48 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

This threat started out with a bullshit complaint, but I love what it has become.

I don't even know what I would do with a fuckbox. But I still want one.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 5:55 PM on April 2, 2014 [4 favorites]

Yeah, speaking as someone who "moderates" on reddit (sub only has 30k subscribers tho, nothing huge) - you have no idea how tricky or hard the job can be, just to get people to "get along on the internet" - jesus. I think the mods here do an amazing job.
posted by ish__ at 5:56 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

I don't even know what I would do with a fuckbox.

If you have to ask...
posted by Ghidorah at 6:02 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

From now on, every time a comment is deleted, I'm going to imagine a mod knocking it over in a joust.

This is what I picture.
posted by desjardins at 6:05 PM on April 2, 2014 [41 favorites]

Dammit, if I could figure out how to build a fuckbox with built-in TI-83, I could retire to Arizona.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 6:15 PM on April 2, 2014 [4 favorites]

ewww guys
posted by sweetkid at 6:19 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

I don't even know what I would do with a fuckbox.

If you have to ask...

Can I just check... is it where I should store my buckfoxes?
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 6:36 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

I try to view everyone here as their best selves.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:07 PM on April 2

Jessamyn, you are really wonderful.
posted by clockzero at 6:47 PM on April 2, 2014 [12 favorites]

I'd probably rather have a fuckbox than a penis beaker, but it's a toss-up, really.
posted by FelliniBlank at 6:49 PM on April 2, 2014 [6 favorites]

What about seafood lasagna
posted by shakespeherian at 6:50 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

Is this the thread where I can get my fuckbox checked?

I don't know, but I was just going through documents from some old, closed bank accounts and I discovered that my checkbook's foxed.
posted by benito.strauss at 6:52 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

It's called an orgone accumulator you potty mouths.
posted by Divine_Wino at 7:00 PM on April 2, 2014 [14 favorites]

or the weird racist-sounding "maybe I didn't get into dartmouth because I didn't have an African name" comment in this thread?

I realize we're busy talking about achewood and fuckboxes now, but i feel like that kid who walked in 20 minutes late to everyone presenting their essays in front of the class or something.

That entire thread really cheesed me off. I wrote one comment then noped out because i realized i wasn't going to be able to engage in a totally awesome, tubular chill way which is something i've been trying to strive for more on here.

Every time i look at one of those comments being hypercritical of the essay, or bringing up the race thing at all the thread just radiates a bunch of disgruntled white dudes(and i'm sure, some ladies) who think they somehow didn't get a fair shake at getting in to the college they wanted and that affirmative action is so unfair and shit.

Seriously, go look at that thread and how many comments dig on that essay and how they aren't that impressed with it and stuff. Do you not get a gross feeling?

Or i mean talk about fuckboxes(or, orgone accumulators i suppose?). Maybe it's just me. MeTa felt like the place to vent though.
posted by emptythought at 7:02 PM on April 2, 2014 [19 favorites]

Apropos of vowel corruption and overanalysis of small jokes, I really love the rendering of "fuck you" as "fock you," it always makes me laugh super-hard and think of a muppet at the keyboard moving its head back and forth with its mouth wide open.
posted by invitapriore at 7:03 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

I don't know, but I was just going through documents from some old, closed bank accounts and I discovered that my checkbook's foxed.

But did you check your foxbook to see who foxed your checkbook? Because fuck those buckfoxes who fox your checks - they belong in the fuckbox.

(And know I know what I should do with my fuckbox).
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:05 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

I realize we're busy talking about achewood and fuckboxes now,

I'm imagining this as the spoken intro to a very smooth r&b jam
posted by clockzero at 7:10 PM on April 2, 2014 [29 favorites]

I think I'm from just before the $5 days of registration. As a result, when I'm at Metafilter, I feel like I'm a guest at somebody's house. As a guest, I do my best to play by the rules of my excellent hosts. When I have occasionally wandered beyond the boundaries of the rules, I've been cool with them leading me back because this is not my house.

Heck, I appreciate that I'm even allowed to offer feedback about the house rules. How awesome is that?

Even if I had paid $5, this still isn't my house. I mean, when I'm out at a restaurant that restaurant doesn't turn into my property. If I say every dumb thing that comes into my head while sitting at Marconi's Fine Italian, I'm going to be asked not to return. I love Marconi and her restaurant and I want to come back, you know?

Anyhow, the Mefi party is the best party because I feel like everyone is held to the same standard and has the same set of expectations by our hosts.

So, basically, party on, mods. You're all all right with me.
posted by Joey Michaels at 7:12 PM on April 2, 2014 [11 favorites]

Seriously, go look at that thread and how many comments dig on that essay and how they aren't that impressed with it and stuff. Do you not get a gross feeling?

I think there's just some folk who see a thing touted as 'good' in a post and so they have to screw their I AM AN EXPERT ON THINGS THAT ARE GOOD hat on real tight and then prove to you their Expertness At Good Things by pointing out that that supposedly 'good' thing is NOT GOOD, LET'S FIGHT ABOUT IT
posted by shakespeherian at 7:14 PM on April 2, 2014 [42 favorites]

Aint no party like a MeFi party cause a MeFi party don't stop!
posted by cashman at 7:15 PM on April 2, 2014 [8 favorites]

Yes, after trying to figure out how to work Fox in Socks into yesterday's Green Eggs and Ham thread, I suspect I fell into a coma and all this "box your checks and check your flocks" stuff is my own fever dream.

Fox
Socks
Fucks
Box

Fucks in box.
Fox in socks.

fox in socks fucks in box.

Socks on fox and fucks in box.

Fox in socks on box with fucks.

Chicks with checks come.
Chicks with books come.
Chicks with bucks and checks and books come.

Look, sir. Look, sir. Mr. Fox, sir.
Let's do tricks with books and blocks, sir.
Let's do tricks with checks and bucks, sir.

First, I'll make a quick check book stack.
Then I'll make a quick fuck box stack.

ad infinitum....

Sorry, sweetkid.
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 7:22 PM on April 2, 2014 [20 favorites]

Sorry, sweetkid.

fox in socks fucks in box.

yea so that's an image that won't go away.
posted by sweetkid at 7:28 PM on April 2, 2014 [11 favorites]

Probably didnt help i wasnt named Kwasi.

It's well known that Dartmouth has a weakness a daredevil kitten with a mysterious pirate past.

But who doesn't?
posted by shothotbot at 7:30 PM on April 2, 2014 [6 favorites]

...they have to screw their I AM AN EXPERT ON THINGS THAT ARE GOOD hat on real tight...

As the owner of numerous hats, I can safely assert that is the wrong and bad way to put on a hat.
posted by griphus at 7:30 PM on April 2, 2014 [18 favorites]

I wrote one comment then noped out because i realized i wasn't going to be able to engage in a totally awesome, tubular chill way

Oh man it has been YEARS since I heard someone use "tubular" in that way.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:32 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

People actually said "tubular"?
posted by sweetkid at 7:37 PM on April 2, 2014

"I don't even know what I would do with a fuckbox."

"Mama's got a Fuckbox" sounds like a Blowfly track.
posted by klangklangston at 7:38 PM on April 2, 2014 [6 favorites]

In howevermany years, no one is going to believe we said "totes" so...
posted by griphus at 7:39 PM on April 2, 2014 [4 favorites]

People actually said "tubular"?"

You've clearly never listened to the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles Sewer Surfin' cassette.
posted by klangklangston at 7:39 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

"Lost your keys? Check your fuckbox!"

Townes Van Zandt used to tell a joke that went something like this.

So this drunk guy is staggering down the street trying to find his car with his key in his hand, and barely staying upright as tries one locked door after another. He stumbles into a cop who has taken an interest in the situation.

Cop says "Can I help you mister?"

And the guy says "Well, I think they stole my car officer, I can't find it anywhere and I'd like to make a report."

The cop says "where did you last see it?"

And the guy thinks a minute and says "last time I saw it, it was attached to this key right here in my hand."

The cop says "Well, you have to go down to the station house to file a stolen car report, and by the way, did you notice your fly is open sir?"

At which the drunk guy's gaze drifts downward and his with a trembling voice he says, "oh no, they got my GIRL too?"

I miss Townes Van Zandt.
posted by spitbull at 7:41 PM on April 2, 2014 [19 favorites]

Today is my ten year anniversary at MetaFilter, so I'm going to consider this the thread commemorating it.

Er, not just me, but we lucky few who can tell of surviving those two brutal April days, noontime Sun in the cloudless sky, doing battle with the faulty gatekeeping code.

Through the years, we and our children and our children's children see the like of Colonel Panic come and go, witness innumerable quixotic battles with language and good sense, and know that MetaFilter abides as it always has, as it always will.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 7:50 PM on April 2, 2014 [14 favorites]

Today is my ten year anniversary at MetaFilter

Just out of curiosity, do you have a gmail account?
posted by SpacemanStix at 7:52 PM on April 2, 2014 [6 favorites]

colonel panic, at 3:44 PM, you referred to yourself in the third person. except for the case of self-deprecation, everybody i've ever met who does this is a jumped-up buffoon.

my comments get deleted all the time. i figure they're like baby spiders, the ones that survive will grow up to be stronger arachnids.

recreational math is definitely a thing.
posted by bruce at 7:53 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

Approximately 99.96% of the time, the answer to: "Why are my comments being deleted?" is "Because you were kind of being an asshole."

It doesn't necessarily mean you are an asshole. But it does mean you might be better served by taking a break and reflecting on how you might have gone off the rails than by starting the umpteenth OMGDELETIONSAREOUTTACONTROL!!!!1! MeTa.
posted by DirtyOldTown at 7:53 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

Approximately 99.96% of the time, the answer to: "Why are my comments being deleted?" is "Because you were kind of being an asshole."

I don't know if that's true. I've had comments deleted because I was following a derail. Usually when I notice the deletion I'm like, "yeah, papaya ice cream really has little to do with Hugh Jackman and I was probably just commenting because I know more about ice cream than Hugh Jackman. Fair enough."
posted by sweetkid at 7:56 PM on April 2, 2014 [8 favorites]

"I don't even know what I would do with a fuckbox."

"Mama's got a Fuckbox" sounds like a Blowfly track.

Not even William Carlos Williams will eat plums left in the fuckbox.
posted by ActingTheGoat at 7:56 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

Back in the day there was not so many I's in team.

There is no "i" in "team." There is a "u" in "putz," though.
posted by octobersurprise at 7:58 PM on April 2, 2014 [15 favorites]

Often I dream about library conferences.

Ditto. Though mine are often retrospective e.g. wishing I'd said something wittier or more profound during a presentation at some previous ALA or CILIP event.

Oh, though also have a recurring dream about attending an event at the Library of Cheese and finding out that everything there is made of cheese; the walls, the books, the chairs, and the projector I am trying to plug my laptop into while an audience of Movers and Shakers and ALA Think Tank members grows increasingly impatient.
posted by Wordshore at 7:59 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

I have to work in the morning, so goodnight you wonderful boxfuckers.
posted by vrakatar at 8:01 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Not even William Carlos Williams will eat plums left in the fuckbox.

I have thrown out
the plums
that were in
the fuckbox

and which
you were probably
saving
for kink play

seriously?
that's unhygenic
so wrong
and so gross
posted by His thoughts were red thoughts at 8:02 PM on April 2, 2014 [85 favorites]

I checked my fuckbox!
posted by Kabanos at 8:03 PM on April 2, 2014

"Just out of curiosity, do you have a gmail account?"

Yeah. Just now I checked when I opened it and it was on June 16th. I didn't get in right away.

Interestingly, though, my very first email was from a mefite.

"colonel panic, at 3:44 PM, you referred to yourself in the third person."

"what's the third person? You mean him? i don't understand you. the anus is on the moderators for the quixoticking deleting."

(Justified reference. Not a paraphrase. Almost a complete fabrication. Verisimilitude high, but indeterminate.)
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 8:16 PM on April 2, 2014 [6 favorites]

I think there's just some folk who see a thing touted as 'good' in a post and so they have to screw their I AM AN EXPERT ON THINGS THAT ARE GOOD hat on real tight and then prove to you their Expertness At Good Things by pointing out that that supposedly 'good' thing is NOT GOOD, LET'S FIGHT ABOUT IT

This sounds reasonable, and i also agree that it is A Thing That Happens, but the degree to which it happened in that thread is just ridiculous. There's like 18-20 comments specifically poopin on it just within the first half of he thread, and even more that derail into discussing the essay in general that would probably total up to over 30. I would feel safe saying half of the thread turned into that.

The behavior you're discussing generally involves a small group of 2-5 people arguing about some pedantic detail and being experty. In this thread, almost no one double posted about it who on the directly crapping or defense side or even just discussing it. It was a WIDE showing of people who all bizarrely wanted to harp on this kids essay and sort of project their own insecurity regarding this shit or... something*

I don't know, this just doesn't strike me as a typical or platonic threadshit of that variety. It's like this struck some nerve deep within a lot of mefites that they felt it was "unfair" this kid was going so far, or that the standards had dropped and he never would have been this sucessful in their day, or... something. It's like it made everything go "NUH UH IM WAY SMARTER THAN THIS DUMB KID" even if they didn't realize that is essentially what they were saying. And it was kind of just, a really sad a pathetic display and a really ugly moment for this site. Idk.

*flying dangerously close to the sun of my hatred for armchair psychoanalysis in MeTa here, i acknowledge.

I also realize i'm making one of my bizarre soapboxy posts.
posted by emptythought at 8:19 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

I dunno, maybe it's just that the essay was specifically mentioned in the original post as being impressive, Mefites like to be pedantic, and there wasn't much else to discuss?

I don't think I could hang around a website where I thought a significant vocal minority of users misanthropically sought to shit on the accomplishments of a teenager.
posted by muddgirl at 8:23 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

I've got bad news for you then
posted by shakespeherian at 8:24 PM on April 2, 2014 [4 favorites]

Yeah. Just now I checked when I opened it and it was on June 16th. I didn't get in right away.

Interestingly, though, my very first email was from a mefite.

I was just wondering if your memories about these two things intermingled a bit. I'm finding the notion of "internet time" interesting these days and find that I keep track of time differently with internet related activities than I do offline things.
posted by SpacemanStix at 8:26 PM on April 2, 2014

Sounds like that thread is a fuckbox I'd rather not check out.
posted by cashman at 8:33 PM on April 2, 2014

I always try and be my best elf.

Seriously, desjardins' cat gif is totes awesome.
posted by arcticseal at 8:34 PM on April 2, 2014 [9 favorites]

I dunno, maybe it's just that the essay was specifically mentioned in the original post as being impressive, Mefites like to be pedantic, and there wasn't much else to discuss?

yeah, this was my thought.

As someone who criticized the essay mostly because it was set up to be really good (it seemed like), I mean, I regret that it made people so upset. But I clicked on it thinking it was going to be amazing and it was just sort of ok.
posted by sweetkid at 8:42 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

I dunno, maybe it's just that the essay was specifically mentioned in the original post as being impressive, Mefites like to be pedantic, and there wasn't much else to discuss?

Yeah, I mean, what else is there to say? "Oh, that's nice." I think I also regret clicking over to read the essay and thinking it was eventually going to get good and it just being meh. The grind is with the FPP, not the kid.
posted by corb at 8:43 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

People actually said "tubular"?

Huh.
posted by clockzero at 8:51 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Every time i look at one of those comments being hypercritical of the essay, or bringing up the race thing at all the thread just radiates a bunch of disgruntled white dudes(and i'm sure, some ladies) who think they somehow didn't get a fair shake at getting in to the college they wanted and that affirmative action is so unfair and shit.

Seriously, go look at that thread and how many comments dig on that essay and how they aren't that impressed with it and stuff. Do you not get a gross feeling?

I got an extremely gross feeling about the thread and the feeling was that it was racist. I felt the same way about the recent UCLA Law thread and the thread about the black woman who wanted to rush a white sorority at Alabama a few months ago. I guess the specific stuff that I objected to in the first thread was the sort of "well come on of course an African immigrant kid is going to get in to Harvard" type comments like the kid couldn't also have been highly-qualified. In the other two threads, I felt like there was a lot of "well, why did they go to that school in the first place? what did they expect?" and I mean I think they expected to be able to go to any college or university in the country and not have to face systemic racism.

I have been not stepping in to those conversations because I become a drama llama very quickly and I think that's bad for the site as a whole and because I felt like it wasn't my place because I'm not black. I'm sure I'm not handling this perfectly and I could probably flag a lot more. I know I'm pretty far to the left on a lot of social issues (my standard for deleting sexist stuff would be a lot higher, but I understand that's my personal whatever and it's fine) and maybe this is a case of that but it's concerned me. Sorry to come in here like a jerk in someone else's Meta, I can start another one but that seems like it could go really bad really quickly so I guess I am just trying to say this.
posted by Snarl Furillo at 8:56 PM on April 2, 2014 [23 favorites]

I don't know, I thought the whole fact that this was "news" was sort of weird and going for racist comment section type stuff on the media that picked it up. It's weird that this became a story. I've seen commentary on Facebook about it and while I agree it's good to shine a light on black achievement, the framing of a lot of the media discussion seemed like it was trying to raise an affirmative action or race debate.

I mean the kid grew up solidly middle class - personally I got a squicky feeling from the "wow! black people CAN do all this" vibe from the media - whereas it should be so much more obvious that race has zero to do with achievement, and it's completely the socioeconomic and family structures that kids are exposed to, many of which are destroyed by institutional racism.

When we talk about black achievement, when we talk about affirmative action, to me we're talking about correcting wrongs from institutional racism and the genuinely poor shot a lot of poor black kids get because of the circumstances they're born into, rather than 'black people can't do X, so let's give em a leg up" sort of thing.
posted by sweetkid at 9:06 PM on April 2, 2014 [17 favorites]

bruce: "colonel panic, at 3:44 PM, you referred to yourself in the third person. except for the case of self-deprecation, everybody i've ever met who does this is a jumped-up buffoon. "

No one tell Bob Dole.
posted by Chrysostom at 9:09 PM on April 2, 2014

Regarding the criticism that the essay was set up as being something amazing or unmissable (to paraphrase): the thing is, it wasn't. Here's the full text of the FPP:

Long Island teenager Kwasi Enin made headlines this week for having the honor of being accepted at all eight Ivy League colleges, as well as Duke, Stony Brook University, SUNY Geneseo and Binghamton University. This is the essay he credits with a big part of his success.

"This is the essay he credits with a big part of his success" is not overly effusive praise, really.
posted by Lexica at 9:11 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

That's true, but I took it and I think other people initially read it as "this essay is going to be super great!" Looking at it again, it's possible Kwasi credits the *content* of the essay as the reason behind his success, ie his love of music and how it shaped his connection to his school and community, and helped him learn leadership skills.

But still, the essay was linked in the article, it seemed to a lot of people like it was a feature, and they commented on whether it was great or not. I agree there wasn't much story to this beyond that so people focused on the essay.

To call them racist or frustrated about their own life success because of that is gross and uncalled for though.
posted by sweetkid at 9:19 PM on April 2, 2014

Yeah, I agree that the framing of the story overall (not just on Metafilter) was super-weird and freighted. Like, it's cool generally that the kid did an amazing thing that is rare and that's a perfectly normal human interest story AND I would be interested to read more good discussions about affirmative action (and I'm aware that my standard for what a "good" discussion would be in this case is not universal or even necessarily correct) but the latter is so racially loaded that it seems like a bad if inevitable idea to pair them up.
posted by Snarl Furillo at 9:21 PM on April 2, 2014 [4 favorites]

I propose that if you change the titular "Squeezebox" to "fuckbox" in The Who's famous song, the song's meaning does not change.
posted by Joey Michaels at 9:27 PM on April 2, 2014 [7 favorites]

Also I will say that I looked at the Kwasi Enin thread earlier today when it had many fewer comments and so the couple that mentioned race stood out much more to me. Looking at it again, it seems to have gone in a perfectly fine direction since then, so it's not really a very good example of the phenomenon that I was talking about.
posted by Snarl Furillo at 9:37 PM on April 2, 2014 [3 favorites]

I think the moderation here is fine and am happy we get a lot of pushback every time a Reddit-style FREE SPEECH argument raises its ugly head.

That said, I feel like March was weirdly fighty both around here and elsewhere on the internet and I can't say why, but April seems to be toning it down.
posted by Ghostride The Whip at 9:57 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

I didn't really think people were being unusually harsh in that thread. Honestly, I think most people were attempting in good faith to find any inroad to discuss a non-story that only sort of kind of makes sense qua a news event when engaging the type of fighty racialized discussion the story's original architects are (IMO) all but provoking.

There were basically three potential roads for that thread, as I see it:

1) Yay, congrats on your unusual but otherwise not really notable achievement. (is MeFi a family Christmas letter?)

2) Try to create discussion from the details of something concrete in the OP (basically the essay).

3) Take the articles' bait and have a (within this context) poisonous discussion about race and higher education.

None of these options really make for enlightening conversation. But I think #2 is sort of the best of 3 weak options.
posted by threeants at 10:12 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

Or put, maybe, more simply: I think the articles are sort of subtly, sort of not-so-subtly constructed as conversation/ragebait pieces for people who want to advance the wack idea that being a person of color earns you undue advantages in life. It makes me genuinely sad that a puff piece about a black person's achievements can't be taken at face value, but I think this story's context and framing really call for a thinkthrough.
posted by threeants at 10:28 PM on April 2, 2014 [10 favorites]

Or put, maybe, more simply: I think the articles are sort of subtly, sort of not subtly constructed as conversation/ragebait pieces for people who want to advance the wack idea that being a person of color earns you undue advantages in life. It makes me genuinely sad that a puff piece about a black person's achievements can't be taken at face value, but I think this story's context and framing really call for a thinkthrough.

Yea, pretty much this.

And for what it's worth, i think mefi is good at this sort of thing! a lot of the essay criticism that bugged me was everyone making their best effort at just doing #2 and not shitting up the thread with a bunch of #3 like every other place that was discussing this did.

The thing is, it gets stuck in the craw of what you just brought up. The article itself is just framing this in a shitty way. And i can't really unsee the elephant in the room i saw when i very first laid eyes upon this article that the entire thing is just like dressed up in a celluloid dickey ready to burst into flames as soon as someone lights up a smoke.

Someone, somewhere in the chain of this either wanted to have that fight or wanted the clicks it would generate.

I agree with you people were trying to do their best, but even the best that could come from this was still pretty gross. It's like the least injurious way to drunkenly fall out a 2nd story window.

Also, i liked the post you dropped in the original thread. I almost replied, but i realized anything i'd say would be wayy too MeTa-y and i'm trying to do that less.
posted by emptythought at 10:37 PM on April 2, 2014 [5 favorites]

Yeah, I mean, no specific offense to the OP of that thread, but I feel like the source material is just low-quality in all regards and there's really no great way up from there.
posted by threeants at 10:49 PM on April 2, 2014 [2 favorites]

joey michaels, the term "squeezebox" in The Who's song refers to an accordion, not a vagina. it's a rorschach for dirty minds like yours.
posted by bruce at 10:55 PM on April 2, 2014

I'm just surprised there's no Oglaf strip with the dwarves making a fuckbox.

Yet.

(Please?)
posted by sukeban at 11:40 PM on April 2, 2014 [9 favorites]

I think I dozed off halfway through this, but I want to say that what makes MetaFilter my home away from home is very much a result of the moderation here. You kids just can't be beat. I don't know how you do it but I thank you very much for not throwing in the towel when I'm sure you'd like to.

I appreciate the topics and especially the commentary, but if the comments were allowed to deteriorate to one-line snarky bits and attacks, MetaFilter would be nothing to shout about; it's the mods who prevent that from happening.
posted by aryma at 11:45 PM on April 2, 2014

Every time I run across a busy-ish street to get the bus, I always get on the bus wondering "what if this was the time I got hit by a car and everything from hereon out is the delusion of a dying mind?

Sometimes, when I'm lying in bed late at night and all the old fears come back, I worry that Stanislav Petrov hadn't been steadfast enough to stop the missiles flying, or Able Archer had spooked the soviets enough and that everything since 1983 has been the raving delusions of a mind scared shitless in the last few seconds before the bombs hit and any time now the shockwave will hit me.
posted by MartinWisse at 11:53 PM on April 2, 2014 [1 favorite]

joey michaels, the term "squeezebox" in The Who's song refers to an accordion, not a vagina. it's a rorschach for dirty minds like yours.

Hurm. In that case, it looks like a pretty flower.
posted by Joey Michaels at 1:30 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

Check your fuckbox!

1+ new hockey fan.
posted by Pudhoho at 1:32 AM on April 3, 2014

I'm looking forward to the next time cortex runs his fuck- words script, and seeing a massive spike in 'fuckbox'.
posted by Ned G at 2:03 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

bruce: "colonel panic, at 3:44 PM, you referred to yourself in the third person. except for the case of self-deprecation, everybody i've ever met who does this is a jumped-up buffoon. "

No one tell Bob Dole.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:09 AM on April 3
[+] [!]

I can't get rid of the uneasy feeling that this is Chrysotom revealing that he's been Bob Dole All along!
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:06 AM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

We've deleted a few of your comments just in the past two hours. Please feel free to let us know if it was the "who needs the facts" comment in the weather thread or the weird racist-sounding "maybe I didn't get into dartmouth because I didn't have an African name" comment in this thread? You seem to be trolling. If you're not trolling you may have to adjust your joke-o-meter a little.

In this case, there's no question that Colonel Panic was an ass and his comments were correctly deleted, but until this thread I would have assumed that when mods put parts of deleted comments in quote marks they were actually quoting and not paraphrasing. The versions of the comments that Colonel Panic posted later were worded quite differently. Were they closer to the actual posts? Again, it doesn't make much difference here, but it seems that it would be fairer to people making complaints while also making mods' lives easier if the policy were to use quote marks only when directly quoting.
posted by cincinnatus c at 2:35 AM on April 3, 2014 [10 favorites]

"maybe I didn't get into dartmouth because I didn't have an African name"

I am decidedly not a fan of the general moderation approach here, or a couple of mods in particular, but dude. Really. Come on.
posted by Decani at 3:27 AM on April 3, 2014

Wait. Jessamyn put that in quote marks when it wasn't the actual quote? See, THAT is an example of the sort of low bullshit I really, really loathe here. There's too much of that sneaky, underhand nonsense. If you can't justify your moderation without misrepresenting or twisting what you moderated, you're bang out of order and perhaps you should consider that moderation might not be a good fit for you.
posted by Decani at 3:33 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

joey michaels, the term "squeezebox" in The Who's song refers to an accordion, not a vagina.

Wait, what makes you think Joey would think a squeezebox "she wears on her CHEST" would be a VAGINA? What kind of mutant women have you been seeing?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:41 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Wait. Jessamyn put that in quote marks when it wasn't the actual quote?

You're joking, right?

We have been here (and never left) for the last, what, two months or so. I mean talking about """""paraphrases""""" has become a meme around here, you know. As to this particular case, and re-reading how the OP later re-prhased himself, does it make a difference what kind of quotes were used around which paraphrase?

[pointer: no]

Commenting on Metatalk isn't scholarly writing. Reading metatalk doesn't require scholarly reading skills. What it does require is a nice little dose of goodwill. Jessamyn has, in this very thread, left a comment that demonstrates just how far she herself goes out of her way regarding goodwill. What can there possibly be left to argue about?
posted by Namlit at 3:45 AM on April 3, 2014 [16 favorites]

I would like to argue about arguing (no I wouldn't).
posted by h00py at 3:51 AM on April 3, 2014

Can someone please post a pancake recipe?
posted by kinetic at 3:59 AM on April 3, 2014

German-style (that is: frying-pan large) pancakes with spinach in the batter are pretty nice as a hearty lunch.
posted by Namlit at 4:15 AM on April 3, 2014

That's Dutch style pancakes.
posted by MartinWisse at 4:27 AM on April 3, 2014

We can always talk about preferences when using quotation marks, but I'd like to note that "sneaky" and "underhand" don't enter into the situation. This is the thread started by the OP, who was being addressed directly, and who is right here and can discuss his comment. So, in other words, this wasn't an "I'm going to lie about this directly to his face and hope the OP doesn't notice" comment by Jessamyn, it was a "this is a shorthand description in quotes" comment.

Again, we can talk about doing it differently for Meta, but when people contact us to ask about deletions, we commonly say things like, "yeah, sorry, but a 'let me describe in detail how I want to physically torture this guy' comment is not okay because blah blah blah."
posted by taz (staff) at 4:40 AM on April 3, 2014 [16 favorites]

Dutch style

Yup, that too. I like some good Dutch-style pancakes. I've got have some home cured and -smoked bacon to contribute. Could you bring a bottle of stroop? There's a flight coming in from Amsterdam at 4:10 I believe, you ought to be able to make that.
posted by Namlit at 4:41 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

I think those Dutch-style spinach pancakes need some molten brie on top and possibly some sliced almonds.
posted by Too-Ticky at 4:42 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

BRIE?
Hmmm….
posted by Namlit at 4:43 AM on April 3, 2014

Appelstroop, Rinse stroop or suikerstroop?
posted by MartinWisse at 4:47 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Trick question! Rinse stroop is always partially appelstroop.
posted by Too-Ticky at 4:51 AM on April 3, 2014

This is the thread started by the OP, who was being addressed directly, and who is right here and can discuss his comment.

Sure. As I said, I didn't think it made much difference here, but there is definitely a sense when a mod uses quotation marks when talking about a deleted post that these are the exact words used. This can be problematic for the reasons outlined by billiebee in her recent Metatalk post, which was more about general use than specifically mod use. FWIW, this was the only comment from a mod in that thread:

My approach to this is to (try to) include a clarifying phrase like "your comment sounded to me like..." when using it for paraphrase or similar.

I think just the awareness that this is a possible source of misunderstanding goes a long way, both for people writing comments (so you can try to be unambiguous) and for people reading them (so you can be charitable in interpreting the other guy's comment). But I'll be interested to see if anyone has other ideas.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 5:01 PM on March 16 [3 favorites +] [!]
posted by cincinnatus c at 4:55 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Trick question or no, I'd say appelstroop. Some jong belegen would be good too.
posted by Namlit at 4:59 AM on April 3, 2014

FelliniBlank: I'd probably rather have a fuckbox than a penis beaker, but it's a toss-up, really.
shakespeherian: What about seafood lasagna

Seafood lasagna is definitely a toss-up.
posted by drlith at 5:03 AM on April 3, 2014

Veers off into the can I still eat this realm.
posted by Namlit at 5:05 AM on April 3, 2014

Can someone please post a pancake recipe?

Mine from a few years back, pretty much:

Ingredients

1.5 cups milk
1 egg
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
2 cups White Wings self-raising flour
0.25 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
0.25 cup caster sugar
25g butter, melted

Method

Whisk milk, egg and vanilla together in a jug. Sift flour and bicarbonate of soda into a bowl.

Stir in sugar. Make a well in centre. Add milk mixture. Whisk until just combined.

Heat a large non-stick frying pan over a not too hot heat. Brush pan with butter. Using 0.25 cup mixture per pancake, cook a pancakes for 3 to 4 minutes or until bubbles appear on surface.

Toss pancake in the air. Be puzzled at pancake not returning to frying pan. Inspect kitchen ceiling, noticing pancake stuck to it, bits of the ceiling starting to detach.

Turn off heat. Hurriedly leave house with partner, promising her "something better". Find a good Chinese restaurant and eat Dim Sum.

On return to the house, make sure partner does not enter the kitchen until you have scraped the evidence off the ceiling. Never mention any of this to anyone until on MetaFilter several years later.
posted by Wordshore at 5:14 AM on April 3, 2014 [9 favorites]

Can someone please post a pancake recipe?

I had to hunt down this from my childhood. Thank god the internet comes in handy for important pancake recipe requests.

Bewitching Blueberry Pancakes (serves 2-3) - From Old Black Witch
~
1 1/4 cups flour
2 1/2 tsp baking powder
3 T sugar
3/4 tsp salt
1 egg, beaten
3/4 cup milk
3 T oil
1/2 cup blueberries
~
As you stir in the blueberries (this is the magic part) say three times:
Gobble dee gook
With a wooden spoon,
The laugh of a toad
At the height of the moon!
~
Pour on a hot griddle and watch.
~
You can make things disappear just like Old Black Witch. Put three pancakes in front of any hungry boy or girl and watch them go.
posted by Nanukthedog at 5:15 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Strange- there's a point in the corporals comment history where they appear to be attempting to moderate the thread - I guess that shows that perhaps they have to get a bit more of a feel for the community.
posted by sgt.serenity at 5:15 AM on April 3, 2014

Guys, no more recipes please. We all officially love pancakes, but the recipes thing tends to make Metatalk useless for it's purpose.
posted by taz (staff) at 5:18 AM on April 3, 2014 [17 favorites]

GenjiandProust: "I can't get rid of the uneasy feeling that this is Chrysotom revealing that he's been Bob Dole All along!"

Can I say something, GenjiandProust? I don't know what my good friend Pierre Dupont - and that's your name; come on, it's Pierre, not Pete, don't go around telling people your name's Pete when it's Pierre - Pierre, I don't know what you know about Social Security. I mean, Bob Dole didn't grow up with a 150-foot yacht, I didn't have the convertible for graduation, the sterling silver cocktail shaker, or the machine that tears the tennis balls at you....
posted by Chrysostom at 5:20 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

If you want to make them disappear taz, you need to say the magic words three times.
posted by Nanukthedog at 5:36 AM on April 3, 2014

appelstroop
appelstroop
appelstroop
posted by taz (staff) at 5:39 AM on April 3, 2014 [22 favorites]

Veers off into the can I still eat this realm.

Parsing exercise:

A. Veers off into the" can I still eat this" realm.

B. Veers off into the "can I still eat this realm?"

Which was written by Garthrax, the Enormous Green Dragon and which merely written for the Green?
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:41 AM on April 3, 2014

I dunno, maybe it's just that the essay was specifically mentioned in the original post as being impressive, Mefites like to be pedantic, and there wasn't much else to discuss?

Oh. Hmm. I hope it's clear my comment in that thread was just intended as a silly joke and not an actual criticism of the essay (or Kwasi, or Harvard Men, for that matter).
posted by Rock Steady at 5:41 AM on April 3, 2014

Maaaaaan. Come for the whining, stick around for the recipes is what I always say! *

* not really, but I was getting bored with ordinary pancakes, so yay!
posted by bitter-girl.com at 5:44 AM on April 3, 2014

appelstroop

If you say this three times in front of a bathroom mirror at midnight, the Pancake Witch will come and batter you.
posted by GenjiandProust at 5:48 AM on April 3, 2014 [10 favorites]

If you can use NaCL to store electricty, what do you have?

[beat]

[beat]

[beat]

A salty battery!
posted by MartinWisse at 5:53 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Did you hear the one about the chemistry professor arrested for pulling out the sodium chloride and a nine volt during a disagreement in the lab?
posted by Nanukthedog at 5:56 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Given the MeFi history here, I think we need to drop getting into the 9 volt battery thing in a thread devoted to sly puns about anatomical metaphors summoned by the mention of various kinds of boxes.

Or we will be here all week and get nothing else done until the eroto-paronomastic fever subsides.
posted by spitbull at 6:15 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

Two peantuts were walking down the steet and one of them was asalted.

Peanut.
A salted peanut
posted by shothotbot at 6:16 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

The Underpants Monster: "Dammit, if I could figure out how to build a fuckbox with built-in TI-83, I could retire to Arizona."

Isn't TI-83 Fuckbox one of those The Terminator sequels?
posted by chavenet at 6:18 AM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

Sorry to rerail, but to address the post, No... I don't always agree with a comment or post deletion, whether it's something I'm responding to in a thread, a FPP, or my own comments. However, I also have never been thoroughly flummoxed by a deletion, whether it's something I posted or something posted by someone else.

I don't think that the moderators are so far off base and out of touch with the posting populace here that anyone who has spent time perusing the front page and subsequent comments would be completely (and honestly) shocked and confused by a deletion.

To reiterate, I don't always agree with deletion, sometimes I think that a Mod may have read too much or too little into a specific post or comment, but in nearly a decade, I have never been absolutely confused by a deletion.

Sometimes it takes a minute of looking at things from a different perspective, and taking into account the Mods' position of attempting to make this place as welcoming and open to the people who have chosen and paid to be here. I'm sure each Mod brings their own belief system and experience to the table, just as I am sure each Mod has made mistakes in their tenure here. It's the nature of being human, and a necessary component of having human moderators. I don't think Metafilter would be better off if bots were moderating threads for flagged words and flag/favorite algorithms.

I have changed over the last ten years, become more conservative on some levels, less idealistic, more interested in changing some things, less in others. This place has evolved too, and that is OK. There are some topics I try to stay the hell away from, because I don't agree with how I perceive the majority of MeFites feel, or I think some topics are silly and ridiculous and don't have anything serious to add, where it is evident that historically speaking there are a great many people who take the topic very seriously. Me chiming in with an unbidden witticism isn't going to help discourse, even if it is really funny (at least to me).

I came here in 2004, and continue to come here, because it's interesting, fun, alternatively serious and insane, educational, silly, and challenging. The last bit sometimes can make me want to sign off for good, but what is life but not a constant evolution of thinking, perceptions and understanding. Wisdom isn't gained by agreement, but by being challenged. And, at the end of the day, I choose to open my browser, click on the bookmark, and select each link I view, whether linked article/page or its comments. I know of no other educating and entertaining interactive "object" in my life which would provide years of use for $5.

Lastly, I know someone joked above about "going to reddit," but this is precisely where I go (although I don't have an account there) when I need to indulge my less cerebral/liberal self. Despite the opinions you may find here regarding reddit, I find it a welcome companion to MetaFilter.

Hope this helps.
posted by Debaser626 at 6:33 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

Great, now I'm always going to think of an accordion as a "fuckbox."
posted by The Underpants Monster at 6:41 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

If you can't justify your moderation without misrepresenting or twisting what you moderated, you're bang out of order and perhaps you should consider that moderation might not be a good fit for you.

This is meanspirited* and asinine. And, if you really truly believe that the core moderation team is incompetent and dishonest, what on earth are you doing spending time here? It's a big internet with lots of options, and if a place makes you feel bad and unhappy and it clearly isn't going to change, the smart thing to do is leave.

* The routine pattern is that the really mean stuff is always in reference to the female moderators. Freud might say it's mommy issues, or maybe it's just reflective of how people feel entitled to express aggression in our society, but either way it makes me feel shitty to keep seeing it.
posted by Dip Flash at 6:46 AM on April 3, 2014 [57 favorites]

I propose that if you change the titular "Squeezebox" to "fuckbox" in The Who's famous song, the song's meaning does not change.

the term "squeezebox" in The Who's song refers to an accordion, not a vagina. it's a rorschach for dirty minds like yours.

Next up on Human Music with Z'Laz and Ee^eeee: Is it possible to get the blues so bad it puts your face in a permanent frown?
posted by bleep-blop at 6:47 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

*headdesk*
posted by zarq at 6:52 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Ivan Fyodorovich: "Today is my ten year anniversary at MetaFilter"

Happy anniversary! :)
posted by zarq at 6:53 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

Metafilter: Veers off into the can
posted by Chairboy at 7:02 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

So the March 16th thread about deleted comments has multiple references to "echo chamber".

I think that's being kind. In this thread alone the redundancy of thought (mixed in with the recipes and snark competitions) is so uniform its almost as if commenters are climbing on top of each other to be the next person to say the same thing.

If that thing is The Mods are Great, Do Not Criticize Them, well sorry but at least one of them used quotes while inaccurately paraphrasing my comment for the effect of making it seem more outrageous than it was.

I wasn't trying to start a shitstorm so I was initially apalled at the response here but now I think this venue is actually all about shit storms. In that respect I'm disappointed because i thought metatalk was not exactly like any other messageboards. Aside from a fetish level of jingoism it is exactly the same but maybe more annoying.

I know it sounds obvious but i should go frequent the less annoying messageboards now. I guess i will.
posted by Colonel Panic at 7:03 AM on April 3, 2014

If you're quixotically deleted does it mean you're tilting at windmills?
posted by Segundus at 7:04 AM on April 3, 2014

The Mods are Great, Do Not Criticize Them

Of for shit's sake, man.

As someone who is occasionally disposed to grumpy observation about the rate of and reasons for comment deletion here, and who does in fact feel this site has become somewhat overmoderated to my taste compared to what's possible and might have been the case in the past (debatable), but who realizes that's just my view of what kind of discourse space I prefer, not some transcendent ideal that Metafilter Needs to Be), and in addition as someone who is a bit of a stickler on the issue of "direct quotes" that are used as reductive paraphrases (hey, I'm an academic, it's in my blood, I see the technique used in bad faith or thoughtless rage a lot in heated threads here), I nevertheless would never dispute that the mod crew is acting in anything but good faith and with the best of intentions and with generally and commendably fair and transparent policies and responsiveness to critique and questioning.

Even. When. I. Think. They. Are. Wrong. Or. Made. A. Mistake. That's what "good faith" means, and it requires good faith and civility to address differences of perspective that are equally grounded in good faith and intentions. (Read your Habermas.)

So I am always interested in debates about deletions that are triggered by a MeTa that is *respectful* to that good faith and the earnest intentions of the mods (and indeed most of the community).

But as soon as I see any trace of "silenced all my life" bullshit creeping in, I know I'm gonna come down on "good deletion" and/or "let it go dude." I think calling anything that happens on a privately owned internet forum of any sort "censorship" or whatever is equivalent to Godwinning the argument with hyperbole, trivializes actual censorship in the real world, and produces schismogenesis in which personal conflicts become sides and teams.

That and even if the paraphrase in question was slightly more blunt, the "African name" comment was so bleedingly racist on its face and in its original form that I regret I did not have a chance to add to the flag pile. (In other words, you must stop trying to cut down a tree with a Red Herring.)

And finally, it's just a comment in an internet discussion, get over it or you'll die unhappy if such little things eat away at you regularly.

I myself usually think bluntly racist comments that are quickly rebutted and Obviously Bad should be allowed to stand as examples of what they represent, in a universe where free exchange of ideas produces greater purchase on truth. But I understand why they are not and what sort of culture is being fostered where such remarks are simply not only not tolerated, but not allowed to remain part of the record.

And I accept, in exchange for all the value this site and community provides for me, that participating here means you accept the house rules, even when they shift or are ambiguous or simply evolve over time thanks to the changing demographics of the community. Despite my occasional differences with mod decisions, I find accusations of bad faith or personal enmity leveled at their decisions to be stupid and patently wrong.
posted by spitbull at 7:05 AM on April 3, 2014 [50 favorites]

In this thread alone the redundancy of thought (mixed in with the recipes and snark competitions) is so uniform its almost as if commenters are climbing on top of each other to be the next person to say the same thing.

If that thing is The Mods are Great, Do Not Criticize Them, well sorry but at least one of them used quotes while paraphrasing my comment for the effect of making it seem more outrageous than it was.

I think I see the problem - you are assuming that we are falling all over ourselves to say "The Mods Are Great, Do Not Criticize Them."

In fact, the takeaway you should be getting from this is "The Reason Your Comments Were Deleted Was Because They Were Bad Comments, You Zitbrain."
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:08 AM on April 3, 2014 [28 favorites]

Wow - I'm prescient today. FWIW I really don't think it's possible for anyone to make your comment seem any more outrageous than it already was.
posted by Chairboy at 7:12 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

at least one of them used quotes while paraphrasing my comment for the effect of making it seem more outrageous than it was.

You can get a referendum from other folks about whether I was actually doing you a kindness or making you seem more outrageous. I can honestly say I wasn't trying for the latter but actually the former. In fact you didn't even seem to notice/mind this (I thought it was obvious I was paraphrasing, if not then I apologize) until Decani showed up bearing his usual grudges. People criticize me, all the mods, all the time. Comes with the territory. We just make you do it here and not in the middle of unrelated threads. You want to see Do Not Taunt Mods communities, you will have to go elsewhere.

I think there are a lot of people in the thread who think the mods are okay or even maybe a little overreaching but who still like the community and so they stick around. You may or may not be one of those people which is totally fine. You seemed to want to know what people think about your topic, but then when they tell you, you decide to call everyone names. I don't really get it.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:13 AM on April 3, 2014 [32 favorites]

its almost as if commenters are climbing on top of each other to be the next person to say the same thing.

You said you wanted a 'me too' thread. Can you make up your mind already?
posted by Too-Ticky at 7:20 AM on April 3, 2014 [22 favorites]

When people say, "I want to know what everyone thinks," they often mean, "I want everyone to agree with me."
posted by Chrysostom at 7:21 AM on April 3, 2014 [35 favorites]

In fact you didn't even seem to notice/mind this (I thought it was obvious I was paraphrasing, if not then I apologize) until Decani showed up bearing his usual grudges.

To be fair to him, Colonel Poo's first follow-up comment (16 hours ago) was almost entirely a complaint about being misquoted, with him trying to reconstruct the actual words he had used (admittedly nearly as bad as the paraphrase).
posted by cincinnatus c at 7:25 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

Damn, I knew I should have used some kind of sarcasm indicator.
posted by Too-Ticky at 7:26 AM on April 3, 2014

When people say, "I want to know what everyone thinks," they often mean, "I want everyone to agree with me."

I've also noticed that when people say something like "well maybe I should go join some other message board" they often don't.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:29 AM on April 3, 2014 [12 favorites]

at least one of them used quotes while inaccurately paraphrasing my comment for the effect of making it seem more outrageous than it was.

Having seen both your version of the comment and the paraphrase, I'm disinclined to agree with you about this. Your actual comments as you presented them do not make you sound like less of an ass than do your comments as jessamyn paraphrased them. Just, if you wanted someone else's take.

I suppose it's lucky for jessamyn that this isn't an English paper or someone would have to mark her down for using quotation marks around a paraphrase, but, y'know, this isn't an English paper and she's doing her job with what appears to me to be the strong-maybe-even-overwhelming support of the people who have responded in this thread.

My advice to you: quit digging.
posted by gauche at 7:29 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

Also, I know from the inside how elite college admission processes actually work. Do you have any freaking idea how hard it is to get good *viola* players for your excellent college orchestra? Compared to violists, star track and field athletes are common.

So maybe what you meant was "Maybe thats why i [sic] got rejected by Dartmouth. Probably didnt [sic] help i [sic] wasnt [sic] [a seriously good violist]?"
posted by spitbull at 7:31 AM on April 3, 2014 [9 favorites]

Also, if it were an English paper, that same someone would probably have mark you down for failing to cite your instances of the behavior you are talking about.

So, you know, lucky all around I guess.
posted by gauche at 7:31 AM on April 3, 2014

Seconding that Jessamyn's offhand paraphrase did not change the sense of the offensive comment under discussion one bit, at least the "African name" vs. "Kwasi" distinction. In the latter case, "Kwasi" was very clearly meant as a metonym for "African name" of any sort, which itself is a metonym for "black person (illegitimately) advantaged by affirmative action policies," and you damn well know it.

You will not convince this particular echo chamber otherwise either, which is one reason some of us like it here.
posted by spitbull at 7:44 AM on April 3, 2014 [39 favorites]

Schismogenesis was 10x better with Phil Collins as the frontman, and anyone who disagrees with me is an ignorant poopyhead.
posted by drlith at 7:46 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

That is, unless you're from Ghana and you view an advantage accruing to the name Kwasi to be evidence of discrimination against non-Akan-speaking Ghanaians named Toure.
posted by spitbull at 7:47 AM on April 3, 2014 [24 favorites]

"Schismogenesis" is a term Metafilter needs to learn. It was coined by the anthropologist Gregory Bateson in the 1930s, and basically refers to the seemingly natural tendency of humans to divide and subdivide into opposed factions within any social group. It's the opposite of "cohesion" or collaboration.
posted by spitbull at 7:49 AM on April 3, 2014 [21 favorites]

Gregory Bateson sounds like an idiot. That's all I need to learn about him and/or the stupid words he's coined.
posted by klarck at 7:51 AM on April 3, 2014 [9 favorites]

You can get a referendum from other folks about whether I was actually doing you a kindness or making you seem more outrageous.

If the Colonel's reproduction of what he said was accurate, then yes, it was more awful. If he was hoping the original somehow sounded less racist, then it did not, not to me.
posted by rtha at 7:51 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

klarck, lolwhut? He's a major figure in the history of social thought.
posted by spitbull at 7:53 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

It's the opposite of "cohesion" or collaboration.

I call this the monkeys vs. spacemen effect. When I was in Seattle and hung with a group that was in the New Year's Parade the sure fire crowd-pleaser was to split into two groups--whatever they were, you can make them up--and then have a mock conflict between them. Doesn't have to be based on anything, just "Here are the two sides, they fight..." and then all of the parade activities can be based around that. People love a good conflict. Even better if it's between sides that ultimately don't matter much (i.e. monkeys/spacemen is better than baseball teams is better than political elections)
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 7:55 AM on April 3, 2014 [18 favorites]

I just had a very nice exchange with Jessamyn about a comment of mine that was deleted. I was answered within 15 seconds and once she explained it, I couldn't disagree with her decision.

Point is, the mods are very happy to discuss any question with you, and to explain the thought process. You can agree or disagree, but at the end of the day, if you want unmoderated messages, Metafilter ain't the place for you.
posted by Ruthless Bunny at 7:55 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

spitbull: klarck, lolwhut? He's a major figure in the history of social thought.

I think klarck's just... schismogenesising.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:56 AM on April 3, 2014 [10 favorites]

Oh sorry, I get it now. Duh.

Sorry, Bateson was important to me and I have never seen the word "stupid" used in proximity to his name before. ("Wrong," yes, but not "stupid.")
posted by spitbull at 7:56 AM on April 3, 2014

I think klarck's just... schismogenesising.

And in that case, er, um, so was I.
posted by spitbull at 8:00 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

Is the verb form schismogenizing?
posted by nangar at 8:00 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Jerk. ; }
posted by spitbull at 8:00 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

[Schismogenesis] refers to the seemingly natural tendency of humans to divide and subdivide into opposed factions within any social group. It's the opposite of "cohesion" or collaboration.

There's safety in numbers
When you learn to divide
How can we be in
If there is no outside?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:01 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

My favorite example for teaching schismogenesis as a concept is the South Park episode that features the future war between the "United Atheist League" vs. "Unified Atheist Alliance," which is the commonest internet meme version of "schismogenesis," so 20-something grad students get the concept quickly.

Believe it or not, the undergrads have hardly even heard of South Park anymore.
posted by spitbull at 8:06 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

Re-reading the original question, and the room, I can think of no other way this thread could have developed, including the recipes in the middle.*

Two points to lift out from this mess-that-can't-be-truly-meant-seriously:

To water down the idea of "censorious tendencies" [quotes intended] in support of a ""me too"" statement in an internet forum is a rather terrible move of making light of real concerns of a most serious kind of real people in a real world for one's own petty aims. Not cool.

To duck away from discussing the Kwasi thing, no matter whether in paraphrase or as a literal quote, in favor of these statements about good faith and the use of quotes is just about the least easy-to-stomach thing I've seen in this place, ever. What is it you even want to discuss here? I can't begin to imagine an answer.

*Well, nobody has yet mentioned that counter productive is what some carpenters are.
posted by Namlit at 8:07 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

spitbull: Believe it or not, the undergrads have hardly even heard of South Park anymore.

Oof.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:07 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

I'm sorry. I have a problem with premature schismogenesis.
posted by klarck at 8:08 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

And yet, yay.
posted by bleep-blop at 8:08 AM on April 3, 2014

The undergrads haven't missed much, I feel.
posted by Namlit at 8:10 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

I love schismogenesis; it's how we got "Solsbury Hill."
posted by FelliniBlank at 8:10 AM on April 3, 2014 [15 favorites]

The Judean People's Front vs the People's Front of Judea is my classic example of schismogenesis.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:12 AM on April 3, 2014 [25 favorites]

I've never had my comments randomly deleted. After writing them, if they were deleted I'd generally be able to look at them (albeit briefly) and know exactly why they were deleted.

Honestly, sometimes I wish some of my other comments were deleted too - you know, for the opposite of posterity.
posted by Nanukthedog at 8:17 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

> ... the future war between the "United Atheist League" vs. "Unified Atheist Alliance,"

It would be funnier if it wasn't already happening.
posted by nangar at 8:17 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

I always tell the undergrads they are living in my future (I'm almost 50).

(And that I expect them to show a little respect for it, thank you.)
posted by spitbull at 8:18 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Wait, what makes you think Joey would think a squeezebox "she wears on her CHEST" would be a VAGINA? What kind of mutant women have you been seeing?

Mama's got a squeezebox
Daddy never sleeps at night

It goes in and out and in and out and in and out and in and out...

This song titillated my stupid male jr. high classmates who had yet to have the pleasure of seeing rl/touching/licking a woman's vulva like you would not believe.

Everyone else understood the song referred to one of these.

Turned out that several of my classmates and I had one or more in our houses. All of them from the various 'old countries' our grandparents emigrated from.
posted by Pudhoho at 8:20 AM on April 3, 2014

Your jr. high classmates touch/lick a woman's vulva like I would not believe? Can you get me contact info? I'd like to make some introductions.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 8:24 AM on April 3, 2014

I think it's pretty clear the song intentionally implies both meanings.
posted by Chrysostom at 8:24 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

Not in the eye of the beholder, obvsl
posted by Namlit at 8:28 AM on April 3, 2014

Your jr. high classmates touch/lick a woman's vulva like I would not believe? Can you get me contact info? I'd like to make some introductions.

You're interested in 12 and 13 year old young women? How about I introduce you to a 30 year no parole penitentiary jolt, shitbird.
posted by Pudhoho at 8:31 AM on April 3, 2014

So the March 16th thread about deleted comments has multiple references to "echo chamber".

I think that's being kind. In this thread alone the redundancy of thought (mixed in with the recipes and snark competitions) is so uniform its almost as if commenters are climbing on top of each other to be the next person to say the same thing.

Look, buddy... Metafilter has its faults. Let me share a few of my own opinions.

Metafilter does have too many "clever" users who turn threads into joke one-upsmanship or snark one-upsmanship. It can get really tiresome sometimes, and it can turn threads into a fully derailed Spector-esque wall of noise. See this very thread as an example.

Metafilter also does have too many users who kiss the mods' butts, without having anything constructive or useful to add themselves. "Oh Jessamyn, you're so amazing." I mean, I agree that she's a good mod, and I appreciate that she donates so much of her time to support the site, but come on.

Also, it does feel like sometimes if a poster is a liberal or agrees with the hivemind, they're more likely to get away with a shitty post. Take this example, from a recent thread about the debate over the costs of building safety nets on the Golden Gate Bridge to prevent suicides.

Opponents don't care about human life and can go to hell.

For some reason, the mods didn't delete this post. Even though I agree with the poster's point (that the nets are totally necessary), I feel it's pretty obvious that it's noisy, rude, and it has an inappropriate tone for a thread on such a sensitive topic. Yet a bunch of people favorited it, and the comment still stands. It backs popular opinion, so it must not have picked up many flags.

I also feel sometimes that the mods delete posts for reasons that feel subjective or a little questionable. But even though I feel they overreach sometimes, I still think MeFi's moderators are some of the most thoughtful ones I've seen anywhere on the web.

All told, despite all those occasional gripes, I feel like the community still works, and works well.

The real problem in this situation is not the community, or any of its faults- it's you. Your posts are blatantly offensive and noisy. They sound like something I would expect my 13 year old brother to post on the internet- something with little or no filter.

Your posts were also typed the way my 13 year old brother would type them. A fact of life on the web (and in the workplace) is that most people won't take you very seriously if you can't be arsed to use basic elementary school spelling, grammar, and punctuation in what you write.

Don't try to turn this situation around on MetaFilter and make it about the site's faults. The specific problem here is entirely the fact that you don't think before you post.

And maybe go ahead and act on that "I'm leaving" threat. My experience is generally that whenever a community gets an "I'm leaving" threat from someone, the community will do just fine if they act on it.
posted by Old Man McKay at 8:38 AM on April 3, 2014 [11 favorites]

I think this comment was not the worst I've ever seen remain, though I disagree, "Still a lot of theory in that report so i am not drinking the Kool Aid. And the use of past tense for the here-and-now statuses is kind of spooky."

The other comment was was deliberately inflammatory and was rightly nuked.

Personally I would like to see less "short leash" treatment from from the mods for ideas regarding science as opposed ideas regarding morality [not that there is no overlap].
posted by vapidave at 8:40 AM on April 3, 2014

> Metafilter also does have too many users who kiss the mods' butts, without having anything constructive or useful to add themselves. "Oh Jessamyn, you're so amazing." I mean, I agree that she's a good mod, and I appreciate that she donates so much of her time to support the site, but come on.

Oh for Christ's sake. In the first place, these comments occur in the context of some asshat insulting the mods (usually, as mentioned above, the female ones). The point is not to kiss their asses, the point is to counteract the shit they have to deal with. Do you really not get that? In the second place:

I mean, I agree that she's a good mod, and I appreciate that she donates so much of her time to support the site

There you go, kissing the mods' butts.
posted by languagehat at 8:51 AM on April 3, 2014 [24 favorites]

Aside from a fetish level of jingoism

I wouldn't have expected the author of "Probably didnt help i wasnt named Kwasi" to have a problem with jingoism.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:54 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

I appreciate that she donates so much of her time to support the site

Not to be all "Well actually" but just making sure that people know that this is an actual full-time job, with dental benefits and stuff.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 8:56 AM on April 3, 2014 [37 favorites]

The point is not to kiss their asses, the point is to counteract the shit they have to deal with.

I see your point! There's nothing wrong with complimenting someone in a forum where they're being attacked. I still don't think it's necessary, though... my feeling is that the mods are a little more thick skinned than you might be giving them credit for.

Not to be all "Well actually" but just making sure that people know that this is an actual full-time job, with dental benefits and stuff.

I had no idea- that's awesome that MeFi can support a full time staff. Thanks for the heads up!
posted by Old Man McKay at 9:00 AM on April 3, 2014

If you say this three times in front of a bathroom mirror at midnight, the Pancake Witch will come and batter you.

And I would have thought she whisks you away.
posted by Celsius1414 at 9:01 AM on April 3, 2014 [11 favorites]

*Well, nobody has yet mentioned that counter productive is what some carpenters are

:-)
posted by nangar at 9:03 AM on April 3, 2014

my feeling is that the mods are a little more thick skinned than you might be giving them credit for.

Sure, I think anyone who moderates a web forum for a living - especially one that skews pedantic and intellectual with a lot of strong personalities and persistent user histories - would necessarily have to be able to roll with the punches.

Still, doesn't mean it's not shitty when yet another asshole comes along to accuse you of underhanded malicious intentions, and it's nice when people chime in to contest that. I can see why, from an outsider's perspective, praise for the mods might feel a little brown-nosey. But I think we also then have to ask ourselves: why is it so common practice to leave shitty comments on a blog or website, but often positive comments or genuine praise is saved for private messaging? I'm guilty of it, too - when I read a blog post and the comments are all "RIGHT ON!" I roll my eyes a little bit, and I'm much more inclined to MeMail effusive praise to a poster I have a braincrush on than come out and say it in a thread - but it's an impulse I'm beginning to question.

Unless the users complimenting the mods are colluding in some sort of bizarro flattery cabal that I'm not aware of (wasting your time, I'd say, the mods can obviously only be paid off with pie and postcards), I'm trying to take those comments at face value as sincere expressions of appreciation, with no further inference about motives or the mods' ostensibly delicate sensibilities.
posted by Phire at 9:12 AM on April 3, 2014 [9 favorites]

So the March 16th thread about deleted comments has multiple references to "echo chamber".

One person's echo chamber seems to be another person's community consensus. Or maybe more accurately, a bunch of people's community consensus.
posted by Toekneesan at 9:14 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

a) The deleted comment in the Ivy League thread was gross and I'm glad it was deleted. **
b) I don't feel like Jessamyn was deliberately trying to belittle Colonel Panic by putting her paraphrased version of what he said in quotes.
c) That said, as someone who is uptight about punctuation to the degree that it makes coworkers roll their eyes at me (and to the degree that I sometimes over-punctuate), my own personal habit is to put actual quotes in inside quotation marks (" "), and paraphrases inside single quotes (' '). I don't know where I picked that up, but I assumed it was somewhat standard. Or maybe I made it up! I don't know for sure. But now I worry that people think I've misquoted them when I've put a paraphrase of their comment inside single quotes.

I suppose it doesn't help that the single quotes are more standard as notations of actual quotations in the UK. (Or used to be. Is that still the case?)

**I mentioned in that thread that the first article I saw about the kid was illustrated by a stock photo of flashing police lights. Headline was the standard 'Kid Gets into All Nine Ivy League Schools' (single quotes!). Because of the headline juxtaposed with the stock photo, I confusedly thought it was a crime story, and opened the article thinking "got into" meant "broke into."

This dog whistle-y shit is everywhere. All you have to do is use the right -- er, wrong -- stock photo to get people thinking something bad about the kid. 'And it doesn't help that he has a name like Kwasi.'
posted by mudpuppie at 9:15 AM on April 3, 2014

There's nothing wrong with complimenting someone in a forum where they're being attacked. I still don't think it's necessary, though

The OP specifically asked "to get some opinions on the moderation here" so people gave their opinions, which are pretty much "the mods do a great job [paraphrase winking smiley tongue out]". So it's not about kissing ass or thinking they're thin-skinned, it's giving Colonel Panic what they asked for, if not what they were hoping for.
posted by billiebee at 9:16 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

>Wait, what makes you think Joey would think a squeezebox "she wears on her CHEST" would be a VAGINA? What kind of mutant women have you been seeing?

"Mama's got a squeezebox
Daddy never sleeps at night

It goes in and out and in and out and in and out and in and out..."

Yeah, but the opening line is "Mama's got a squeeze box she wears on her chest". So unless mama's the (by-now-infamous) sex teratoma,(NSFW) I think there's some biological confusion going on.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:18 AM on April 3, 2014

I always thought that it was talking about ... what do the kids today call it... titty fucking?
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:20 AM on April 3, 2014 [20 favorites]

I thought, oh it's an Amazon link. Probably pretty safe. Maybe a book on sex stuff or something.
posted by cashman at 9:20 AM on April 3, 2014 [22 favorites]

I always thought that it was talking about ... what do the kids today call it... titty fucking?

See, yes, I always thought the double entendre the Who were going for was something boob-related as well.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:22 AM on April 3, 2014

There's nothing wrong with complimenting someone in a forum where they're being attacked. I still don't think it's necessary, though... my feeling is that the mods are a little more thick skinned than you might be giving them credit for.

Why should one not be kind even to thick skinned people, if one feels like it's the right thing? I just don't get the implications of the "kissing ass" metaphor. As if a friendly gesture always means that one is hankering for benefits of an undefined (but silently known to all) kind. I, and other people here who are generally mod-sympathetic, may well be less brain dead than you give them credit for.
posted by Namlit at 9:23 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

Boy, between the squeezebox discussion and the blog post I just did decrying the Facebook breast cancer awareness memes, I am really being dicey about the NSFW line today.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:24 AM on April 3, 2014

Townsend in the liner notes for Scoop said the lyrics were "intended as a poorly aimed dirty joke." Daltry said in a magazine interview "I've never had a problem with that song because it doesn't pretend to be anything other than what it is and I love it for that. Live audiences love it. Nothing wrong with a bit of 'in-and-out', mate!"
posted by Lame_username at 9:26 AM on April 3, 2014

Metafilter: talking about ... what do the kids today call it... titty fucking?
posted by Chrysostom at 9:32 AM on April 3, 2014 [8 favorites]

Still, doesn't mean it's not shitty when yet another asshole comes along to accuse you of underhanded malicious intentions, and it's nice when people chime in to contest that.

Fair enough! Agreed.

(Thanks for the tone and tenor of your response, by the way.)
posted by Old Man McKay at 9:35 AM on April 3, 2014

This all gets me confused 'cause how does the accordion joke* fit together with all this squeezebox stuff?

*guy leaves his accordion on the back bench of his car and goes out for lunch. When he returns, he sees from a distance that a car window is smashed. Oh oh, he thinks, my accordion. But when he arrives at the car, what does he find? Someone left another accordion beside his own.

Yeah, ha ha, you knew it already.
posted by Namlit at 9:35 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

So here's my summary of this thread.

CP: This is outrageous and I would like to hear everyone's opinions!

Everyone: You're acting like an ass and the system is working as expected.

CP: You are all stupid and wrong and asskissers!

Everyone: Great, now we can go back to talking about pancakes and titty-fucking.

The Universe: Ah, yes, everything appears to be in order.
posted by KathrynT at 9:36 AM on April 3, 2014 [42 favorites]

I've always found the "ass-kissing" thing sort of weird, maybe because I've never really had any real kiss-up instincts, I dunno. Positive reinforcement seems like a good thing, being supportive of shit you like seems like a good thing, life's not just a series of brutally extracted proofs of righteousness or something where the only true compliment is that which is implied by manifesting one's capacity for stoicism.

I feel sometimes like there's this thing for some people where the basic theory is some sort of Never Side With Authority thing, where anything that looks like being voluntarily nice or complimentary of someone in any position of relative power is automatically suspect. That by virtue of any quantum of asymmetry, all encouraging words moving in the less-power to more-power direction are forfeit and disingenuous and necessarily a cynical and calculated play that condemns both parties. Or something. It's alien to me, I feel like my own assessment of it is ungenerous because I can't really make total sense of the headspace and am left trying to figure it out structurally.

I dunno. I've got a thick skin and it's gotten thicker over the last several years, but thick isn't bulletproof and as much as I love this job it's a weird one and I'm not embarrassed to say it's nice to get the occasional "hey, that looks like it sucked to deal with, good on ya" note now and then. People largely like it here, they are at the end of the day largely willing to be kind to each other and kind to us, and that's just sort of a nice human thing about this place.
posted by cortex (staff) at 9:37 AM on April 3, 2014 [29 favorites]

talking about ... what do the kids today call it... brutally extracted proofs of righteousness
posted by bleep-blop at 9:42 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Yeah, and the mechanism of the "Never Side With Authority thing" in a context like this one has never to do with the Authority, nor with the Sider but always with the Never-Sider, and that's why it's so difficult to discuss. We are not chained to a wall by some evil government or whatever else. We are free do walk away from a thread or from the entire stupid internet, and do some other stuff. The mods have not a kind of authority over the individual user, that would turn "siding" into a survival-type of situation. It's all in the heads of those who grump about the occasional mod-complimentary utterance here.
posted by Namlit at 9:49 AM on April 3, 2014

Not to be all "Well actually" but just making sure that people know that this is an actual full-time job, with dental benefits and stuff.

Just out of curiosity, how many moderator actions would you say you do on average to cover the cost of a root canal?
posted by Nanukthedog at 9:50 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

I wasn't trying to start a shitstorm

son, you ain't never seen a real shitstorm.
posted by quonsar II: smock fishpants and the temple of foon at 9:51 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

...life's not just a series of brutally extracted proofs of righteousness or something where the only true compliment is that which is implied by manifesting one's capacity for stoicism.

When one is the center of the universe, other people speaking or acting in a manner contradicting said universal center are cause for scorn and recrimination. And if more than one person is contradicting simultaneously -- well, that's obviously a fetishistic-jingoistic-echoic-chamberish-cabalistic conspiracy full of cultish collaborators.

Also: martyrdom is a devilishly seductive role.
posted by Celsius1414 at 9:51 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Hey, if I'd known there was so much enthusiasm for ass kissing and titty fucking, I would have been organizing completely different meet-ups all these years.

With buffets.
posted by Lutoslawski at 9:54 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

If I'd known this was going to be that kind of meet up something something mashed potatoes?
posted by Nanukthedog at 9:56 AM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

I've always found the "ass-kissing" thing sort of weird, maybe because I've never really had any real kiss-up instincts, I dunno.

I'm just glad you have insurance so you can go to the doctor for a salve when all the ass-kissing causes chafing.

Geeze... what's so bad about saying that the moderators mostly do a good job and are pretty decent overall? It's possible to actually appreciate people's hard work.

Also, as a mod-appreciator, I resent the suggestion that I kiss asses. When I want to bribe people, I call on the powers of a really good cheese shop. And I live in RI, where there is a finely grained culture of.... let's say... socially-influenced political decision-making.
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:57 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

something something mashed potatoes

Shhhh, we no longer speak of the potatoes.
posted by Lutoslawski at 9:58 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

I think it's funny that a lot of people who take issues to MeTa have this idea that the mods "randomly delete" posts. Like, whoop, there goes one of my posts again! I suspect, however, that 98% of users rarely or never are affected by deletions. The one time I'm aware of having had a post deleted was when I mean-spiritedly brought personal information from someone's comment in an unrelated thread to leverage a point against them. I regretted it immediately after posting and was extremely thankful to notice that a mod had deleted it and helped me avoid looking like a dickhead.
posted by threeants at 10:03 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Cortex, I really, really appreciate your work here. Come to the April meetup at Eastburn and I will demonstrate just how much.

By purchasing you the beverages of your choice, not that other way. Just to eliminate any possible confusion.
posted by Toekneesan at 10:05 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

I thought the mods were paid in hugs, so appreciation simply means more hugs!
posted by filthy light thief at 10:06 AM on April 3, 2014

Metafilter: hugs at the dentist
posted by Namlit at 10:07 AM on April 3, 2014

And by "that other way" I mean ass kissing, not titty fucking, to eliminate further possible confusion.
posted by Toekneesan at 10:10 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Eastburn doesn't even serve mashed potatoes.
posted by cortex (staff) at 10:10 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

> (Thanks for the tone and tenor of your response, by the way.)

Assuming that was aimed at me and the less gentle tone and tenor of my response, you might want to reread your original comment: "Look, buddy [...] It can get really tiresome sometimes [...] wall of noise [...] too many users who kiss the mods' butts [...] get away with a shitty post [...]" etc. etc. If you want people to be nice to you, try being nice to them. And surely you realize there's a long history of people accusing the mods of being fascist dictators and sheeplike users kowtowing and kissing their asses; if you don't want to be mistaken for a pig, don't lie down in the sty.
posted by languagehat at 10:10 AM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

I can bring mashed potatoes. I'm already going to be bringing a zip drive for vespabelle, so what's one more item.
posted by Toekneesan at 10:13 AM on April 3, 2014

For what is worth, I praise the mods not because I'm kissing ass but because Metafilter is moderated the way I'd moderate a site. I don't think it's unusual that the people who are most comfortable with the way a site is run are the ones who would care enough to participate in discussions such as this one. You don't move to Metatalk, to whit, unless you really like Metafilter.

There are probably plenty of people out there who don't like how this site is run. Good for them and hopefully they've found sites that better match their preferences.

Also, just because a bunch of people agree on something doesn't mean they are echoing each other. Reading through the names of the people participating in this discussion, I note a number of users whom I have witnessed attempting to verbally tear each other new fuck boxes. These are people who are not afraid to disagree with each other in loud, impolite terms - terms which sometimes require moderating.
posted by Joey Michaels at 10:13 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

" I regretted it immediately after posting and was extremely thankful to notice that a mod had deleted it and helped me avoid looking like a dickhead"

I've certainly, and correctly, been warned by mods in thread that my next comment would be deleted (breaking guidelines/getting fighty). In some ways it's so, so much worse than having a comment simply vanish. a public scolding, like the rest of the class chants "oooooooh, Blerp's in troooouble".

I know why it's done (more efficient than MeMail/ serves as a general guideline to the rest of the class), but it is such a shitty feeling, to be publicly warned, even if I wholeheartedly support the method.
posted by BlerpityBloop at 10:14 AM on April 3, 2014

Huh. I actually prefer a public warning, because I know that I can be prone to Full-Tilt Someone Is Wrong On The Internet mode, and the public callout can sometimes break through the trance.

Chacon a son gout.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:25 AM on April 3, 2014

The Fuckbox/Foxbuck Battle, Or, Gregory Bateson Is Not an Ingenious Gentleman But Rather a Tool of in the Pocket of Big Gabriel

In the first days of springtime,
winter finally at bay,
the old user took me
to read through the Grey.

For a while he stood silent.
Then finally he said,
with a very bad shake
of his very old head,
"As you know, in this part of the grey
we are Fites.
On the far other side of this site
live the Fits."

Then the user said,
"It's high time that you knew
of the terribly horrible thing that Fits do.
In every Fit house and in every Fit town
every Fit has a thing
that he calls a Fuckbox

"But we Fites, as you know,
do not fuck in a box
instead, the man said,
MeFites buck with a fox..
That's the right, honest way!"
as he gritted his teeth.
"So you can't trust a Fite, that’s what foxbuckers say!
Every Fite is a pervert!
He has kinks in his soul!
That's why, as a youth, I made questing my goal,
questing Fites for the Knights of the Foxbuck Patrol!

The one day I spied one,
a boxfucking Fite!
with huge arms and grim visage
just seething with spite!

If he dared to come close
I’d give more than a glance
with my powerful
finely honed Lotus Tree Lance.

For a while that worked fine.
All the Fites stayed away
and our country was safe.
Then one terrible day
a very rude Fite with complete nonchalance
snuck up and slingshotted my Lotus Tree Lance!

With my broken-off lance, with my head hung in shame,
to the Chief Moderator in sorrow I came.
But our Leader just smiled. She said, "You're not to blame.
And those Fits will be sorry they started this game.

"We'll dress you right up in a fancier suit!
We'll give you a fancier slingshot to shoot!"
And she ordered the Cabal (THERE’S NO CABAL) to figure
how to build me some sort of a triple-sling jigger.

With my Triple-Sling Jigger
I sure felt much bigger.

I marched to the Grey with great vim and great vigor,
right up to to that Fite with my hand on the trigger.
"I'll have no more nonsense," I said with a cluck,
"from Fites who think boxes are good places to fuck.

The Fite looked quite sickly.
He ran off quite quickly.

I'm unhappy to say
he came back the next day
with a new username but the same attitude,
and he snarled as he said, looking frightfully rude,
"You may fling those hard rocks with your Triple-Sling Jigger.
But I, also, now have my hand on a trigger!

My wonderful weapon, the Jigger-Rock Snatchem,
will fling 'em right back just as quick as we catch 'em.
We'll have no more nonsense.
We'll take no more lip
from you Fits who buck foxes on trains and on ships

You probably also
eat green eggs and ham!
And dress catses in hatses
And like Phil Collin’s jam!”

“That we do, I replied,
and we also like pancakes,
with triple-strength appelstroop, that’s how we partake.”

“That’s just wrong!” Said the boxfucking Fite,
“oh so wrong!
This xkcd comic will prove you how wrong!
The last straw had been laid,
I could take it no more,
And I flew into battle
And the battle turned to war

"Fight! Fight for the foxbucking Fits,
Do or die!"
Kill the boxfucking Fites and their
terrible lies!

Well . . .
We didn't quite do.
And we didn't quite die.
The thread just dragged on
‘Til the end of July.

As the posters gasped last
The carnage was vast
From boxfucking Fites with their callouts defiant
And foxbucking Fits thinking windmills were giants

“Let’s close this all up” I heard one small Fit say.
“Not so fast! We’ve BEEN SILENCED!” bleated Fites on the gray.

The thread was closed and so it stays.
Closed until this very day.

What did we learn from this huge war on fuckbox vs. foxbuck?
That squeezebox is a euphemism not for cootch but for titfuck.
posted by drlith at 10:26 AM on April 3, 2014 [18 favorites]

I leave the internet for three hours and suddenly there's titty-fucking on Metafilter.
posted by zarq at 10:27 AM on April 3, 2014 [8 favorites]

Wait... If "titty fucking" is what the kids call it today, what did we call it back in the day.

/keanu
posted by Joey Michaels at 10:30 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

ewwww guys eww
posted by sweetkid at 10:30 AM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

Was there anything out there? (for zarq, meaning when you left the internet for three hours)
posted by spitbull at 10:30 AM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

I love schismogenesis; it's how we got "Solsbury Hill."

"Is is the time signature," I thought. "The lyrics don't seem to express any sort of conflict, let alone a manufactured one. Do I remember that right?" I Googled ["Solsbury Hill" schismogenesis], knowing it would be futile. Google agreed, and in its wisdom tried to help by assuming I was taking the piss: all of the results on the first page said "Missing: ~~schismogenesis~~".

"It's not about the weird time signature, is it?" I glanced out the window, evening rush hour's laborious mundanity somehow slightly lifted by the budding promise of spring. I doubted myself. I was feeling part of the scenery. I went to get a glass of water. "I'll just ask," I thought. "It'll turn out to be some stupid joke but at least I'll have asked." "No, no, no, I'll only be the humourless mod again. And I don't want to derail the portentous discussion on titty-fucking". Maybe someone will bring it up and all will be explained. To keep in silence, I resigned. I had to listen, had no choice.

It couldn't possibly be about the time signature. I stared a good minute at the tool drawer I had removed earlier with an eye on the momentous task of sorting the various flavours of sticky tape I've amassed over the years. Rolls of tape by their nature are mostly made of hole, a waste of space that naturally invites the nesting of smaller rolls. The electrical insulation tape can go inside the sellotape, was my idea, yes, this is good and proper. Of course this arrangement of adhesives tends to fall apart the very moment you actually need use any, unless you want to go through the whole matryoshka process again every time you want to stick a thing to another stupid thing. The universe is cruel that way. So I had to come up with something else.

I wasn't doing that. I was thinking about Peter Gabriel. There was something I hadn't noticed about "Solsbury Hill" and that bothered me. Worse, I didn't understand what this thing even was. I did not believe the information. And clearly I could no longer trust my imagination. So there I sat, in an early evening of an early April, amazed at the late light, a miracle accomplished by the combined efforts of the EU's Directive 2000/84/EC on summer-time arrangements and Earth's solar orbit, not sorting tape and thinking about Peter Gabriel.

Peter Gabriel, who after leaving his old band, — oh. Right.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane (staff) at 10:31 AM on April 3, 2014 [79 favorites]

Hey, if I'd known there was so much enthusiasm for ass kissing and titty fucking, I would have been organizing completely different meet-ups all these years.

With buffets.

Verily, those would have been rude buffets.
posted by jamjam at 10:31 AM on April 3, 2014

Friends with buffets?
posted by GenjiandProust at 10:32 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

It's surprisingly hard to be rude to people when everyone is naked and eating scrambled eggs.
posted by Lutoslawski at 10:34 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Not that I would know.
posted by Lutoslawski at 10:34 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

I think a boxed lunch would be more appropriate.
posted by spitbull at 10:35 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

I'm not sure if this thread is still being serious or not, but here goes anyway.

I've had (multiple) comments deleted, most of them quite reasonably in retrospect.

There's only one thing in common between all of those comments: I was being an ass. The mods try to keep the ass-level to background noise, and I for one don't envy their job, especially when dealing with people like me who can be, let's say, highly strung. (Or at least in the words of the inimitable Mr Fawlty, should be.)

I'm not saying that I'm an ass (well, you are what you eat...) all the time. But there are times when assbehaviour leads to assposts and anti-ass deletions. See also the Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory.

Nor am I saying that you are an ass. But if you're getting deleted a lot, it's probably because you're making assposts. MeFi remembers everything except the deleted posts, and here's a personality call only you can make for yourself: do you want to be remembered for assposts or headposts?

Colonel Panic, I strongly recommend you hit the Big Red Button. I'm not saying quit the site, I'm saying make it impossible for yourself to make assposts.

Keep reading the site, for sure. And once you see something that you want to respond to in a headpost way, click here to contact the mods and ask for your account to be reinstated. That delay between "I would like to post" and "I am able to post" is generally more than enough to move the post control from your ass to your head. FWIW, that time delay was about twenty hours for me. (Although Jessabot's response to my asking to reinstate my account was about 27 nanoseconds, it took me those twenty hours to make sure I was responding with my head and not my ass).

My posting this may be an example of the above advice.

something something mashed potatoes

Shhhh, we no longer speak of the potatoes.

Mashed taters?
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:39 AM on April 3, 2014 [11 favorites]

So this is the foxfucking thread?
posted by Wolfdog at 10:40 AM on April 3, 2014

I propose that if you replace the titular "Squeeze Box" in The Who's classic song with the phrase "lunch box," the meaning of the song is essentially unchanged.
posted by Joey Michaels at 10:40 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Welcome back, fffm. :)

Was there anything out there? (for zarq, meaning when you left the internet for three hours)

Gorgeous weather!
posted by zarq at 10:42 AM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Phil Collin’s jam

Sounds like a job for the penis beaker.
posted by FelliniBlank at 10:47 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

Only to find Gideon's lunch box.
posted by bleep-blop at 10:47 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

My theory is if one person tells you that you should shut up, it's a simple disagreement and you can ignore them. But if multiple people tell you that you should shut up, it's a clear sign that you should take their advice.
posted by tommasz at 10:48 AM on April 3, 2014

PLEASER REQUEST YOUR $5 BACK AND GO AWAY. This is obviously not a good fit as a community for you, or a community that makes you happy, so you will probably be happier in some other community with different moderators.
posted by DarlingBri at 10:50 AM on April 3, 2014

My theory is, Skinner likes dog food.
posted by Chrysostom at 10:50 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

This is long.
posted by jonmc at 10:53 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

And life is short
posted by zarq at 10:54 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

One last "Squeeze Box" derail from me and I promise I'll drop it. The thing that makes me love that song isn't the salacious innuendo - it's the bridge, "squeeze me like you do... I'm so in love with you." Papa gets no rest because he and mama are still deeply in love. Townsend paints a picture of a happy older couple with a robust and playful love life and it's charming.
posted by Joey Michaels at 10:57 AM on April 3, 2014 [15 favorites]

May my grave stone read:

Lutoslawski
1985 -
He read all the MetaTalk threads.
posted by Lutoslawski at 10:58 AM on April 3, 2014 [13 favorites]

The FPP was sketchy because of tokenism.

We could treat the kid like a pet video, which most of the media has already.
We can also have a discussion of the institution of racism in the United States.
Some of our members say that this is something that Metafilter doesn't do well because we keep rehashing the same old arguments in the same manner of feminism and trans threads.

My personal feeling is that MetaFilter handles these topics exceptionally well.
Metafilter is the best forum bar none.

Why?

Firstly because our best contributors are not interested in winning picayune arguments, they are focused on changing people's minds.
Political struggle is a long game and our best endure.
There's an incredible concentration of intellect here.

The second is the consistent moderation. Dumbass crap, stupid derails, hairsplitters and other bed-wetters disappear fast once their 'contributions' are flagged
Stupid crap will vanish faster once folks understand flagging isn't tattling but rather scat removal. Would you cross the street just to step in a pile of dog shit? Of course not, flag it and move on.
Colonel Panic's racist comment got nixxed quick and that's a good thing.
posted by Pudhoho at 11:01 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Oh, "Squeezebox" is an awesome song for many reasons. (I mean, it's The Who.)

I kinda feel bad perpetuating the derail now, I just got confused about the alternate anatomical conceptions someone said it had provoked in them. But I also had to have someone explain to me how the lyrics to "Sledgehammer" could be dirty, so hey.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:03 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Will you be my internet spouse?
posted by Pudhoho at 11:07 AM on April 3, 2014

Over three hours before the first dismissive "all my life" comment? MetaFilter, you're slipping.
posted by entropicamericana at 11:07 AM on April 3, 2014

Slipping, slipping, into the lunch box.
posted by bleep-blop at 11:13 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Over 2 hours between one person killing another.
Now I get to go pick through the dirty underwear, etc, and figure out who done what.

Laterz
posted by Pudhoho at 11:14 AM on April 3, 2014

Welcome back, fffm. :)

Seconded.
posted by spitbull at 11:15 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

thanks guys but let's not make this about me ok? please?
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:21 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

I don't know how anyone can reasonably question that there are sycophants with regards to moderation here. It may be how commuities develop. Some people feel that their ideas are protected and will respond by making the most cutting remark possible, resulting in favorites - I mean bookmarks. Pretending it doesn't happen is absurd.

I mostly agree with the opinions expressed here but the notion that somehow metafilter is a special garden for honest and free expression of political and moral viewpoints and a bastion of wisdom is absurd.

Your website is just another website.
posted by vapidave at 11:23 AM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

cortex: "life's not just a series of brutally extracted proofs of righteousness or something where the only true compliment is that which is implied by manifesting one's capacity for stoicism."

It's like you haven't even seen True Detective.
posted by invitapriore at 11:26 AM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

just making sure that people know that this is an actual full-time job, with dental benefits and stuff.

I actually want to applaud Metafilter on this. This is not the case in a ton of nonprofits with much more 'serious business models'.
posted by corb at 11:28 AM on April 3, 2014 [8 favorites]

Something else about the mods is that some of us have been here long enough to remember when the majority of them were just regular users, and so tend to relate more to them as regular users who happen to have the keys to the place, kinda like how it works if you've ever been a regular at a bar that's hired some regulars to tend. They're not some alien authorities, they're the same folks that were generally respected but sometimes full of shit now trying to be responsible with the place they enjoyed.
posted by klangklangston at 11:29 AM on April 3, 2014 [14 favorites]

The FPP was sketchy because of tokenism.

I'm not going to argue about how anyone else read the thing (or how The Media is treating the story) but I totally thought the notability aspect was a kid who got into all the Ivy League schools. I actually didn't realize he was black until it was pointed out in-thread.
posted by shakespeherian at 11:29 AM on April 3, 2014

I don't believe Metafilter Enterprises Unlimited is "non-profit." But yes as a Navajo elder once put it to me, "non-profit is White Man for 'nice office, nice car, nice house, no taxes.'"
posted by spitbull at 11:31 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

I don't know how anyone can reasonably question that there are sycophants with regards to moderation here.

I think the question is what is the difference between sycophancy/ass-kissing and just saying positive things about how things work? And whether the bulk of positive-sounding comments are ass-kissing or just ... people feeling positively?

For people who dislike the moderation here, it's easy to think/see/say that people who like the moderation are ass-kissers when they say "Hey they've done a good job" or even more personally "I don't mind it" And this makes it easier to dismiss such comments. People have an ulterior motive, people are just being crass/venal/self-serving. Obviously there are always going to be some people who "work the ref" by sucking up to the mods in the interests of having future moderation decisions go more favorably their way. And I think it's a weird way of looking at it, as if we-as-mods are so into ourselves that we can't tell the difference between a regular old compliment and someone trying to ... get something from us. I have a lot of friends within the userbase, as do most of the mods. I work pretty hard to not make those friendships turn into preferential treatment here on the site. I think we all do. So what's the beef? That people don't like to see other people liking a thing that they dislike? That people think the people who like the thing that they dislike are stupid/incorrect/wrongontheinternet?

I rarely employ this phrasing, but I think people who always see the negative side of even positive commentary are reflecting more of their own viewpoint about the world (and this site) than an actual reasoned commentary about how moderation works. Sure it's just our own little corner watering hole and it's not necessarily anything special. But for most of us, we come here because it's the place we like. So it's not that surprising that the people who come here because they like it ... like it.

I don't believe Metafilter Enterprises Unlimited is "non-profit."

Yeah no we're not. I think we're an LLC? We don't even all have benefits (the international employee thing winds up being ... confusing) Matt is the money guy, you'd have to ask him specifics.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 11:32 AM on April 3, 2014 [8 favorites]

The FPP was sketchy because of tokenism.

No seriously, America simply does not understand the value of being a viola player. Moms and dads, if you want your kid to get into the Ivies, push them into viola, bassoon, or orchestral percussion, not sports.

As I always like to say with a knowing smile, trust me, I'm a music professor.
posted by spitbull at 11:33 AM on April 3, 2014 [14 favorites]

they're the same folks that were generally respected but sometimes full of shit now trying to be responsible with the place they enjoyed

And boy howdy was I full of shit sometimes. May the god of critical backup failures somehow save me from my early twenties.
posted by cortex (staff) at 11:35 AM on April 3, 2014 [21 favorites]

No seriously, America simply does not understand the value of being a viola player. Moms and dads, if you want your kid to get into the Ivies, push them into viola, bassoon, or orchestral percussion, not sports.

For serious. I started playing viola in grade 5, and after about twenty seconds I was being invited into more quartets, quintets, and chamber ensembles than you could shake a bow at.

Plus, the viola is simply the most beautiful sounding instrument humanity has ever produced. This is known.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:36 AM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

spitbull: Moms and dads, if you want your kid to get into the Ivies, push them into viola, bassoon, or orchestral percussion, not sports.

Wow. Never thought about that. Are there full ride scholarships for musicianship, like there are for athletics?
posted by Rock Steady at 11:37 AM on April 3, 2014

Yeah, but the opening line is "Mama's got a squeeze box she wears on her chest". So unless mama's the (by-now-infamous) sex teratoma, I think there's some biological confusion going on.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:18 AM on April 3 [+] [!]

I thought, oh it's an Amazon link. Probably pretty safe. Maybe a book on sex stuff or something.
posted by cashman at 9:20 AM on April 3 [8 favorites +] [!]

I really wish I hadn't clicked that link at work. I also thought it was a book. I suppose I can only be mad at myself, but thanks for nothing.

NSFW warning would be nice.
posted by GrapeApiary at 11:37 AM on April 3, 2014

No, there are not many full ride scholarships for musicians. But at the Ivies, there aren't many for athletes either, actually. Almost all Ivy League financial aid is supposed to be need based (and admission is supposed to be need blind).

If you are not well off, the hard part is getting in more than paying for it. At my Ivy, if your family makes less than 80K your tuition is basically covered, plus there is aid for other parts of the cost. But so few working-class and lower-middle class students get in, for reasons worth a separate thread.

I'm talking about making yourself competitive to get admitted in the first place. Having musical talent is one thing, but there are hundreds of singers, violinists, flutists, and pianists in the pool for the Ivies. There are very few musicians at the same level who play viola. Your music faculty members, who will rate all those hundreds of audition CDs sent in by the applicants boasting of musical talent, will know what is needed in the student music community, and as fffm says, violas are ALWAYS needed cuz they don't get much respect, but you need a section of them for the orchestra for sure.

Playing an unpopular instrument well also stands you out from the crowd in other ways. You can spin an "I march to my own drummer" riff around it. It's a sign of character and self motivation. Whatever.

It's not a magic bullet, but it's definitely a thing.
posted by spitbull at 11:43 AM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

life's not just a series of brutally extracted proofs of righteousness or something where the only true compliment is that which is implied by manifesting one's capacity for stoicism.

Well, I wish you'd mentioned this sooner.
posted by Diablevert at 11:43 AM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

DB IV OD

Not likely

K
posted by Pudhoho at 11:44 AM on April 3, 2014

I have had a handful of comments removed. In hindsight, I appreciate the removals. Each of them has helped me figure out what I didn't get about being in this community (like "answer the question if you're in 'Ask'").

Please keep it up, mods. You make this a better place.
posted by Mad_Carew at 11:55 AM on April 3, 2014

NSFW warning would be nice.

There was an NSFW warning! It was just spelled "sex teratoma."
posted by KathrynT at 11:57 AM on April 3, 2014 [28 favorites]

Are there full ride scholarships for musicianship, like there are for athletics?

Yes, very much so.
posted by DarlingBri at 11:59 AM on April 3, 2014

No seriously, America simply does not understand the value of being a viola player.

This. My cousin is a professional viola player and has never had a real job. He switched from violin in high school because there was too much competition.
posted by shakespeherian at 12:01 PM on April 3, 2014

extra tip -- if you do play one of the double-reeds, like oboe or bassoon, you can triple your employability if you also pick up the "odd instrument" associated with that. So if you play oboe? Learn the English horn. If you play bassoon, learn the contrabassoon. To a lesser extent this is also true with clarinet (B-flat and E-flat) and flute (piccolo) as well. Those skills can absolutely make the difference between being hired as a section musician in an orchestra and not.
posted by KathrynT at 12:02 PM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

Giving one-liners a bad name is bad form. Please quit.

(Oboes are ducks, that's all. Putting lipstick on them won't turn them into pigs.)
posted by mule98J at 12:04 PM on April 3, 2014

NSFW warning [on the sex teratoma link] would be nice.

ooh, yeah, my mistake....mods, can that be added after the fact?
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 12:06 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Plus, if you're violist, you get the star role in Janáček's String Quartet No. 2, which is seriously one of the most stunning string quartets ever written. It's worth it for that alone.
posted by invitapriore at 12:13 PM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

I could edit that typo but I like the implication that there is a system of beliefs called "violism."
posted by invitapriore at 12:14 PM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

No seriously, America simply does not understand the value of being a viola player.

Some of us do; oh yes, we do.
posted by FelliniBlank at 12:14 PM on April 3, 2014

ooh, yeah, my mistake....mods, can that be added after the fact?

And a link to lube would be nice, thanks!
posted by Brandon Blatcher at 12:16 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Townsend in the liner notes for Scoop said the lyrics were "intended as a poorly aimed dirty joke."

I see what he did there.
posted by chavenet at 12:17 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

"Schismogenesis" is a term Metafilter needs to learn. It was coined by the anthropologist Gregory Bateson in the 1930s, and basically refers to the seemingly natural tendency of humans to divide and subdivide into opposed factions within any social group. It's the opposite of "cohesion" or collaboration.

No it isn't.
posted by Kabanos at 12:20 PM on April 3, 2014

Argument is an intellectual process. Contradiction is just the automatic gainsaying of any statement the other person makes.
posted by Chrysostom at 12:24 PM on April 3, 2014 [9 favorites]

[NOT VIOL-IST]
posted by kagredon at 12:27 PM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

And a link to lube would be nice, thanks!

That's what the taters are for. That's what they've been for this whole time. Who knew?
posted by Nanukthedog at 12:28 PM on April 3, 2014

And boy howdy was I full of shit sometimes. May the god of critical backup failures somehow save me from my early twenties.
posted by cortex

I don't know, cortex, my first memory of you (from well before you became a mod) is one time when you were hanging out in the depths of a stale Metatalk thread in which I was posting, for no good reason I could discern-- until I realized you seemed to be trying to trying to protect me from languagehat!

I have often regretted giving you such cause to regret that kindness since, but it's all the sweeter to me now for being so undeserved.
posted by jamjam at 12:35 PM on April 3, 2014

Thanks, Empress
posted by GrapeApiary at 12:36 PM on April 3, 2014

Q: What's a major second?

A: The viola section playing in unison.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 12:37 PM on April 3, 2014 [8 favorites]

No, there are not many full ride scholarships for musicians.

The only one I ever knew was a tubist friend of mine being put through school by the Salvation Army with an eye to being in one of their major staff bands. They ended up offering him a full-time gig before he even graduated. He was really good.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 12:47 PM on April 3, 2014

"I think people who always see the negative side of even positive commentary are reflecting more of their own viewpoint about the world (and this site) than an actual reasoned commentary about how moderation works."
There's the rub. As I said above, It may be how communities develop. Pretending [and though I occasionally disagree with some of the decisions I think that metafilter has the best moderators in the business] that by virtue of being a moderator removes you from bias is egocentric and arrogant.

And really, "people who always see the negative side of even positive commentary are reflecting more of their own viewpoint about the world (and this site) than an actual reasoned commentary" is just a bit rude. My comment regarding moderation makes me unreasonable and I hate the world? Seriously?
posted by vapidave at 12:47 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

I don't know how anyone can reasonably question that there are sycophants with regards to moderation here.

FWIW, my take on this is why should I care if there are? I mean, lots of people participate here so it isn't statistically unlikely that some of them might feel that they could win the moderators favor with fulsome praise. But first I'd have to try to identify those users, then I'd have to try to determine if they were actually sycophants or just naturally extravagant with their praise, and finally I'd have to be concerned that the mods would favor them in return with ... what? Money? Power? Favorites? Fewer deleted comments?

I don't always agree that every deleted comment or topic was necessary. I think there's a tendency to let a kind of more circumspect obnoxiousness go and attending to only the more direct kinds. But that's okay! None of this is a fight for survival or anything. I'm here to be entertained and to try to entertain others. When that isn't happening I do something else with my spare time.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:00 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Pretending ... that by virtue of being a moderator removes you from bias is egocentric and arrogant.

I don't think any of us have pretended as such. We've talked plenty of times about how we try to account for the fact that we are human beings with biases and idiosyncrasies and our own specific backgrounds and experiences and perspectives, how we try to be aware of that and route around it and check in with other people to try and keep that from directly affecting our moderation work because we know it's a realistic difficulty.

My comment regarding moderation makes me unreasonable and I hate the world?

Which she didn't say? Having a strongly negative reaction to people being positive and supportive about a place they like to hang out and the people who work there doesn't mean you hate anything or aren't a reasonable person, but if it's a common or consistent reaction it may reflect as much you having (for whatever, probably totally valid and meaningful-to-you reasons) sort of a net negative attitude toward that sort of thing as it does something actually fundamentally problematic with those other people liking a thing they like for totally valid and meaningful-for-them reasons.

Characterizing people liking what they like as sycophancy comes off to me as sort of weirdly rude and aggressive in its own right. I don't think you're a bad dude and at the end of the day I respect your right to your opinion, but that's the flip side of the "Seriously?" coin, for me.
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:00 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

I say that as someone who recently bought a TI-89, partially because I wanted to do some recreational math, but mostly because I remember envying the posh upperclassmen who showed theirs off way back when to us poor TI-83-owning freshmen.

HP 48G
For all my parents' faults, they raised me on RPN and I got that sweet calculatin' machine for my 16th birthday. I still have it, it turned old enough to buy alcohol in the States last year. Still use it regularly for math that is hardly worthy of it, but ah well.

Also, our high school music director was a bassoonist who also played contrabassoon, so I can confirm the bassoon conversations. He had a prime spot in the Eugene Symphony until retiring recently. Contrabassoon is pretty sweet.

Also also, yay good moderation.
posted by fraula at 1:21 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

And even on the occasions when I'm opposed to some deletion, the reason why is clear, usually. Even when that reason is pretty obviously just "Oh, Christ, meatloaf again?"
posted by octobersurprise at 1:23 PM on April 3, 2014

Q: What's a major second?

A: The viola section playing in unison.

that is the weirdest misspelling of "French horn" that I've ever seen.
posted by KathrynT at 1:27 PM on April 3, 2014 [16 favorites]

That's a direct quote. Parse it as you will.

I parse it as a truism!
posted by mudpuppie at 1:45 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

jamjam: "...trying to protect me from languagehat!"

Great. Things I can't unsee. Languagehat = Odd Job.
posted by zarq at 1:57 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

That's a direct quote. Parse it as you will.

I don't get "are unreasonable and hate the world" from it, is basically the whole thing. "There may be something in how someone views the world that is driving their specific negative reaction to other people reacting positively to something" seems like a pretty fair statement.

I mean, I can't fucking stand Guns 'N Roses. Axel Rose sounds like a cat dying, to me. I'm at peace with the fact that this band I can't stand is a band that a lot of people like, and I don't think their like of the band is based on some kind of deception or pose; they just do like it. Doesn't mean I can't dislike it or am wrong to, and the fact that I think the solo riff on Sweet Child 'O Mine is pretty awesome doesn't invalidate my general dislike either.

But if my stated conviction to people who liked the band was that people in general are just pretending to like 'em for some other cynical purpose, that'd be a reflection of some personal deal going on inside my head, not with the legitimacy of other people's fondness for the band. Sometimes other people just actually like stuff that I don't like, and it's not my job to understand why but neither is it their job to prove it to me. Saying otherwise is just kinda picking a fight.

If you're trying to make a narrower point about what you see as the legitimate issues with concrete examples of sycophancy or attempted sycophancy on the site, it's fine to raise those examples and argue that point and maybe we can see where different folks stand on it and whether they have the same read. But your original comment basically dared people to deny that it was a foregone conclusion, in the process of being openly dismissive of anybody who felt like Metafilter was special in any way to them, which isn't a great opening for a nuanced discussion of some notional site issue.
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:02 PM on April 3, 2014 [12 favorites]

...in the cold November rain.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 2:08 PM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

Its 'Axl Rose sounds like a cat dying.'

Not true.

It's 'It's Axl Rose sounds like a cat dying.'
posted by mr. digits at 2:09 PM on April 3, 2014 [9 favorites]

Q: What's a major second?

A: The viola section playing in unison.

that is the weirdest misspelling of "French horn" that I've ever seen.

One of the many reasons that musician jokes fail as actual jokes is that almost any of them can be be told with any random instrument.
posted by Gygesringtone at 2:15 PM on April 3, 2014

...in the cold November rain.

I was in Grade 8 the year that came out.

Guess what got played as the mushy slow song at the end of our graduation dance?

Go on, guess.

I hate you
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 2:16 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

I concede that if you replace the words to "Squeeze Box" with the words to "Paradise City," the basic meaning changes significantly.

Another broken promise.
posted by Joey Michaels at 2:17 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Interestingly, Quixotilotocatl was the Aztec god of moderators, or more accurately, "Lord of the Houses of Deleted Comments."
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 2:18 PM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

Go on, guess.

Did you leave enough room for the Holy Spirit? It would have manifested as BBWWEEEEEEEEERRRM, BWEERM Ba-BWEEER Ba-Ba-BE-Ba-BEEEERRR followed by a badass cello sting and Serious Eye Contact.
posted by robocop is bleeding at 2:21 PM on April 3, 2014

I too really hate Guns n Roses but man, I got a totally different take on them after reading The Final Comeback of Axl Rose.
posted by Lutoslawski at 2:21 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

"Squeeze Box", "Paradise City", broken promise

Got to find my reading glasses. What, Pandora's box is broken?
posted by Namlit at 2:22 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

sounds like a cat dying, to me

nothing a little axl grease can't fix
posted by Namlit at 2:23 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

Axel Rose sounds like a cat dying

"Pffft! Ack!"
posted by octobersurprise at 2:23 PM on April 3, 2014 [13 favorites]

Did you leave enough room for the Holy Spirit? It would have manifested as BBWWEEEEEEEEERRRM, BWEERM Ba-BWEEER Ba-Ba-BE-Ba-BEEEERRR followed by a badass cello sting and Serious Eye Contact.

I went to middle school in a neighbourhood so Jewish that on certain High Holidays, classes were simply cancelled.

The Holy Spirit was not in much evidence at that dance, or indeed anywhere else in the school.

"Pffft! Ack!"

That's spelled B-I-L-L
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 2:24 PM on April 3, 2014

As to viola jokes, the one I told upthread about accordions circulates as a viola joke too. It was told to me during a drive from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv -- by a viola player.
posted by Namlit at 2:24 PM on April 3, 2014

"Pffft! Ack!"

Hairball??
posted by Namlit at 2:25 PM on April 3, 2014

Well, you get two different groups of jokes - the viola/oboe/french horn/saxophone/trombone/clarinet jokes.

Then there's the trumpet/cello/violin/flute/percussionist/conductor jokes.

No one ever jokes about the basses. The basses are serious.
posted by Lutoslawski at 2:26 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

You're saying instrument humor is de-bassed?
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:27 PM on April 3, 2014 [9 favorites]

Unless they're electric, in which case tip well, they have no other source of income.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 2:27 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

A friend of mine plays the oboe quite seriously, or he did until he moved to Buenos Aires. Now he is learning the bandoneon. He's in a tango band and everything.
posted by rtha at 2:28 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

There's one trumpet/harpsichord joke overlap, though.

It has to do with a tailor who tucks up frills...
posted by Namlit at 2:28 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

Seriously though, why do those people freak out about the rain like that? I mean, doesn't a guy dive through the cake?
posted by neuromodulator at 2:29 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

You're saying instrument humor is de-bassed?

That's a bassless accusation.
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:31 PM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

I know so many singer jokes, you guys. "How do you know it's an alto at your front door? she can't find her key and doesn't know when to come in!"
posted by KathrynT at 2:32 PM on April 3, 2014 [23 favorites]

In the meantime, what's the similarity between a viola solo and an orgasm?

[you know it's coming and you can't do anything about it]
posted by Namlit at 2:33 PM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

Hairball??

Thanks, no. I'm full.
posted by octobersurprise at 2:33 PM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

>No it isn't.

>Argument is an intellectual process. Contradiction is just the automatic gainsaying of any statement the other person makes.

….And SCENE.
posted by Kabanos at 2:34 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

"How do you know it's an alto at your front door? she can't find her key and doesn't know when to come in!"

Okay, that one made me laugh.
posted by Lutoslawski at 2:34 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

No one ever jokes about the basses. The basses are serious.

That's just not true, there's one particularly epic joke about Beethoven's 9th, a bunch of drunk bass players. Also this.
posted by Gygesringtone at 2:34 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

"No one ever jokes about the basses. The basses are serious."

Nobody loves the bassist.
posted by klangklangston at 2:34 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

We all know Alto's Lament right?
posted by Lutoslawski at 2:35 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Jinx!
posted by klangklangston at 2:36 PM on April 3, 2014

That skit is so awesome it needed to be posted twice.
posted by Gygesringtone at 2:38 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Which she didn't say? Having a strongly negative reaction to people being positive and supportive about a place they like to hang out and the people who work there doesn't mean you hate anything or aren't a reasonable person, but if it's a common or consistent reaction it may reflect as much you having (for whatever, probably totally valid and meaningful-to-you reasons) sort of a net negative attitude toward that sort of thing as it does something actually fundamentally problematic with those other people liking a thing they like for totally valid and meaningful-for-them reasons.

Well, if I may speak briefly in defense of us cranky contrarians, it's not so much that people voicing their enthusiasm for ~~The Man~~The Mods comes off as disingenuous in any particular individual's case. More that seeing a pile-up of comments along the lines of "I Support The Status Quo and Those Who Enforce And Maintain It" becomes a little wearisome after a while out of the sheer mass and volume. When someone comes along and says "I have a complaint about X" and a dozen people chime in immediately to say "X is fine and you're a nutter" they're saying, "your concern is invalid, what you believe is untrue." A certain cast of mind --- mine, perhaps regrettably, among them --- can't help looking a a thread like and starting to think about the ways in which a complaint might be partially true, or somewhat valid, in certain cases...it's not that people hate happiness and positivity, it's that you gotta watch yourself sometimes that in your happy we-all-think-alike hegemony you're not smooshing down those who don't.* In other words, I can't help but always be a little suspicious of utter unanimity. It's like a temptation to sin, to be so certain. The Puritanism of foxes, in Berlin's foxes-and-hedgehogs sense.

*meta: could not decide whether to use yourself or ourselves in that phrase.
posted by Diablevert at 2:40 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

mods, can that be added after the fact?

Apparently I am the only one who reads the comments down here? Added.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:42 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

you mean we others don't read, we only comment? Yeah, that's me.
posted by Namlit at 2:47 PM on April 3, 2014

Speaking of commenting without reading...
posted by Joey Michaels at 2:48 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

one = mods in this case. I meant something along the lines of "It's not my shift but I guess I'll take care of this..."
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 2:49 PM on April 3, 2014

No one ever jokes about the basses. The basses are serious.

Basses still qualify for any "G-string snapped and fell into the f-hole" jokes.
posted by Kabanos at 2:49 PM on April 3, 2014

MONKEY VS ROBOT
posted by jenkinsEar at 2:50 PM on April 3, 2014

When someone comes along and says "I have a complaint about X" and a dozen people chime in immediately to say "X is fine and you're a nutter"

I hear you, but at the same time there's a difference between e.g. "I want to talk about site policy" and "mods are quixotic censors, amirite", and the latter is going to draw from people who disagree with it a lot more active of a "no, u r not" than the former even if the notional subject is more or less the same.

I feel like a lot of folks pretty freely speak their mind about stuff around here when it comes to working out the dynamics of stuff that's not so cut-and-dried—certainly if there's consistency to the flow of Metatalk discussions over the years it's a consistency of heterogeneity and disagreement on a whole lot of stuff including but not limited to how moderation works—so it feels like comparing a well-framed critique or inquiry about mod stuff to something like this is not super illuminating.

Apparently I am the only one who reads the comments down here?

I'M NOT EVEN SUPPOSED TO BE HERE TODAY

*gets in argument about Star Wars*
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:54 PM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

No, there are not many full ride scholarships for musicians.

Enough to encourage your kid to be a band/orchestra dork on an unusual instrument, though. I was a good French horn player in high school, enough so that at two of the more regional schools I applied to, my horn playing got 1/2 tuition academic scholarships stretched to a full ride. I am sure that it helped me get the full "Congrats, You're A Giant Nerd" scholarship I got from the larger and better-regarded college I eventually chose, too.
posted by charmedimsure at 2:54 PM on April 3, 2014

No it isn't

Please proceed, governor.

Truly, it's not "the opposite" of anything, since it is a process that generates oppositions on a structural and affective level, so perhaps my common sense phrasing did not reflect a scholarly way of putting it. But both complementary and symmetrical schismogenesis are mechanisms of social solidarity that apparently in contradiction (re)produce forms of difference (and inequality). Sometimes that's a coherent process, sometimes it's a revolution. (Revolutions are internally coherent and schismogenetic too, though.)
posted by spitbull at 3:00 PM on April 3, 2014

I Support The Status Quo

Both The Who and Guns n Roses are significantly better than Status Quo.

Vaguely on-topic: the mods here are great, I know from some of their posts and from having modded a lot of forums in my time (significantly less well than the mods moderate Metafilter, is the thing).
posted by Pink Frost at 3:00 PM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

A certain cast of mind --- mine, perhaps regrettably, among them --- can't help looking a a thread like and starting to think about the ways in which a complaint might be partially true, or somewhat valid, in certain cases...it's not that people hate happiness and positivity, it's that you gotta watch yourself sometimes that in your happy we-all-think-alike hegemony you're not smooshing down those who don't.*

I'm familiar with that particular mindset, and I have worked really hard to suppress it in myself. Because it lets a kind of knee-jerk contrariness stand in for critical thinking. "If all these people like it, then there must be something bad going on" is just as ridiculous as "all these people hate this thing, so I'll embrace it to show what a maverick I am."

While any case of piling-on gets tiresome (and would be helped by more people reading the thread and then cautiously deciding whether another comment is really necessary), there are plenty of cases where the person being piled on is wrong. Take this thread, for instance. Colonel panic started it because he was mad that some comments got deleted, and he specifically asked for opinions on the moderation. He then accused a mod of distorting his deleted comments by paraphrasing them, and the actual comment provided turned out to be at least as bad as the paraphrases. If Colonel panic got piled on, it was because he quite literally asked for people to tell him what they thought, and they did.

I support the moderation here. The mods do a good job, and they put up with a lot of crap from members who object to being deleted, who object to deleting on principle, or, apparently, just want to be contrary. They make MetaFilter a workable place, and it's a little weird to see people who apparently like the site constantly carp about one of the functions of the site that lets it work as well as it does. I'm also kind of annoyed that people think that opinion makes me a "sycophant." Do I think the mods sometimes delete comments and posts in haste? Yes, although i bet way less often than you do. Do I think that "why was my comment/post deleted" threads are almost always tiresome and self defeating? Hell, yeah. They pretty much never get what the poster seems to want -- a clear statement from the community that the mods are a bunch of bullies or, maybe, an abject apology from the mods for their deletion -- because, almost all the time, when the dirty laundry gets aired, most sensible members go "yeah, that was pretty bad."

Maybe we need to set up an independent tribunal to rule of "why was my comment deleted MeTas." It could be like jury duty -- 30 MeFites get selected each week who, when such a MeTa is proposed, have to read the comments and rule on whether the poster deserved deleting or not. Only if they can pass the jury do they get to "poll the community." That would cut out most of the worst pile-ons....
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:03 PM on April 3, 2014 [7 favorites]

There's one trumpet/harpsichord joke overlap, though.

It has to do with a tailor who tucks up frills...

We tell that one about sopranos, too.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 3:11 PM on April 3, 2014

I hear you, but at the same time there's a difference between e.g. "I want to talk about site policy" and "mods are quixotic censors, amirite", and the latter is going to draw from people who disagree with it a lot more active of a "no, u r not" than the former even if the notional subject is more or less the same.

We were talking about a similar thing in the #cancelcorbert discussion. To whit, had the original tweet said #disappointedwithcolbert or some other similar weaker wording, it wouldn't have generated the discussion that it did. On the one hand, 90% of that discussion (nationally) was grar but the 10% that wasn't grar was genuinely worthwhile. That worthwhile discussion wouldn't have happened at all without the original tweetbomb.

I feel like on the Internet, you can catch one or two flies with honey, but if you sling some shit you might catch a thousand hornets but also 20 really good flies.
posted by Joey Michaels at 3:24 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Firstly because our best contributors are not interested in winning picayune arguments, they are focused on changing people's minds.

potato po-tah-to?

i don't disagree that this is the best forum on the internet, but a fuck of a lot of talking past eachother and "if you don't agree with me you must just not understand what i'm saying" and "if you don't agree with me you are objectively wrong, sorry" stuff happens here.

I mean, the latter is true from time to time, but sure as hell not nearly as often as people think it is.

From the drivers seat, everyone thinks they're fighting the good fight and changing peoples minds. A lot of really worthless arguments do take place here.

The difference isn't that somehow this place is more highbrow and everyone here has a higher standard of posting, more than just the mods flush the worst stuff down the toilet and people are way more likely to get called out. I mean yea people do make an effort here, but this isn't like some gathering of the universes best minds for the betterment of the world.

Sorry if that comes off as overly cynical and bitter, but i'm just not seeing what you're saying as rosy as you are. This place can be gross and ugly and people fight a lot in gross and ugly ways. People shut down and kill threads. People run good people off the site.

I love this site, but it can be very ugly at times. And sometimes its in exactly the way you're emphatically saying it's not. I just can't idly watch that sail by with high fives and champagne flutes clinking when some of my favorite posters have bailed over that kind of shit.
posted by emptythought at 3:27 PM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

Take this thread, for instance. Colonel panic

Colonel Panic salute
posted by cashman at 3:31 PM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

I mean yea people do make an effort here, but this isn't like some gathering of the universes best minds for the betterment of the world.

Pony request: mindsforevil.metafilter.com or supervillain.metafilter.com

Its time we took back the light.
posted by Nanukthedog at 3:33 PM on April 3, 2014

Yeah Joey but I think the point of Mefi is to filter out the hornets, no?

I say this as a not-infrequent hornet who needs filtering more often than I'd like.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 3:33 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Fffm: that's the goal I think, but the pattern here also can be "inflammatory comment inspires much grar while thoughtful comment inspires silent agreement (sic)." Metafilter is better but not immune.
posted by Joey Michaels at 3:38 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

Honestly, can't be bothered to read most of this. Because every single fucking time I see one of these posts where someone is going "WAH! THE MODS ARE BEING MEANIES WHO ARE UNJUSTLY DELETING MY SHIT! WAH! PEOPLE, PLEASE SIDE WITH ME AGAINST THEM" I can't help but wonder why no one has ever thought to suggest that THIS is the Gold Standard for how to talk to MeFi about your repeat deletions.

Of course I don't (er..didn't before) because then someone would say (again) "Michele is a just an egomaniacal narcissist who makes everything about HER" but whatever. I get sick of this shit.
posted by Michele in California at 3:54 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

It's the spaces. It's not the ink, or #000000. It's sometimes what's not there that makes what's there, shine.

I've always kind of wished that user profiles included the number of times that you started commenting, and then didn't.
posted by Toekneesan at 3:54 PM on April 3, 2014 [8 favorites]

It can be really difficult to differentiate between "pile on because someone seems vulnerable" and "is this what a consensus looks like?" in comment threads like this.

I'll admit, I had some initial GRAR don't attack my Mods *hugs to chest and decorates hair with pretty sparkles* which fueled my initial response, but I also think that while I may sometimes disagree with some of the choices the mods make, overall they are more focused on maintaining a loose sense of community than on giving any particular individual cookies and happiness, and I think this is a good thing.

We take on contentious topics on MetaFilter, and while sometime I'll leave a discussion with sore feelings that remain for a long while (I am a grudge holder) I also leave with a sense I've learned something nine times out of ten, and that's valuable to me. Also, MeFi does good cat videos.

...and now I really want Mefi Mod Action Figures to put up next to my Ever After High girls. Cortex could come with a CD, and Jessamyn could come with a library card holder, and Matt could come with some neat, random internet tchotchke, and for some reason I want Taz to come with snacks, but that doesn't make sense to most of my brain.

Communities and a sense of community is made up much more of our emotional responses to a lot of things over time which are no longer easily separated into component parts than anything rational. This doesn't mean that a felt opinion might not be well reasoned (they can be) but it does mean that it's difficult to track them in others.

Also, in my experience on MeFi, though, sycophancy doesn't really get you much. The mods are available in... like... every MeTa thread, and they respond to all kinds of people, and they are here amongst us all the time, so there isn't any extra special "in crowd" that I've seen at all, and as near as I can tell they can like someone and delete their comments without too much difficulty.
posted by Deoridhe at 4:24 PM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

How many bass players does it take to change a lightbulb?

...

None. The keyboard player can do it with her left hand.
posted by Anoplura at 5:09 PM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

How many drummers does it take to change a lightbulb?

...

None. They have machines for that, now.
posted by Anoplura at 5:10 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

The difference isn't that somehow this place is more highbrow and everyone here has a higher standard of posting, more than just the mods flush the worst stuff down the toilet and people are way more likely to get called out. I mean yea people do make an effort here, but this isn't like some gathering of the universes best minds for the betterment of the world.

I actually think its AskMefi that is the real soul of this site, because that's just an endlessly deep font of wisdom from which we can all drink and into which we can all pour our own allotted stock. And that is a treasure.

Though FWIW I've had my mind changed by Metafilter a fair bit over the years, largely towards the MeFi consensus; though I've also subvocalized oh, get fuuuuuuuucked a bunch at its occasional SJW monomania.
posted by Sebmojo at 5:13 PM on April 3, 2014

How many moderators does it take to change a lightbulb?

...

Six. One to change the bulb, and five more to deal with the inevitable MeTa about how much better it was in the dark.
posted by Anoplura at 5:13 PM on April 3, 2014 [58 favorites]

Why was my lightbulb deleted, huh?
posted by spitbull at 5:53 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

How many bass players does it take to change a lightbulb? Five. One. Five. One. Five. One. ...

(That works much better when you're hanging out with the classically-trained but bluegrass-playing.)
posted by introp at 6:02 PM on April 3, 2014 [4 favorites]

Q. How many soundmen/persons does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

A. At least two, one to unscrew a perfectly good old one and another to break the new one, leaving you in the dark.

_____________

Q. Lead guitarists?

A. One. But he's stealing your best lightbulb.
posted by spitbull at 6:25 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

Q: How many guitarists does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

A: Six. One to screw in the lightbulb, and five to watch while thinking "I can do that."
posted by valkane at 6:31 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

Q How many IATSE members does it take to screw in a lightbulb?

A Six, at a minimum four hour call with a 1/2 hour break. Got a problem with that?
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 6:35 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

A Six, at a minimum four hour call with a 1/2 hour break. Got a problem with that?,

Yeah, you're not gunna have a friggn box of light bulbs in the building without the Teamsters.
posted by sammyo at 6:39 PM on April 3, 2014

Wait, what was this about, viola jokes?
posted by sammyo at 6:40 PM on April 3, 2014

There are no actual viola jokes.

There are sad attempts at humour made by musicians not good or smart enough to play the viola, however.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 6:51 PM on April 3, 2014

Why is a viola better than a violin?

Holds more beer.
posted by maryr at 7:09 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

(That's the kind version of that joke.)
posted by maryr at 7:11 PM on April 3, 2014

How many conductors does it take to change a lightbulb?

If you'd been looking up instead of burying your face in the score, you'd have noticed that he changed the lightbulb five measures ago.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 7:30 PM on April 3, 2014 [12 favorites]

What's the difference between a lead guitarist and a terrorist?

You can negotiate with a terrorist.
posted by Pope Guilty at 7:32 PM on April 3, 2014 [5 favorites]

What do you call an optimist?
A banjo player with a beeper.

How do you get a drummer to play quietly?
Put sheet music in front of him.

How can you tell a soprano is at the door?
She can't find the key and doesn't know where to come in.

How can you tell a tenor?
You can't tell a tenor anything.
posted by bunderful at 7:37 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

What's the difference between a pig and a conductor?
There are some things even a pig won't do.
posted by Snarl Furillo at 7:54 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

One of the many reasons that musician jokes fail as actual jokes is that almost any of them can be be told with any random instrument.

After her date, Jane tells Mary she probably won't see the guy again. When Mary asks why, Jane says, "Well, he was a drummer, and we were in sync all night but he was a terrible kisser."

A few days later, Jane goes on another date and Mary asks how it went. "It was going well for a while," Jane says, "but it turns out she's a trumpet player. It was like kissing a lemon- all puckered up."

One morning a few days later, Mary knows Jane has had a date but she hasn't said a thing about it. Finally Mary asks her about the date and Jane turns bright red. Mary asks if he was that bad a kisser, like the drummer. Jane shakes her head and says, "He was a French horn player. The kissing was fine, but you won't believe where he thought he was supposed to put his hand."
posted by Snarl Furillo at 8:00 PM on April 3, 2014 [17 favorites]

When the squeezebox is a rockin', don't come a-knockin'
posted by double block and bleed at 8:05 PM on April 3, 2014

oh thank god the musical instrument jokes came back to this thread as i was reading.

what's the definition of perfect pitch?

It's when you throw a banjo into a trashcan and hit an accordian.

(attributed to willie nelson, but who knows)
posted by gorbichov at 8:20 PM on April 3, 2014 [11 favorites]

sex teratoma /
put me in a coma /
asking and telling like they repealed DOMA /
jokey viola /
OP about ebola /
mods frontin' all quixotic like they're drinking blue cola

yo, yo
posted by threeants at 8:28 PM on April 3, 2014 [6 favorites]

I don't spend a lot of time here these days, for a variety of reasons, none of which are the current topic of discussion. So I'd just like to say, in general: as a person who has grown somewhat disenchanted with this community, I think that is not down to the mods, who moderate differently than I might but certainly not worse and probably better; if there were a status quo, members like myself would not gravitate away, nor would new members gravitate towards; in no case is the moderation here "enforcing" except in the very broadest of terms, and I have the allergic reaction to authority that cortex alluded to. There's a quote from a favorite book of mine which I will now mangle: "Like? What has that got to do with it? I neither like nor dislike them; I respect them." I do like and dislike people here, including the mods, but, more importantly, I try to respect people here regardless of my like or dislike. I think that's the essence of good faith, and it's proven useful to me in many communities.
posted by Errant at 8:34 PM on April 3, 2014 [3 favorites]

Seriously though, why do those people freak out about the rain like that? I mean, doesn't a guy dive through the cake?

He was upset because someone left the cake out in the rain.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 8:35 PM on April 3, 2014 [2 favorites]

why do those people freak out about the rain like that?

It's set in LA, no?
posted by juliplease at 9:11 PM on April 3, 2014

I don't know how anyone can reasonably question that there are sycophants with regards to moderation here.

I find this kind of negativity really off-putting as well as baseless. What special privileges do you think we're getting through the Machiavellian legerdemain of telling the moderating team that they're doing a great job? Or that we appreciate their commitment to building and maintaining a good community? Why are we supposed to think that appreciating a good person doing their job well implies an invidious motive?
posted by clockzero at 10:17 PM on April 3, 2014 [11 favorites]

the thread just radiates a bunch of disgruntled white dudes(and i'm sure, some ladies) who think they somehow didn't get a fair shake at getting in to the college they wanted and that affirmative action is so unfair and shit....people who all bizarrely wanted to harp on this kids essay and sort of project their own insecurity regarding this shit

I got a very fair shake at getting into the college I wanted. Affirmative action is fair, necessary and the right thing to do. I feel very secure about my writing.

Sometimes somebody who thinks an essay is a bit crap just thinks it's a bit crap. It's not like I go out of my way to pass judgment on essays, but this one was being widely touted as the standard for getting into all of your country's top schools, all at once. That's extraordinary. The essay wasn't. That's all. Cigars, let alone hoods and burning crosses, didn't enter into it.
posted by obiwanwasabi at 10:47 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

What's the difference between a bull and a symphony orchestra?

On a bull, the horns are in the front and the asshole is in the back.
posted by KathrynT at 11:11 PM on April 3, 2014 [12 favorites]

what's the difference between a plum and an elephant?

pretty much everything, except they're both the same color.. Except the plum's purple.
posted by philip-random at 11:33 PM on April 3, 2014 [1 favorite]

and the difference between a viola and a washing machine?

The washing machine vibrates regularly, and what comes out of it is clean.
posted by Namlit at 12:24 AM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

Close this up
posted by evil_esto at 3:14 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

If you are a good violist, you can get in to Harvard with an essay that says "i is good violist."

Rather like if your family has Cabot and Forbes millions and has been "Eliot House people" for six generations. "i is charles Lowell the forth" will also work.

In conclusion, being a violist is like being an entitled scion of old money.
posted by spitbull at 3:45 AM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

Q: What's the difference between an upper class twit and a violist?

A: Both can get into Harvard, but the upper class twit probably learned how to bow at some point.

(I'm sorry.)
posted by kagredon at 4:04 AM on April 4, 2014 [15 favorites]

Sometimes somebody who thinks an essay is a bit crap just thinks it's a bit crap. It's not like I go out of my way to pass judgment on essays, but this one was being widely touted as the standard for getting into all of your country's top schools, all at once. That's extraordinary. The essay wasn't

Yeah, that essay didn't get him into any school, I don't think. I'm sure the straight A's, extracurricular activities, and SAT scores is what did it.
posted by empath at 4:09 AM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

Yeah, that essay didn't get him into any school, I don't think. I'm sure the straight A's, extracurricular activities, and SAT scores is what did it.

I am astonished that anybody takes college admissions essays at all seriously. That's not a dis on anyone at all. It's just weird to me that an essay could mean anything to anyone. Nobody knows if you actually wrote it, rich kids pay for "editing" and coaching and advice on those essays, and 99.999% of those essays are going to be totally, utterly, fundamentally unremarkable.

They should just hand everyone a checklist where everybody marks off their hardships and accomplishments in life. "My three immigrant parents worked day and night to support me while I went to viola practice and varsity hurling. After beating both leukemia and scabies, I won the state wrestling championship while bleating 'Nessun Dorma'. Check, check, check."
posted by Sticherbeast at 5:23 AM on April 4, 2014 [7 favorites]

gorbichov: "It's when you throw a banjo into a trashcan and hit an accordian."

I wish more people would do this.

'Cos, I mean, I'd love to find free banjos sitting in the trash. God, you can never have too many banjos.
posted by barnacles at 5:46 AM on April 4, 2014 [5 favorites]

I do not think the mods are the cancer that is killing Metafilter but I'm not sure if they're the chemo Metafilter needs to be saved.
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 5:46 AM on April 4, 2014

the cancer that is killing Metafilter

Citation needed.
posted by Chrysostom at 5:49 AM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

All websites are constantly being killed by cancer. [/b/]
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 5:50 AM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

What a peculiar analogy.
posted by rtha at 5:52 AM on April 4, 2014 [8 favorites]

Right, because a blog community that doesn't exactly suit my needs the way it once did is like cancer.

Ever known anyone with cancer?
posted by spitbull at 5:54 AM on April 4, 2014 [20 favorites]

My wife and I were just discussing what stringed instrument our son should play. The viola is suddenly a much stronger candidate.
posted by Area Man at 6:02 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

Let's cool the personal remarks, please.
posted by taz (staff) at 6:14 AM on April 4, 2014

Anything the mods tell me stop I endeavour to stop.
posted by save alive nothing that breatheth at 6:14 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

peculiar analogy
Yeah, no, that one was…
no so great. (I don't even want to begin counting, re friends and family members and cancer at this point in time)

*veil of charity*

Just to put the complimentary noises around here vis à vis "The Mods" into (my personal) perspective, I've been frequenting a bunch of professional forums for many years (out of my own professional interests and because of my affiliations), and have been time and again astonished how bad "No Moderation" works. No matter the context and topic of interest and expertise, people almost always believe they have a right to act like their evil twins on discussion forums (astonishingly, no matter whether they post anonymously or not).
Most of these groups actually do have moderators. They wade in, like, once every half year, to discourage excessive quoting for bandwidth reasons, and to pick fights with single members they can't stand because of a mismatch between their (the mod's) individual preferences and that member's behavior.

Never, and I say never, have I seen anything that resembles the crystal clear way of how the mods here usually tackle whatever shit is being put in front of their toes at any given moment. This is patently not about agreement and disagreement, or about cultural concurrences of any kind (speaking as a Dutch-educated German living in Sweden together with an American SO). It's just a simple fact of comparison. Most discussions on the web are unbearable; those here may often be difficult, but there is always that silver lining of hope because of the people who are being paid to keep their heads level (a structural thing), and because they actually do their jobs (a thing, I think, of personal excellence), and because of the mechanisms of flagging (structural again, and a community thing).
posted by Namlit at 6:20 AM on April 4, 2014 [10 favorites]

Personally I am of the opinion that if nothing that is not rape, cancer or AIDS is ever compared to rape, cancer or AIDS again, nothing of value will be lost.
posted by Too-Ticky at 6:26 AM on April 4, 2014 [27 favorites]

My wife and I were just discussing what stringed instrument our son should play.

I grew up playing violin and played professionally in a small- town opera's pit orchestra in my early 20's. Childhood violin lessons gave me a good basis for teaching myself guitar in high school, and I enjoy playing music every day.

I think your son should play sanshin.
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 6:28 AM on April 4, 2014

spitbull: "Right, because a blog community that doesn't exactly suit my needs the way it once did is like cancer.

Ever known anyone with cancer?"

Thank you for saying this.
posted by zarq at 6:29 AM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

Some quick googling reveals there may not be that many sanshin instructors in Minneapolis.

I felt I had to check the Young Lutheran's Guide to the Orchestra to see what Garrison Keilor had to say about the viola:

"The viola section is not a nice place for a Lutheran and here you’ll have to have to take my word for it. I know violists and they are fine people until, late at night, they start drinking a few bottles of cheap red wine and roasting chickens over a pit in a vacant lot and talk about going to Yucatan with a woman named Rita. Don’t be part of this crowd."
posted by Area Man at 6:49 AM on April 4, 2014 [7 favorites]

Nothing roasts chickens like a sand pit full of burning violins!
posted by spitbull at 6:51 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

The terrible cancer analogy is a 4chan meme (NSFW).
posted by Proofs and Refutations at 6:54 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

I'd love to find free banjos sitting in the trash. God, you can never have too many banjos.

Just so long as none of them get sent to you anonymously...

The terrible cancer analogy is a 4chan meme.

On the bright side, though, it reminded me of a cool Joe Jackson song and so now I'm all happy and sort of samba-ing at my desk.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 6:57 AM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

My child is a violist. She's 10. She has just toured for a week with the state primary schools strings orchestra. She is rapidly improving — she knows much more than she thinks she does, because she is a also a wonderful piano player — but if anyone is actually reading this far down the thread, playing the viola is a great way to differentiate yourself from the swarms of the inevitable violinists and cellists.

She got home from her tour tonight, cuddled me and her mother, ate dinner and then spent 90 minutes on Loopy and Garage Band.

It's fun, Dad.
posted by Wolof at 6:59 AM on April 4, 2014 [10 favorites]

The terrible cancer analogy is a 4chan meme.

Yeah, but it also well predates /b/ and this isn't /b/, and in any case "no, no, it's a meme on /b/" is pretty high on the list of things you'd never want to say as the next clause after "But yr Honor..."
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:04 AM on April 4, 2014 [28 favorites]

God, you can never have too many banjos.

[citation needed.]
posted by soundguy99 at 7:11 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

soundguy99: [citation needed.]

Binns, A. E. "Is It A Grand Gesture..." Ask Metafilter. vol 140517. 12 Dec, 2009. MetaFilter Industries, Inc: Portland, Ore.
posted by Rock Steady at 7:19 AM on April 4, 2014 [9 favorites]

soundguy99: "God, you can never have too many banjos.

[citation needed.]"

I have only ever had three banjos at the same time, so I can't speak for numbers greater than that. But, one banjo is great because it means you can play it and have fun. Two banjos are great because it means you can play one and you can share one with your friends; or you can have a heavy resonator for gettin' loud and an open back for carrying around. Three banjos are great for all the above reasons AND you can have one to loan to your friends to get them hooked.

I can only assume that beyond three banjos there is some sort of geometric multiplication of happiness. One of them died and I'm back to just two, and this is clearly a sub-par situation compared to a three+ -banjo life.

But really what I mean is: let's get more banjo talk (or violas, I guess; whatever floats your boat) and less cancer talk.
posted by barnacles at 7:32 AM on April 4, 2014 [5 favorites]

-My wife and I were just discussing what stringed instrument our son should play.

--Childhood violin lessons gave me a good basis for teaching myself guitar in high school, and I enjoy playing music every day.

IMO, the violin is a great place to start. As Ice Cream Socialist says, it's a good foundation for other strings - it's not difficult for most players to transition to another stringed instrument once they've mastered violin basics. (For instance, the mandolin has the same tuning.) It's small and easy for a kid to carry around, there are relatively inexpensive student models available, and there are lots of teachers out there.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 7:34 AM on April 4, 2014

I felt I had to check the Young Lutheran's Guide to the Orchestra to see what Garrison Keilor had to say about the viola:

Link

"The oboe is the sensualist of the woodwind section, and if there’s ever a wind a Lutheran should avoid, it’s this one. In movie soundtracks, you tend to hear the oboe when the woman is taking off her clothes, or else later, when she asks the man for a cigarette. "
posted by bunderful at 7:49 AM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

God, you can never have too many banjos.

Depends on the size of your fireplace.

IMO, the violin is a great place to start. As Ice Cream Socialist says, it's a good foundation for other strings - it's not difficult for most players to transition to another stringed instrument once they've mastered violin basics.

IME it was much harder going from reading treble clef to alto than the other way around. Every Good Boy Deserves Fuckoff gimme a viola.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 8:00 AM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

I learned to read music playing the clarinet for four years in elementary and middle school, which is the story of how I never really got any good at reading music and fuck it let's teach ourselves to play guitar.
posted by cortex (staff) at 8:02 AM on April 4, 2014 [7 favorites]

I can still recall being 6 years old, standing waiting as my grandmother discussed with my new band teacher what instrument I was to start learning: trumpet, trombone, or tuba.

Let's just say being a tuba player is similar to viola in the "stand out in a crowd of musicians" or "get a job" department.

Over the years of being in school bands, including marching band in military school (yay sousaphone), I felt a certain amount of resentment regarding the choice made for me. Especially when trumpet players seemed to be the social hierarchy equivalent of quarterbacks, while trombonists were the cool, laid back, quirky types. It's hard to be cool with a tuba.* I was also resentful whenever I had to carry around (much less march up and down in the heat with) a huge metal contraption while everyone else had their lightweight instruments.

Well, except for the drummers, who also had a time of it and were also always in the back with me. I would entertain them making quiet Star Wars battle noises through the tuba until the conductor barked at me.

* Unless you are Victoria Tennant in LA Story. Or Damon Bryson AKA Tuba Gooding Jr.
posted by Celsius1414 at 8:16 AM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

I won the state wrestling championship while bleating 'Nessun Dorma'.

This is so perfect I can't even.
posted by mountmccabe at 8:16 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

However I should add it's very easy to go back and forth between alto and bass clef, and violas and cellos are even tuned the same (an octave apart sure, but still).
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 8:22 AM on April 4, 2014

I learned to read music playing the clarinet for four years in elementary and middle school

I learned to read music in middle school choir, after I smugly proclaimed that I would never need to because my ear was so good I could hear something once and sing it and my teacher vowed that she was going to wipe that smug off my face. 24 years later, I am starting to maybe get good at it. Reading music is hard.
posted by KathrynT at 8:23 AM on April 4, 2014 [5 favorites]

My mom never understood how I could be so good at reading some languages (English, French) and crap at reading others (music). She could sit down with a music score and read it like I'd read a book. Even after all those years of piano lessons and choir, I can't sight-read for shit.
posted by rtha at 8:31 AM on April 4, 2014

Celsius1414: It's hard to be cool with a tuba.... Unless you are Victoria Tennant in LA Story. Or Damon Bryson AKA Tuba Gooding Jr.

Or Diana Rigg in The Avengers.
posted by Rock Steady at 8:33 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

KathrynT: "I learned to read music in middle school choir, after I smugly proclaimed that I would never need to because my ear was so good I could hear something once and sing it and my teacher vowed that she was going to wipe that smug off my face. "

Mozart's Requiem? :)
posted by zarq at 8:34 AM on April 4, 2014

Metafilter: fuck it let's teach ourselves to play guitar.

I just came to this thread for the first time since it started. It began as a questionable complaint about moderating and now it's...well, I'm not sure what it's turned into.
posted by Melismata at 8:36 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

I played the viola through middle and high school and it was a fun instrument. I was initially bummed that I didn't get to play the violin, but I quickly grew to love the viola - it's got such a lovely, rich sound. It definitely didn't hurt when I applied to college; I got into a very good school, partially due to my musical abilities.

I also found a mystery banjo on my porch once. (Only one of these stories is true.)
posted by sockermom at 8:38 AM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

Melismata: "
I just came to this thread for the first time since it started. It began as a questionable complaint about moderating and now it's...well, I'm not sure what it's turned into."

It's not unlike a tuba. Hot air was blown in at one end, and after many twists and turns out came a lovely golden sound.
posted by chavenet at 8:56 AM on April 4, 2014 [22 favorites]

I picked trombone for myself after hearing descriptions of how the different instruments were used in school bands. I was really good at reading music, and though I was a bass clef native I was pretty good at reading treble just because it was more common, not only throughout the rest of the band but also standard vocal music.

I was, however, poorly suited to the trombone because my ears aren't very precise (another reason I had to be good at reading music). I eventually switched to percussion - because we had a lot of trombones and few drummers and I could carry a big bass drum for marching band - but that didn't quite suit me either due to a lack of rhythm.

I stopped playing after high school but eventually it carried over into a deep and abiding love of classical/orchestral music, reading scores and understanding a lot of the music theory and terminology. Looking back I wish I had tried some theory classes in college.
posted by mountmccabe at 8:57 AM on April 4, 2014

Melismata: "It began as a questionable complaint about moderating and now it's...well, I'm not sure what it's turned into."

Us.
posted by zarq at 8:57 AM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

Martin Mull's version of Dueling Banjos with a Tuba is also cool.
posted by Confess, Fletch at 8:58 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

trombonists were the cool, laid back, quirky types.

Haha! I'd love to think so, but the fact we have to drain spit out of our instrument constantly makes me doubt. Still, low brass 4 LYFE.
posted by winna at 9:35 AM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

The case of the Mystery Banjo was my favorite Nancy Drew Book.

A good school band director should be cool about letting kids try new instruments, no matter what they need to fill out their Flunky Ensemble.

I THOUGHT I had taught myself to read music by playing the recorder family after my Dad had refused to pay for a band instrument and more than a year of piano lessons, but it didn't really sink into my bones until I started singing lots of solfege. Even the piano got easier after that.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 9:39 AM on April 4, 2014

The cost / benefit ratio for free speech is totally different when you're talking about a place like MetaFilter vs. government censorship.

With government censorship, the costs of letting the government decide who can and can't speak at all are much too high for the benefits of getting rid of harmful or unpleasant speech.

But with MetaFilter, the costs of moderation are low. We have plenty of great comments to read, so no individual comment is indispensable, and there are plenty of other places people can express themselves if they can't figure out how to do it properly here. And we're all free to go listen to people elsewhere if they don't/can't contribute here. While the benefits of having a place full of actual discussion rather than a cesspool of trolls and people shouting past each other are very high.

So it really makes sense for the moderators to err on the side of preserving the good of the site.
posted by straight at 9:50 AM on April 4, 2014 [5 favorites]

After a few years of hosting band practices at my house with a band that included a sizable brass section, I have to say that brass players and barnyard animals are basically the same type of creature as far as I'm concerned. They're fundamentally innocent, good-hearted beasts, but you will have a hard time keeping that in perspective after you've let them in your house only for them to drool all over your floor.
posted by invitapriore at 10:31 AM on April 4, 2014 [9 favorites]

Mozart's Requiem? :)

Nah, not enough dudes with changed voices in middle school to do a real symphonic piece. No, it was some contemporary piece that changed tonal centers a lot.

Now that I'm a grownup, I have tremendous respect for the skill. It's hard -- harder for singers than for instrumentalists, because you have to be able to hear the piece in your head by looking at it, you can't just go "oh that note is a G-flat so I will put my fingers in the place that makes a G-flat." It saves SO MUCH TIME in rehearsal, though -- imagine a play where everyone had to be taught their lines out loud instead of reading them off the page! And a lot of the work I do would be flatly impossible without my reading ability; I do some recording work for movie trailers and video games (one of which just released last week! woo! any Diablo players in the house?) and we don't get that music ahead of time, you just walk in and it's on the stand and you sight-read for three hours. Ideally you read it once, record it once, double it once, and you're done, but in reality they're recording the reading take so if you can nail it the first time consistently, you can lock down the track in two takes instead of three, which means you can get 50% more stuff in the metaphorical can in your contracted time. . . which tends to mean you get hired more often.
posted by KathrynT at 10:41 AM on April 4, 2014 [5 favorites]

The way it seems to me, Metafilter as a whole may not be a community, but it does have a culture, and cultural norms that go along with that. The mods are (long-suffering, patient to an inordinate degree) the stewards of that culture.

Some outliers happen; they happen in every culture. But there's a difference between being on the fringe, and standing on the outside pissing in.

Maybe find a toilet instead, if the culture here offends one so.

(one of which just released last week! woo! any Diablo players in the house?)

Okay so that's fucking cool. If only this steam-powered beast could handle D3.

(Fuck steampunk. My computer predates silicon.)
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 10:45 AM on April 4, 2014

It's hard -- harder for singers than for instrumentalists, because you have to be able to hear the piece in your head by looking at it, you can't just go "oh that note is a G-flat so I will put my fingers in the place that makes a G-flat."

This is maybe true for beginner-to-intermediate instrumentalists, but a professional player of any instrument is most certainly going to be audiating at the same level as the singer next to them. You have to hear the music in your head to be able to do things like shape dynamics and articulation appropriately.
posted by invitapriore at 10:49 AM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

a professional player of any instrument is most certainly going to be audiating at the same level as the singer next to them.

Yeah, that's probably true. I just have known a lot of instrumentalists, including people who get paid on the regular, who couldn't hum you a line unless they'd played it out first.
posted by KathrynT at 10:55 AM on April 4, 2014

Oh yeah, it's common enough, frustratingly, and it's definitely the case that singers are forced to be able to do it earlier in their careers.* I just think that recognition of the fact that sight reading for instrumentalists actually involves two translation steps -- from written notes to internally-realized music, and then from internally-realized music to externally-realized physical movements -- rather than the single translation from notes to physical movements is essential for true mastery of instrument playing. I think after enough practice that that two-phase process starts to feel like a single, holistic thing, but it's definitely a more comprehensive and actually musical process than the "put finger here"-style one.

* Which is one more reason that people who think singers are lesser musicians are totally deluded, since in my opinion audiation is the most fundamental part of what making music is.
posted by invitapriore at 11:08 AM on April 4, 2014

gorbichov: what's the definition of perfect pitch?

It's when you throw a banjo into a trashcan and hit an accordian.

barnacles: I wish more people would do this.

'Cos, I mean, I'd love to find free banjos sitting in the trash. God, you can never have too many banjos.

While you're pulling banjos out of the trash, would you grab the accordion for me? I'd really like to have a proper one, instead of the Little Tyke version we have at home. Thanks!

(I mentioned to a co-worker that I like accordions, but don't own one, then he said he had one that he won, but he never used. Was I supposed to offer him money to buy it from him at this point? It was weird.)
posted by filthy light thief at 11:33 AM on April 4, 2014

You can really learn a lot about somebody's musical proclivities just from knowing what instruments they love or hate. Banjos, oboes and accordions all have a rich spectral profile, filled with a lot of inharmonic overtones, and I wouldn't be surprised if a love for those instruments correlates with a taste for expanded dissonance in music (I know both are the case for me). I suspect that the inverse holds for people who don't like those instruments, though maybe more weakly since I think at least in the case of banjos and accordions that there are cultural associations with musical styles that people like to hate.
posted by invitapriore at 11:37 AM on April 4, 2014 [6 favorites]

(I mentioned to a co-worker that I like accordions, but don't own one, then he said he had one that he won, but he never used. Was I supposed to offer him money to buy it from him at this point? It was weird.)

If he is a superstitious sort, you could tell him how restless spirits are drawn to unused accordions, but you would take the risk of exorcising it and removing it's baleful influence from his home.
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:39 AM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

For sale: baby accordion.
Never used.
posted by chavenet at 11:42 AM on April 4, 2014 [20 favorites]

Accordions are the sound of the Devil's farts. It is known.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 11:45 AM on April 4, 2014

Yeah, that's probably true. I just have known a lot of instrumentalists, including people who get paid on the regular, who couldn't hum you a line unless they'd played it out first.

K T, isn't that because playing is to them as humming is to you?
posted by Lesser Shrew at 12:17 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

K T, isn't that because playing is to them as humming is to you?

Well, but that's my point. You can't hum a song without knowing how it goes, but you can play a song without knowing how it goes.
posted by KathrynT at 12:22 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

invitapriore: You can really learn a lot about somebody's musical proclivities just from knowing what instruments they love or hate.

Interesting theory, I'm interested to see how accurate this is.

GenjiandProust: If he is a superstitious sort, you could tell him how restless spirits are drawn to unused accordions, but you would take the risk of exorcising it and removing it's baleful influence from his home.

I think I will invoke restless spirits more often, as a general course of action/discussion.

chavenet: For sale: baby accordion.
Never used.

It's used, just not very much.

feckless fecal fear mongering: Accordions are the sound of the Devil's farts. It is known.

Oh, my good person, how I wish I took notes in that music major's senior presentation on the various sounds one can conjur from the range of accordion-type instruments. Accordions, if played well, can have an impressive range of sounds.
posted by filthy light thief at 12:23 PM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

filthy light thief: "Oh, my good person, how I wish I took notes in that music major's senior presentation on the various sounds one can conjur from the range of accordion-type instruments. Accordions, if played well, can have an impressive range of sounds."

Seriously. It's a different instrument, but hearing for example Piazzolla or someone playing Piazzolla's music on the bandoneon is like being seduced by an illusionist who is also an anthropomorphized acid trip, your other senses just kind of drop out, like "fuck this, it's party time in the auditory processing center."
posted by invitapriore at 12:39 PM on April 4, 2014 [7 favorites]

posted by y2karl at 12:52 PM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

Dammit, "pulling banjos out of the trash" HAS to be a euphemism for SOMETHING.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 1:21 PM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

Making a supposedly grand romantic gesture, but doing it on the cheap?
posted by kagredon at 1:48 PM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

you can't just go "oh that note is a G-flat so I will put my fingers in the place that makes a G-flat."

Well, though, to be fair, you can't actually really do that on lots of instruments, either. For pretty much all wind instruments (as far as I can think of), "put my fingers in the place that makes a G-flat" gets you in the general vicinity of a G-flat, but your embouchure and breath have a lot to do with whether you're really on pitch or not, and you have to learn to take into account the quirks of the instrument in general and of your instrument in particular.

(Speaking from the experience of playing sax from 8 through shortly after college, plus some dabbling in clarinet & flute.)
posted by soundguy99 at 2:12 PM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

you can't just go "oh that note is a G-flat so I will put my fingers in the place that makes a G-flat."

As someone with perfect pitch, this is exactly what I do.
posted by Melismata at 2:17 PM on April 4, 2014

I once dated a viola player, and not only did she enjoy viola jokes and the same kind of movies I did, she took me backstage at Lincoln Center, which was very cool. So I like viola players.

> low brass 4 LYFE.

You know what's also cool? Bass trumpet.
posted by languagehat at 2:20 PM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

As someone with perfect pitch, this is exactly what I do.

Wait, you can put your fingers in different places on your throat and sing different notes precisely in tune ??????

I dunno, every time I try putting my fingers on my throat I just get a bunch of choking sounds . . . . .
posted by soundguy99 at 2:22 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

As someone with perfect pitch, this is exactly what I do.

Wait, you have any time left with all that throwing of banjos into dumpsters?
posted by GenjiandProust at 2:24 PM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

Perfect pitch becomes a bit of a trial if you're playing baroque music at 404Hz and 415Hz, Classical music at 430Hz, and are also a fan of modern piano playing and orchestral music at 440-442Hz. It can be done, but wow, such head spin.

But I like that Melismata has perfect pitch. Epon-lismatic.
posted by Namlit at 2:31 PM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

I think I'm in love with this thread.

it is NOT "just limerance" shut UP
posted by billiebee at 2:33 PM on April 4, 2014 [10 favorites]

you can't just go "oh that note is a G-flat so I will put my fingers in the place that makes a G-flat."

Well, though, to be fair, you can't actually really do that on lots of instruments, either.

Nor on stringed instruments (especially the violin). The very angle of your finger pressing the string can cause enough differences that you're playing Gbb not Gb. Plus there's the issue of vibrato, sliding above and below the actual note, and how much vibrator your conductor wants to hear and when.

Pretty much the only instruments you can reliably go "oh that note is a G-flat so I will put my fingers in the place that makes a G-flat" are pianos (in tune) and electronic keyboards.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 2:36 PM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

Yes Namlit, it can be a trial. I hate it when my church organist spontaneously plays a hymn pitched up or down a step.
posted by Melismata at 2:36 PM on April 4, 2014

how much vibrator your conductor wants to hear and when.

This typo is best typo.

The very angle of your finger pressing the string can cause enough differences that you're playing Gbb not Gb

Yeah, exactly, even on fretted instruments (like the guitar or the banjo) the amount of pressure you put on the string down towards the fretboard can make a noticeable difference in pitch.
posted by soundguy99 at 2:50 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

Those things are all true, but I think they're orthogonal to the issue at hand. I can reliably play Gb on a guitar or a violin if someone asks me to. Vibrato shouldn't really come into it, since you have to be centered on the correct pitch no matter how wide it is.
posted by invitapriore at 2:54 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

I know nada about music but with reference to a vibrator, I assumed all this talk of G something something would surely wind up being about the G Spot.

You people disappoint me.
posted by Michele in California at 3:01 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

You know nada about the power of music...
posted by Namlit at 3:03 PM on April 4, 2014

I can reliably play Gb on a guitar or a violin if someone asks me to. Vibrato shouldn't really come into it, since you have to be centered on the correct pitch no matter how wide it is.

Vibrato covers a multitude of sins. Trust me.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 3:15 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

Like KathrynT I was convinced, in my younger years, that reading music would never be a skill I might need. Sadly I stuck to my guns for much longer. Learned a bit just from osmosis, got better in college, but I would give my right arm (or something less important) to be a strong sight-reader.
posted by bunderful at 3:17 PM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

feckless fecal fear mongering: "I can reliably play Gb on a guitar or a violin if someone asks me to. Vibrato shouldn't really come into it, since you have to be centered on the correct pitch no matter how wide it is.

Vibrato covers a multitude of sins. Trust me."

Heh, string players always think the rest of us don't notice that they're doing this.
posted by invitapriore at 3:18 PM on April 4, 2014 [6 favorites]

Vibrato covers a multitude of sins. Trust me.

My two least favorite words to see in a score (particularly if it's something high) are "senza vib."

But yeah, the whole thing about how it's not a perfect Gb or whatever -- no. It isn't. But damn it is a lot closer than what comes out of your mouth if you see a Gb on the staff and have no idea what actual pitch level that is in your head, and just open your mouth and see what comes out.
posted by KathrynT at 3:19 PM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

I can still sight-read alto clef, but treble or bass? Fuck off.

Heh, string players always think the rest of us don't notice that they're doing this.

No, we don't.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 3:20 PM on April 4, 2014

I...what? You just said yourself that vibrato "covers" for sins, which would imply exactly that. I'm really not interested in starting an argument here, but I am confused.
posted by invitapriore at 3:24 PM on April 4, 2014

It covers for sins in the sense that unless you are playing to a very musically educated crowd, and/or playing in a large ensemble, you can get away with it.

But you are very much aware that the people at the desks around you are quite aware.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 3:27 PM on April 4, 2014

Oh word. Yeah, there's a lot you can get by the audience in that sense.
posted by invitapriore at 3:31 PM on April 4, 2014

This thread is feeling very "school bus" right now.
posted by oceanjesse at 4:35 PM on April 4, 2014

I will take the blame/credit for introducing violas into the discussion. Mea maxima culpa.
posted by spitbull at 4:51 PM on April 4, 2014

This thread is feeling very "school bus" right now.

I'm reminded of a different kind of transportation.
posted by Rock Steady at 5:22 PM on April 4, 2014

I have a friend named Jamaal who's a viola player. He's from North Carolina. He played his viola with a few rock bands along with the usual places. He was one of two coworkers with that name** that I had at that point. The viola player had dreads, the other one had a shaved head. One day my coworker Nicole complained to me about a mess Jamaal had left. I said "Dreadlocks Jamaal?" She replied "No. Bald Jamal." Which kind of sounds like a kids show, Ther Advetures of Bald Jamal." Or something.

*I've known three guys with this name. None spelled it the same. My coworkers were Jamaal and Jamal. My high school classmate was Jomal.
posted by jonmc at 5:22 PM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

I have some great memories of marching with the bass drum in high school. It was heavy, but I'm a big guy and it was fun to play. I could make everyone march faster or slower, which had the side benefit of enraging my band director, who was kind of an ass.
posted by double block and bleed at 5:35 PM on April 4, 2014

jessamyn: "Matt is the money guy"

I'm picturing Matt walking around MeFi HQ, smoking fat cigars, leaving a trail of $5 notes everywhere he goes as wads of cash keep falling out of his pockets, cuffs and pant legs, all bloated and stuffed with years worth of money from member signups.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 5:43 PM on April 4, 2014 [8 favorites]

Viola is cool. The fact that Jake from Adventure Time plays viola, and Jeremy Green's covers of Royals and Roar have done wonders for getting my eight-year-old to practice everyday.
posted by Toekneesan at 5:50 PM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

Hairy Lobster: "jessamyn: "Matt is the money guy"

I'm picturing Matt walking around MeFi HQ, smoking fat cigars, leaving a trail of $5 notes everywhere he goes as wads of cash keep falling out of his pockets, cuffs and pant legs, all bloated and stuffed with years worth of money from member signups."

Every time someone gets banned, Matt lights a cigar with a $5 bill.
posted by double block and bleed at 5:51 PM on April 4, 2014 [9 favorites]

Signups don't actually go to the MeFi bank account. With each new registered account, Matt's mattress gets infinitesimally more comfortable.
posted by Pope Guilty at 6:20 PM on April 4, 2014 [5 favorites]

hopefully i don't derail this thread by coming back here but i see this bonanza of replies and i can't help but be reminded of the time bob, frank and myself went fishing for carp on the Dewey reservoir. The fishing was ok not great but something funny happened.

We had left the tie up rope trailing in the water behind our little boat (really just a frayed nylon cord actually) and as we pulled it in we noticed it had not one but two fish on it! a little carp had somehow gaffed itself on the knot (don't ask me how) and a rather huge bass had come up and bit into him. It was pretty amazing.

I guess the point is this (like that great catch) was a successful post i think because i didn't try too hard- and look at all of you!

CP
posted by Colonel Panic at 6:22 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

I'll take "Tragically Missing the Point" for $1000, Alex.
posted by zarq at 6:27 PM on April 4, 2014 [21 favorites]

"Matt is the money guy"

I pictured him as the person in a very expensive suit who arrives late, sits near the back, spends half the time reading his smartphone, and leaves early without talking to anyone.
posted by salvia at 6:29 PM on April 4, 2014

I'm glad you're back, CP. But remember what dad always said, think first.
posted by Toekneesan at 6:29 PM on April 4, 2014

Colonel Panic, if you're trolling, you are not welcome here. If in the future you want to come back and participate in a good faith way, you can drop us a line to the contact form.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 6:32 PM on April 4, 2014 [8 favorites]

Well, you gotta admit it's a pretty clever thing to go trolling with a story about trawling.
posted by spitbull at 6:40 PM on April 4, 2014 [6 favorites]

I think he was disappointed that no one noticed that he was trolling so he had to be a little more obvious to clueless old us? There's really no shortage of clever on the internet.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 6:42 PM on April 4, 2014 [11 favorites]

There's really no shortage of clever on the internet.

We passed Peak Clever 20 years ago!
posted by Celsius1414 at 6:47 PM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

Is that like the height of trolling success, a 600 comment thread full of Fox in Checkbox rhymes and orchestra jokes?
posted by salvia at 6:56 PM on April 4, 2014 [2 favorites]

There's something fitting, almost beautiful, about his last comment sitting there with one favorite. He favorited himself.
posted by benito.strauss at 6:59 PM on April 4, 2014 [31 favorites]

Anywho, what were we talking about?
posted by Area Man at 7:04 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

I guess the point is this (like that great catch) was a successful post i think because i didn't try too hard- and look at all of you!

Um, like, do you even go here?
posted by jess at 7:05 PM on April 4, 2014 [9 favorites]

Violas.
posted by Toekneesan at 7:06 PM on April 4, 2014

Area Man: "Anywho, what were we talking about?"

I believe the topic had something to do with $5 bills and Matt wearing a top hat while listening to a viola-banjo duel.
posted by double block and bleed at 7:08 PM on April 4, 2014

A friend of mine gave me several years ago a CD of viola-harp duets.

I can't remember the name, unfortunately, and it's gone missing. This is a shame, because it was hauntingly beautiful.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 7:10 PM on April 4, 2014

I know you don't want it to be about you, fffm, but I really am glad you're back.
posted by double block and bleed at 7:13 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

Well, it's been grand my darlings, but Banksy Jonathan Swift Andy Kaufman over here has well and truly zapped us and the experiment is over. Cortex if you will prepare the scuttling charges, I believe we have enough of a quorum of violists and contra-basoonists to play a passable medley of My Way and Waltzing Matilda. Please file out slowly to the left, light refreshments to be served in the parking lot. Ashes to ashes &c...
posted by Divine_Wino at 7:27 PM on April 4, 2014 [6 favorites]

...and look at all of you!

Having fun?
posted by Toekneesan at 7:28 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

No, dancing to his tune. Maybe we should stop.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 7:30 PM on April 4, 2014

No we are dancing to this tune. (SLYTviola-lady-gaga)
posted by spitbull at 7:42 PM on April 4, 2014

CP's trolling effort here reminds me of the reaction to a troll I saw on another board once. It was a message board set up for women, and sometimes we got guys who'd come in and be all "ooh I'm a boy in the girl club boogieboogiebooogie". We developed a habit of having inane conversations around trolls as a way of warning each other "this is a troll, do not take seriously" and to sort of pointedly ignore them.

Once we had a guy come in and spend most of a thread subtly try to troll the board. But then after about two hours, he finally dramatically declared victory, stating "I, a male, have invaded your female space!" (Yes, I swear those were the exact words.). He went on for a couple paragraphs talking about his intellect being superior to ours, which enabled him to troll us all so effectively, etc. much like CP has done here.

However, he was so caught up in self-aggrandiIng that he didn't notice we'd figured him out hours before and we're having too much fun pretending we were an imaginary jug band, and we're talking about shucking corn and fiddlin' and gingham and we didn't even notice.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:00 PM on April 4, 2014 [7 favorites]

We ain't dancing to nuthin' but our own self-made tunes what with the singers and tubas and banjos and violas and accordions and the Colonel can just go be sad and danceless all by himself if that's what he wants.
posted by rtha at 8:11 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

We can dance. We can dance.
posted by rtha at 8:12 PM on April 4, 2014 [6 favorites]

Sax and Violins
posted by Chrysostom at 8:20 PM on April 4, 2014

We can dance. We can dance.

Everybody look at The Underpants Monster.
posted by Celsius1414 at 8:54 PM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

Why did I not have Viola Lady Gaga in my life earlier?
posted by Deoridhe at 9:03 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

Hey here is a very lovely piece for viola, harp, and flute my friend composed.
posted by daisystomper at 9:29 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

a rather huge bass
posted by serif at 9:40 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

I chose violin because I got a skeptical look when I said viola. No wait, I may have anticipated the skeptical look and just preemptively squeaked "violi..n."

Anyway, I always regretted it.

Viola was actually my second choice behind cello, but there was no way I was going to subject my scrawny undersized third-grade self to the humiliation of trying to schlep a cello up the street and back every other day.
posted by desuetude at 10:00 PM on April 4, 2014 [1 favorite]

I read CP's last comment as some sort of odd after-the-fact face-saving attempt in reaction to realizing that there was basically no point in this thread where he was being taken seriously (see also.) Which is sort of sad and awful but also pretty hilarious and I'm not sure what to think of it all.

In conclusion: I wish I'd stuck with the contrabass longer. What a beautiful instrument that is.
posted by kagredon at 10:04 PM on April 4, 2014 [4 favorites]

I regret my username and wish I'd chosen "Alluring Mouthbreather."
posted by Area Man at 10:38 PM on April 4, 2014 [3 favorites]

Chiming in that I kind of wish I made a case to learn viola at some point in my childhood! Some of my friends moved from violin to viola because they wanted to play bigger parts in quartets, quintets or other ensembles in secondary school. They were mostly really proud of being violists, probably because they'd chosen to change, instead of being "saddled" with what people tend to think is a far third to violin and cello.

At the same time - as over saturated as the world is with middling pianists - I'm really glad I did piano and music theory, because being able to read multiple clefs is a real boon for choral singing. And life. Of course on the flip side, other instrumentalists tend to have to have more precise pitch discernment abilities, so... we all win in the end, and it's really all just music, and the same skills (not technique) in different measures.
posted by undue influence at 12:07 AM on April 5, 2014

Lame. Colonel Viola, that would be something.
posted by Namlit at 1:33 AM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

phew. tied that together
posted by Namlit at 1:33 AM on April 5, 2014 [4 favorites]

I guess the point is this (like that great catch) was a successful post i think because i didn't try too hard- and look at all of you!

it wasn't that good if you have to tell us
posted by pyramid termite at 3:37 AM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

Wait... If "titty fucking" is what the kids call it today, what did we call it back in the day.
I think we always called it that. I think the related 'pearl necklace' is relatively new, though.

What's the difference between a drummer and a drum machine? You only have to punch information into the drum machine once. What's the difference between a drummer and a large pizza? A large pizza can feed a family.
posted by dg at 4:27 AM on April 5, 2014 [4 favorites]

Wait... If "titty fucking" is what the kids call it today, what did we call it back in the day.

Raviſhing of the Teates, they being the feminine Glandes of the Cheſte
posted by threeants at 4:39 AM on April 5, 2014 [27 favorites]

dg: "I think the related 'pearl necklace' is relatively new, though."

It has been around for a while...
posted by the_artificer at 5:32 AM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

Well I for one am glad that someone can use a long ſ correctly in MeTa nowadays. I remember a couple of weeks ago there were fs pretending to be ſes.

Also, because it came up earlier in the thread, I took a picture of Solsbury Hill on my walk home from work last night. It's more schismogenetic if you're on top of it, looking down I suppose. From across the valley, it looks like, well, almost nothing.
posted by ambrosen at 6:41 AM on April 5, 2014 [5 favorites]

So, can we dox this Colonel Panic guy? Trolls who announce that they're trolls remind me of hipsters who announce that they're hipsters: they're really just posers and attention whores.

Paying five dollars for an account and leaving personal information in your two-year comment history doesn't really scream foresight or preparation, but if you want to see a post get quixotically deleted, I can whip something up for you.
posted by Johann Georg Faust at 6:49 AM on April 5, 2014

Boxing, Foxing, Poxing, Mocking, Mt. Goxing, Bagel and Loxing, a-okay, but please, No Doxing.
posted by taz (staff) at 7:00 AM on April 5, 2014 [24 favorites]

Mmm now I want a bagel with lox
posted by Melismata at 7:17 AM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

Viola was actually my second choice behind cello, but there was no way I was going to subject my scrawny undersized third-grade self to the humiliation of trying to schlep a cello up the street and back every other day.

I was forced to play the viola in school orchestra because my arms weren't long enough for the flute and all the violins were taken by the time this was discovered. I was so upset until I realized the viola was basically a violin with a deeper voice.
posted by sockermom at 7:24 AM on April 5, 2014

dg: "I think the related 'pearl necklace' is relatively new, though."

It has been around for a while...

Since the porn version of Vermeer.
posted by biffa at 7:43 AM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

So, can we dox this Colonel Panic guy?

Why in the world would we bother?
posted by benito.strauss at 9:03 AM on April 5, 2014 [6 favorites]

So, can we dox this Colonel Panic guy?

No. Don't even joke.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:06 AM on April 5, 2014 [11 favorites]

He's not here anymore. Can we stop talking about him?
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 9:22 AM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

You first!
posted by h00py at 9:26 AM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

First
posted by oceanjesse at 9:27 AM on April 5, 2014

It still blows my mind when I hear British people occasionally pronounce "trolling" like "trawling". I get it, makes sense and all, but totally rattles the inflexible cage stuck in my head.
posted by iamkimiam at 11:07 AM on April 5, 2014

Johann Georg Faust: "Trolls who announce that they're trolls remind me of hipsters who announce that they're hipsters: they're really just posers and attention whores."

There are worse things than doing stupid things just to get attention. For instance: crassly violating people's privacy and intentionally eliciting "mob justice" in an attempt to punish them for doing stupid things just to get attention.
posted by koeselitz at 11:43 AM on April 5, 2014 [11 favorites]

Viola was actually my second choice behind cello, but there was no way I was going to subject my scrawny undersized third-grade self to the humiliation of trying to schlep a cello up the street and back every other day.

Cello was Elder Monster's first choice. He did not care that the damned thing was bigger than he was, that's what he wanted to play. I bought him a case with wheels on.

He's 22 now, and still plays every day.
posted by MissySedai at 12:10 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

I hear British people occasionally pronounce "trolling" like "trawling".

We only troll when wearing a smoking jacket*. It's just part of our relaxed attitude to winding people up, dahling.

*We just share the one smoking jacket between all of us.
posted by arcticseal at 12:37 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

Wait, you have to share a smoking jacket with Michael Gove? That's disgusting; you have no idea where it's been.
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:48 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

Tell you what, if my jacket was smoking, I'd put it out. What does trolling help?
posted by Namlit at 1:54 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

It still blows my mind when I hear British people occasionally pronounce "trolling" like "trawling". I get it, makes sense and all, but totally rattles the inflexible cage stuck in my head.

It doesn't really help that we're a country of sea and coarse fishers, so we don't really have a concept of trolling for fish. But I'm confused of what senses of the words trolling and trawling British people are conflating (at least in pronunciation).
posted by ambrosen at 2:01 PM on April 5, 2014

Well, we do have the concept of trawling for fish, which seems to be pretty similar to trolling for fish.

I think what confused me for a long time is the noun backformation from "troller" - one who is trolling (either for fish, or for the metaphorical internet fish created by inflammatory disingenuous statements ) - to "troll".

It's hard not to interpret that as the under-the-bridge-troll, especially if you've never heard of troll fishermen.

Doubly confusing is that I'd expect an American to pronounce the word "troll" as used by the British as "trawl", like the "Jahn" I often hear for my first name.
posted by Jon Mitchell at 2:52 PM on April 5, 2014

I'm talking about making yourself competitive to get admitted in the first place. Having musical talent is one thing, but there are hundreds of singers, violinists, flutists, and pianists in the pool for the Ivies. There are very few musicians at the same level who play viola. Your music faculty members, who will rate all those hundreds of audition CDs sent in by the applicants boasting of musical talent, will know what is needed in the student music community, and as fffm says, violas are ALWAYS needed cuz they don't get much respect, but you need a section of them for the orchestra for sure.

Playing an unpopular instrument well also stands you out from the crowd in other ways. You can spin an "I march to my own drummer" riff around it. It's a sign of character and self motivation. Whatever.

It's not a magic bullet, but it's definitely a thing.

I work in graduate admissions for the School of Music at a Canadian university, and can confirm. Also bassoonists are like gold dust (direct quote from faculty member).
posted by jokeefe at 2:59 PM on April 5, 2014

So, can we dox this Colonel Panic guy?

sockpuppet in call for revenge against sockpuppet - read the latest updates here.
posted by sgt.serenity at 3:15 PM on April 5, 2014

Wait, you have to share a smoking jacket with Michael Gove?

Except Michael Gove isn't trolling, unfortunately.
posted by arcticseal at 3:32 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

When I saw this post, and the number of comments it had, I was pretty certain that the poster's account was disabled already.

So apparently the mods here deleting racist trolling comments? Where's the justice! How can this still be america with such censorship rampant?

Where are racist trolls to go to troll, if not here? (oh right, the rest of the internet is still there, never mind).
posted by el io at 3:54 PM on April 5, 2014

I think that this has been one of the more cheerful, fun, and community-building MeTas in a while, so thanks OP!

I'm tempted to tell my own story, which begins at 8 with a cello, proceeds through a decade as a professional guitarist, and winds up (so far) at 50 as a tenured music professor, but I'll boil it down to this: music saved my fucking life. That so many American kids grow up with almost no real chance to explore a serious engagement with music that could open and transform their minds these days just breaks my heart.
posted by spitbull at 4:14 PM on April 5, 2014 [9 favorites]

Aw man. Someone already did the "a pizza can feed a family of four" joke.
posted by Cookiebastard at 4:21 PM on April 5, 2014

spitbull, how do you get to be both an anthropology professor and a music professor, unless you're an ethnomusicologist?
posted by nangar at 4:36 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

Ding.
posted by spitbull at 4:55 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

Although I suppose I should have answered "practice, practice, practice."
posted by spitbull at 4:57 PM on April 5, 2014 [12 favorites]

Ding.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 5:04 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

> Ding.

It doesn't make me hate you any less for hating me (I'm a "redneck"), but it does explain a few things.
posted by nangar at 5:10 PM on April 5, 2014

> I work in graduate admissions for the School of Music at a Canadian university, and can confirm. Also bassoonists are like gold dust (direct quote from faculty member).

Man, I played viola AND bassoon in high school, but I don't think I even mentioned that on any of my college applications.

I had no idea I was such a desirable unicorn!
posted by Superplin at 5:20 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

What?
posted by spitbull at 5:33 PM on April 5, 2014

The getting to be an anthropology professor part of the equation requires praxis, praxis, praxis.
posted by drlith at 5:33 PM on April 5, 2014 [13 favorites]

The getting to be a Microsoft db professor part requires Access, Access, Access.
posted by box at 6:14 PM on April 5, 2014 [3 favorites]

Is there such a thing as an undesirable unicorn?
posted by spitbull at 6:14 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

The getting to be a Scrabble professor part requires ZAXES, ZAXES, ZAXES.
posted by box at 7:14 PM on April 5, 2014 [6 favorites]

The getting to be Gimli part requires axes, axes, axes
posted by Sticherbeast at 7:51 PM on April 5, 2014 [3 favorites]

The getting to be Professor of Mongolian Herding Techniques requires yakses yakses yakses.
posted by urbanwhaleshark at 8:09 PM on April 5, 2014 [7 favorites]

The getting to April 15 part requires taxes, taxes, taxes.
posted by Nanukthedog at 8:10 PM on April 5, 2014 [3 favorites]

This getting to be a device for sending facsimile copies across POTS lines requires faxes, faxes, faxes.
posted by jenkinsEar at 8:10 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

The winning of the greatest board game ever created by Milton Bradley to change the course of history requires Axis, Axis, Axis.
posted by Nanukthedog at 8:12 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

Riding around this desert planet on giant worms requires Arrakis, Arrakis, Arrakis.
posted by jenkinsEar at 8:26 PM on April 5, 2014 [6 favorites]

It feels like this thread is important because there are many comments. Could someone summarize the high points for me? Thanks!
posted by Brent Parker at 8:29 PM on April 5, 2014

1. Start a trolling thread.
2. People have fun in thread independent of you.
3. Declare you're a troll, inadvertently resulting in all the fun being at your expense.
4. People continue to have fun after you've been banned.
posted by Mr.Encyclopedia at 8:38 PM on April 5, 2014 [9 favorites]

The getting to be tripped out on peyote part requires cactus, cactus, cactus.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:45 PM on April 5, 2014 [3 favorites]

The becoming a successful desert gardener is Cactus, Cactus, Cactus.
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 8:45 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

Argh!
posted by computech_apolloniajames at 8:46 PM on April 5, 2014 [3 favorites]

My children are threatening me with violence when I read the yakses, cactus, taxes etc out loud. Mefi for the win.
posted by leslies at 8:58 PM on April 5, 2014 [4 favorites]

Started playing the harpsichord at 5 1/2. True story.
(no tenure yet, not even at the zoo)
posted by Namlit at 9:08 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

The goal of the troll is to cause us the inverse of the portmanteau chillaxus, chillaxus, chillaxus.
posted by Divine_Wino at 9:13 PM on April 5, 2014 [2 favorites]

The getting to be a rewrite of a Dr. Seuss classic that now involves butts is Zax lacks cracks.
posted by booksherpa at 9:39 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

Texas praxis taxis.
posted by klangklangston at 10:48 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

There's something I wanted to do with quixotic, but my inspiration lacks lacks lacks
posted by Namlit at 11:01 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

Texas praxis taxis.

A Wenders, Arendt, Ripploh Production.
posted by taz (staff) at 11:11 PM on April 5, 2014 [3 favorites]

This is all reminding me of the time Santana was hanging out in Greece but couldn't get ready for their upcoming tour 'cause everyone was getting drunk off the local spirits. You know, metaxas axes Abraxas practices.
posted by benito.strauss at 11:21 PM on April 5, 2014 [18 favorites]

Depilation is an artform too, you know. You can't be lax to successfully wax backs and cracks.
posted by h00py at 11:25 PM on April 5, 2014 [1 favorite]

This is the first time I have visited MeTa and my first thread read. It's taken more than an hour. Maybe 90 minutes. And I'm just delighted. It started out so cranky and then evolved in such great ways. I liked the pancake recipes. I liked the music stories. I liked the puns. Of course, this epic thread may have ruined me. They can't all be such a mix of serious and silly, can they? Guess I'll find out. Thanks to all the contributors. You've made my evening.
posted by Bella Donna at 12:30 AM on April 6, 2014 [6 favorites]

Oooooh, you should have seen the alphabet thread last spring.
That was even eppicerer.
posted by Namlit at 1:00 AM on April 6, 2014 [4 favorites]

When you have 2 2 4 8 in 2048, each cell collapses, collapses, collapses.
posted by double block and bleed at 1:59 AM on April 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

BTW, I finally won 20-fucking-48.
posted by double block and bleed at 2:00 AM on April 6, 2014 [4 favorites]

The key to being Henry Miller is Sexus, Nexus, Plexus
posted by chavenet at 2:05 AM on April 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

I try to view everyone here as their best selves.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:07 PM on April 2

Sorry to disabuse you, but all of us are just bad copies of you.
posted by skyscraper at 2:34 AM on April 6, 2014

All my exes live in Texas.
posted by spitbull at 2:43 AM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

All my foxes fuck in boxes.
posted by billiebee at 2:52 AM on April 6, 2014 [7 favorites]

Bix Beiderbecke faxed a bad tax check.
posted by box at 4:16 AM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

When daddy can't sleep at night, he might as well squeeze boxes, boxes, boxes.
posted by drlith at 4:26 AM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

A Wenders, Arendt, Ripploh Production.

I should watch Paris, Texas again. I've not seen it in over twenty years, despite the fact that I very carefully dubbed it to a VHS tape in the late eighties, along with A Clockwork Orange and Elephant Parts — a tape which I have weirdly kept for all this time. I think I also have six hours of Live Aid.
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 4:27 AM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

Being a failed ice fisherman only takes one thing actually: cracked ice.
posted by Potomac Avenue at 6:35 AM on April 6, 2014

Speaking of icebreakers, I was joking earlier. Or trying to make the point that the moderation is usually warranted. That's probably the first time the staff has directly addressed anything I've posted, but it's also the first time my comments potentially endangered anyone but myself. In other words:

Watch your crotches, cautious foxes. Toxic doxes are obnoxious.
posted by Johann Georg Faust at 7:01 AM on April 6, 2014 [3 favorites]

All my foxes fuck in boxes.

Be careful they don't get the fox box pox. Then you'll need the sick fox vax and fox vax detox docs.
posted by GenjiandProust at 7:47 AM on April 6, 2014 [5 favorites]

BTW, I finally won 20-fucking-48.

Everyone I know who plays it has said some variant on this. But. Is it really that hard?

I finally gave up and tried 2048 and won after about 2 hour of play. It really didn't seem that hard. Did I just get lucky?
posted by dotgirl at 7:48 AM on April 6, 2014

I finally gave up and tried 2048 and won after about 2 hour of play [and then stopped playing it]. It really didn't seem that hard. Did I just get lucky?

Assuming the implication I've added to that sentence in the square brackets is correct, the answer would seem to be yes. I was similar, and resisted for so long (after losing a lot of time to Mini Metro), then finally clicked and now I'm like the inebriati president of the world after finishing my second drink, looking down on a world that is destroyed because of my compulsions.
posted by ambrosen at 8:09 AM on April 6, 2014

It occurs to me that we have been very insensitive in this thread. Perhaps our member box would not like to be associated with the practice of vulpiphilia. I mean, I wouldn't judge (as long as the was appropriate consent), but people may talk. As my dad used to say "Don't talk until you've walked a mile in fox sox."

In a spirit of full disclosure, y father never said this, nor, do I imagine, it would have ever occurred for him to do so. We are pretty far down the foxbox foxhole here, folks.
posted by GenjiandProust at 9:05 AM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

I finally gave up and tried 2048 and won after about 2 hour of play. It really didn't seem that hard. Did I just get lucky?

If you can repeat your win in another two hours, then no - I'm generally awed. If you lucked into a win after 2 hours of play and your next win requires you spend two hours a night six out of seven nights a week bleary eyed since its been posted playing the game... well then... we have a lot in common.
posted by Nanukthedog at 9:10 AM on April 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

Did I just get lucky?

No, you are an ingenious gentlewoman. Here, have a cookie.
posted by drlith at 9:15 AM on April 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

I finally gave up and tried 2048 and won after about 2 hour of play. It really didn't seem that hard. Did I just get lucky?

The only thing I can say is that I'm on average scoring higher when I just hack randomly about on the screen and set my brain on blank. But the other way is more fun, sorta.

Quixotic obligatory last words:

Pandora's box
was full of lox,
…came Don Qixox,
very obnox,
and took the box,
cuz he loved lox.
That lox was tox,
axed Don Quixox.
Requiex In Pox
posted by Namlit at 9:19 AM on April 6, 2014 [3 favorites]

My fox box hurts, I got the fox box pox
For the fox box pox, I need the sick fox vax
Going to the doc's for the vax and the fox detox
But I don't wanna pay the fox vax tax!

For the fox vax tax to keep my fox box intact
I gotta post off folders of fox detox docs
I gotta fax back piles of fox vax snaps
Man, fucking fox healthcare system is whack
posted by emilyw at 9:26 AM on April 6, 2014 [10 favorites]

This Is Just to Say

I have eaten
the lox
that was in
the icebox

and which
CDC docs
said was
probably tox-

ic. Forgive me
it was spoiled
so rotten
and so poxed.
posted by drlith at 9:38 AM on April 6, 2014 [7 favorites]

Hey, spitbull, I apologize for what must have seemed like a completely out-of-the-blue swipe at you. Some of the stuff you've said about rednecks (and other people) on the site has come across as hateful and made me pretty twitchy, but I don't actually hate you. I think it's cool that you're an ethnomusicologist, and I hope that, despite the attitudes you sometimes display here, you do good work.

I wish you didn't have MeFi Mail disabled. We could have talked about this there. I don't want to derail this thread anymore than already have.
posted by nangar at 9:52 AM on April 6, 2014

I can't imagine what you mean. It's a really weird thing to say if you know anything about me. Hateful, even. Even explicitly so.

But I guess you don't. And I damn sure don't want to be your pal on memail.
posted by spitbull at 10:49 AM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

Folks, I'm sorry you can't have this conversation over MeMail but you also shouldn't be having it here.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 12:04 PM on April 6, 2014

Also read your Habermax
posted by Namlit at 12:12 PM on April 6, 2014

it's all about good faitx, no faux pax allowed.
posted by Namlit at 12:13 PM on April 6, 2014

There is a deep irony in you mis-spelling faux pas.
posted by feckless fecal fear mongering at 12:33 PM on April 6, 2014

What's this about fox paws?
posted by Dr Dracator at 12:37 PM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

fox fucks box, the paws that refrexes
posted by chavenet at 12:41 PM on April 6, 2014 [1 favorite]

That's FoxNews to me.

Somebody put out the Firefox.

And the sock puppets here are not nearly as bad as the fox-in-sox puppets, with apologies to Dr. Seuss (I'm eating the green eggs and ham, see?)

For more information on foxes, read A Redtail's Dream.
posted by oneswellfoop at 1:01 PM on April 6, 2014 [2 favorites]

That's FoxNews to me.

Ahem.
posted by GenjiandProust at 1:27 PM on April 6, 2014

There is a deep irony

darn, and I was being so careful
posted by Namlit at 2:05 PM on April 6, 2014

If you want to play for Arsenal, you need to be a fox in the box.

Colin Meloy's band worry about the rocks in the box and the water down to your socks
posted by Pink Frost at 2:30 PM on April 6, 2014

Well, and let's not forget the time there was a fox on the pitch.
posted by TwoStride at 2:49 PM on April 6, 2014

If you want to play for Arsenal, you need to be a fox in the box.

Unfortunately, today we were outdone by a fox in the box from Ibrox (and also Lukaku and Arteta).

God, Giroud is shit.
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 2:56 PM on April 6, 2014

What does the fox say?

Not the video I was looking for. I don't even know what it's about. Somehow, that seemed more appropriate for this discussion.
posted by Michele in California at 4:24 PM on April 6, 2014

dotgirl: "BTW, I finally won 20-fucking-48.

Everyone I know who plays it has said some variant on this. But. Is it really that hard?

I finally gave up and tried 2048 and won after about 2 hour of play. It really didn't seem that hard. Did I just get lucky?"

I thought it was pretty damned hard. You're probably much better at puzzle games than I am.

I said this in the other post, but I played it obsessively for a while, put it down for 2 weeks and then won on the first try when I picked it back up. It was like the problem had been churning away in the back of my mind during that time.

Now that I've won (and have a screenshot to prove it to my coworkers), I intend to never play it again, lest I waste my life chasing the dragon.
posted by double block and bleed at 5:05 PM on April 6, 2014 [3 favorites]

I went through a frustratingly long stretch of much almost protean anger at the mercy of kernel panics. Should this ever happen again, I will laugh a deep, deep Buddhaesque bellylaugh. Thanks Metafilter!!
posted by riverlife at 10:53 PM on April 6, 2014

Because I was grotesquely accused above by nangar of classist bias and insulting "rednecks" at some point in my commenting history (ca. 5000 comments, sitewide, in 8 years, with over 14,000 favorites distributed amongst them), I wish to defend myself with a factual claim that there is no such record of my use of that term as an insult on this site or anywhere else.

I do feel this response should be allowed to stand in thread as a legitimate response to a base and very personally insulting -- and false -- accusation from nangar, that has been allowed to stand unchallenged above, and considering that I have devoted many years of my life (and my work) to my relationships with working-class communities in Texas, Arkansas, and elsewhere.

I just searched my entire comment history. I found a total of 7 instances of the word "redneck" in my comment history.

In most cases I used quote marks around the term and was discussing the use of the term itself except for a funny comment about a George Jones song ("High Tech Redneck," if you must know). In most cases I preface "redneck" with "self-described," which is in fact the case for many of my dearest friends.

Three long comments in which I used that word were devoted to defending white working-class southerners against the "redneck" stereotype. I have never, ever used the term as a direct insult, to my knowledge, in my entire life in any context. My comment history is full of remarks like this one, from 2013:

I know and love working-class, white, small-town, Christian, gun-loving, self-identified "redneck" and "hillbilly" Americans like this who are similarly decent, tolerant, charitable, and attempt to live by the example of the object of their faith. More than a few. Across the country.

One so rarely sees them represented in all their ordinary human decency and without the reduction of the signs of their labor and subsistence and cultural identity to mere "lifestyle" choices or expressions of taste rather than values.

or this one, from 2007:

There is a wide space between writing of the rural blue-collar constituency as hopeless "hillbillies" and thinking of them as "saints in overalls." Has the American left not been there and done that?

You can't change American politics without engaging the "redneck" constituency, and thinking of them as stupid or irredeemable does not help, as well as being ignorant and classist.
posted by spitbull at 3:53 AM on April 7, 2014 [4 favorites]

....Hang on.

Namlit, did you confuse me for spitbull when I was talking about the other board and pretending we were talking about "shuckin' corn and gingham"? Because otherwise I also have no idea where this sudden "redneck talk" comment came from.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:12 AM on April 7, 2014

A couple of comments deleted. Do not take advantage of the fact that Metatalk is so slightly moderated to just throw out random personal insults.
posted by taz (staff) at 4:32 AM on April 7, 2014

Empress, I was responding to nangar, not namlit.
posted by spitbull at 4:32 AM on April 7, 2014

Empress, I was responding to nangar, not namlit.

Oh, crap. Sorry, namlit - Nangar, my comment was then a question for you.

This comment and the one before have been a public service announcement by the "Wait Until The Coffee Kicks In Before You Speak" Foundation.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 4:34 AM on April 7, 2014

Wooo, I'm already ducking out of the shooting line. Sorry for (clearly) looking like someone else. Carry on (lite)...

[my only beef is not with the South but in the South, and it's actually pork. Delicious pulled pork, of which my SO's family can produce prodigious, scrumptious amounts (but that's in Virginia, in a manner of speaking on the edge for a hardcore Redneck debate)]
posted by Namlit at 5:22 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

But let's not have a hardcore redneck debate here, in any case. If for some reason we must, that would be another Metatalk post.
posted by taz (staff) at 5:34 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

spitbull, I said some of your comments made me "twitchy". I don't actually think you're a bigot. I think sometimes you don't realize how some of your comments come across. And this is a subject I'm hypersensitive about. I realize you've also made comments defending rednecks. My last two comments directed at you were really shitty. I apologize.

Empress, no, this has nothing to do with anything you've said (or Namlit).
posted by nangar at 5:37 AM on April 7, 2014

"Because I was grotesquely accused above by nangar of classist bias and insulting 'rednecks' at some point in my commenting history (ca. 5000 comments, sitewide, in 8 years, with over 14,000 favorites distributed amongst them), I wish to defend myself with a factual claim that there is no such record of my use of that term as an insult on this site or anywhere else."

14,000 favorites, you say? With so great a bounty of favorites, you, sir, are manifestly not the sort of person to use such insulting language! It is indeed a grotesque — nay, scurrilous! — accusation that this could be otherwise. Such an insult to your honor can never truly be erased.

It is a sorry state of affairs when someone so noble, so celebrated as yourself can find his reputation threatened by some low-favorited riff-raff. The scoundrel even had the nerve to apologize! As if anything less than a duel to the death could satisfy justice. Perhaps four or five more outraged comments from you will teach him a lesson?
posted by Ivan Fyodorovich at 5:37 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

wait what
posted by Namlit at 5:38 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

Cut it out. Everyone please drop this bizarre shitfight.
posted by taz (staff) at 5:42 AM on April 7, 2014 [5 favorites]

I owe spitbull an apology. I hope that can be the end of the "redneck debate" in this thread. Mea culpa.
posted by nangar at 5:44 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

Apology accepted, and appreciated, nangar. Yes, I'm blunt and sometimes provocative, but I'm not classist, and pride myself on that.

Thank you. I'm done now.
posted by spitbull at 5:49 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

Thank you, spitbull.
posted by nangar at 5:51 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

Anyone for puns, or possibly Thrilling Viola Stories?
posted by Chrysostom at 5:54 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

One thing you won't hear anywhere are trilling viola stories.
posted by Namlit at 5:56 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

One more. I too apologize to nangar for taking such umbrage, as obviously I too am hypersensitive on this subject. It's really personal to me.

Yes, I said "taking umbrage." But I can field dress a buck too.
posted by spitbull at 6:05 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

spitbull: "But I can field dress a buck too."

A-line or ball gown?

...in a field, naturally....
posted by zarq at 6:07 AM on April 7, 2014 [5 favorites]

Is this the thread where I get my buckfox dressed?
posted by The Underpants Monster at 6:33 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

Yes, we dress buck naked buckfoxes. Just chuck it in the buck naked buckfox box.
posted by Too-Ticky at 7:10 AM on April 7, 2014 [3 favorites]

Taking Umbrage? Call the Ministry of Magic!
posted by h00py at 7:22 AM on April 7, 2014

You know those movies, where the hero is in a bar and a minor bad guy throws a punch at him, then they cut to some guy we've never seen before, who sees the punch being thrown, who shrugs and just throws a punch as some random guy next to himself? Sometimes, MetaTalk reminds me of that.
posted by benito.strauss at 7:30 AM on April 7, 2014 [29 favorites]

*shrugs*

*tosses back shot of whiskey*

*turns and slugs benito.strauss*

Let's call it foreshadowing. :)
posted by zarq at 7:34 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

How dare you? *glasgow kiss* (not scottist)
posted by h00py at 7:39 AM on April 7, 2014 [3 favorites]

*shrugs*

*drinks an entire Capri Sun in one long slurp*

*starts chucking additional Capris Sun at people*
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:58 AM on April 7, 2014 [5 favorites]

It's Capri Suns, son. Capri Sonnen. Prime nauseator of German kiddy parties since 1969. You're right about chucking them.
posted by Namlit at 8:23 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

TIL the correct plural of Capri Sun.
posted by you must supply a verb at 8:23 AM on April 7, 2014

In its original guise the stuff was so sweet, there was no correct plural.
posted by Namlit at 8:25 AM on April 7, 2014

*starts chucking additional Capris Sun at people*

*smacks two of them together a la Stone Cold Steve Austin*

Swig of Capri Sun for the workin' mods!
posted by kimberussell at 8:25 AM on April 7, 2014

Will we get a shot of someone crushing an empty Capri Sun container against their forehead?
posted by GenjiandProust at 8:27 AM on April 7, 2014

Empty is for wimps
posted by Namlit at 8:27 AM on April 7, 2014

Swig of Capri Sun for the workin' mods!

/pours out my 6.75 ouncer. not for my dead homies, but because ew!
posted by Celsius1414 at 8:31 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

"...great tasting fun when you punch open one!"

Damn jingle is stuck in my head now...
posted by the_artificer at 8:33 AM on April 7, 2014

Capri Sun. Apply directly to the forehead.
posted by drlith at 9:11 AM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

*breaks chair across back of violist*

*viola music stops*
posted by TheWhiteSkull at 10:07 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

Capri Sun: The Drink You Have To Open With A Pencil Because The Pointy Straws Are Weaker Than A Drunk Kitten With Anemia And You Aren’t Allowed To Have Sharp Scissors In School So You Have To Spend All Afternoon With Your Mouth Tasting Like Wood And Graphite With Traces Of High Fructose Corn Syrup And Juice Concentrates, You’re Welcome™
posted by The Underpants Monster at 10:15 AM on April 7, 2014 [7 favorites]

The question is how many of you acknowledge that chaz is the same substance as chaz or is merely of like substance to chaz.

Consider carefully.
posted by winna at 10:19 AM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

At least one person in this thread is of topic.
posted by Nanukthedog at 11:15 AM on April 7, 2014

Old joke: The plural of "Capri Sun" is "diabetes".
posted by benito.strauss at 12:14 PM on April 7, 2014

At least one person in this thread is of topic.

I am feeling like this might be the only live thread on MeFi where you can say anything and be on topic.

Or at least I am hoping. I don't get to chat with people enough.
posted by Michele in California at 12:21 PM on April 7, 2014 [2 favorites]

Like the Capri Pun, that it is so sweet and unnatural it's totally off tropic.
posted by Namlit at 2:22 PM on April 7, 2014 [3 favorites]

I am so tired and those things are so heavy and I haven't done the paperwork to get a concealed carry permit...um, did you say puns? Never mind. I thought you said guns.

In theory, I might do my taxes this week. That's my big goal.

Someone shoot me.
posted by Michele in California at 2:25 PM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

double block and bleed: "Now that I've won (and have a screenshot to prove it to my coworkers), I intend to never play it again, lest I waste my life chasing the dragon."

We are Doge 2048.
Your intentions are irrelevant.
You will be ~~assimilated~~ absorbed into the 4x4 grid of animated doges.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 2:30 PM on April 7, 2014 [3 favorites]

DO NOT MOCK KITTENS WITH ANEMIA. THEY DRINK TO FORGET COMPARISONS LIKE YOURS! YOU ARE A MEANIE! THE KITTENS ARE CRYING! I HOPE YOU ARE SATISFIED, YOU MONSTER!
posted by GenjiandProust at 3:27 PM on April 7, 2014 [5 favorites]

All drama aside, "Colonel Panic" is a pretty great username. (really)

It doesn't sit too well over here.
posted by General Tonic at 3:53 PM on April 7, 2014 [19 favorites]

oh doge 2048. can't unsee. pudding brain. must go on. wow. such dzllahblbl
posted by Namlit at 4:10 PM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

spitbull: "Is there such a thing as an undesirable unicorn?"

Well...actually, technically, yes.

(Though I can't imagine that to be true in the case of a bassoon and viola playing unicorn.)
posted by desuetude at 9:13 PM on April 7, 2014

Such gaming!
posted by arcticseal at 9:40 PM on April 7, 2014 [1 favorite]

So win!
posted by dg at 1:51 AM on April 8, 2014

very addict
posted by Namlit at 3:11 AM on April 8, 2014

I have tried to diagram this process, only partially successfully.
posted by Shepherd at 9:56 AM on April 8, 2014 [15 favorites]

much donut!
posted by arcticseal at 10:00 AM on April 8, 2014

I have tried to diagram this process, only partially successfully.

I shall pronounce the name for metafilter emotional units, "pluh-TOE-bee-uhns."
posted by The Underpants Monster at 10:21 AM on April 8, 2014 [3 favorites]

"Colonel Panic" is a pretty great username

It doesn't sit too well over here.
posted by General Tonic

Where is Admiral Haddock when we need him!
posted by Namlit at 10:44 AM on April 8, 2014 [4 favorites]

I have tried to diagram this process, only partially successfully.

It needs little spikes of "Weird interpersonal thing that no one else gets but, gosh, it makes us all uncomfortable." Also "Cute animals study fugue."
posted by GenjiandProust at 11:19 AM on April 8, 2014

All drama aside, "Colonel Panic" is a pretty great username. (really)

Until fairly recently, I kept reading it as "Colonial Panic," which gave me visions of people fighting during the American Revolution in the 1770s.
posted by Melismata at 11:26 AM on April 8, 2014

All drama aside, "Colonel Panic" is a pretty great username. (really)

I kept thinking he should maybe be fighting GI Joe, not Metafilter.
posted by mordax at 12:35 PM on April 8, 2014

Also, because it came up earlier in the thread, I took a picture of Solsbury Hill on my walk home from work last night.

That was my backyard when I was 10, and I haven't seen it since then, so now my heart kind of hurts.

Although, properly, it should be going boom boom boom.
posted by Bunny Ultramod at 12:46 PM on April 8, 2014 [8 favorites]

Also "Cute animals study fugue."

I am having trouble parsing this but I think it might involve a kitten, a notebook, and a harpsichord?
posted by beryllium at 1:32 PM on April 8, 2014 [3 favorites]

No notebook necessary. A cat and a harpsichord is enough.
posted by Namlit at 2:03 PM on April 8, 2014 [1 favorite]

Namlit: "It's Capri Suns, son. Capri Sonnen. Prime nauseator of German kiddy parties since 1969. You're right about chucking them."

Surely it would be Capris Sun?
posted by double block and bleed at 2:04 PM on April 8, 2014

Capris sun

That's what the man said, uh huh.
posted by Namlit at 2:09 PM on April 8, 2014

Metatalk is a flat circle.
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:15 PM on April 8, 2014 [2 favorites]

Aarrggghhh!!!! All circles are flat, by definition! They only have two dimensions! Everybody just stop saying that, dammit!
posted by Chrysostom at 2:21 PM on April 8, 2014 [1 favorite]

Tautologies gonna tautology.
posted by Bunny Ultramod at 2:35 PM on April 8, 2014

You have to credit good writing for what it is: you can make a line a lot more memorable by just fucking it up a little bit on purpose.

Though there's also the argument that the distinction between the idea of time as something that merely repeats and time as a flat circle is a meaningful one if the argument is not just that things come back around later on but that things are literally just happening again; that is, the non-flat circle of a loop in time is a helix that when viewed from along the axis of forward movement appears to be a circle.

But I think the real lesson here is I need to hurry up and watch some more True Detective so I actually have context for this meme.
posted by cortex (staff) at 3:01 PM on April 8, 2014 [1 favorite]

Aarrggghhh!!!! All circles are flat, by definition! They only have two dimensions! Everybody just stop saying that, dammit!

At least the saying isn't "flat sphere"
posted by double block and bleed at 5:59 PM on April 8, 2014 [1 favorite]

Absent a rigorous definition of "flat," one could make a nitpicky semantic argument that a circle inscribed on a 2-dimensional surface that is then embedded in 3-dimensional space in a non-planar fashion is not strictly flat from that same 3-dimensional perspective, while retaining the relevant properties of a circle from the perspective of the 2-dimensional surface.
posted by invitapriore at 7:02 PM on April 8, 2014

The line was originally said by a redneck tweaker, so I think it was intended to sound kind of semi-literate.
posted by empath at 7:09 PM on April 8, 2014

In any case, everyone knows time is a cube, unless they were educated stupid.
posted by empath at 7:10 PM on April 8, 2014

But I think the real lesson here is I need to hurry up and watch some more True Detective

This is a good lesson. A lesson for you all!
posted by sweetkid at 7:41 PM on April 8, 2014

You have to credit good writing for what it is: you can make a line a lot more memorable by just fucking it up a little bit on purpose.

We have a bingo!
posted by Divine_Wino at 9:26 PM on April 8, 2014

I checked and it's "OOOOHH, That's a bingo!", I was tempted to use the edit window to change it, but then remembered that's not what the edit window is for, so instead I say: Celebrate me, CELEBRATE MY RECTITUDE!
posted by Divine_Wino at 9:50 PM on April 8, 2014

Every time you refrain from using the edit window to change content, an angel gets a pancake.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 9:52 PM on April 8, 2014 [11 favorites]

ANGEL PANCAKES MIX

2 1/4 c. flour
1 tbsp. sugar
3/4 tsp. salt
3 tsp. cinnamon
2 eggs
2 1/2 c. milk
3/4 c. vegetable oil

Mix together dry ingredients in large mixing bowl. Mix eggs, milk and vegetable oil together. Add these to dry ingredients; mix well. If too thin, add more flour 1 tablespoon at a time. If too thick, add milk one tablespoon at a time. Serves 4-6.
posted by billiebee at 1:03 AM on April 9, 2014

I am a little confused by recipes that specify vegetable oil, but not which vegetable: Is there some animal product that could legitimately be called an oil instead of butter, lard or fat?
posted by Dr Dracator at 1:52 AM on April 9, 2014

Well, there's baby oil, but personally I think it's cruel.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane (staff) at 1:58 AM on April 9, 2014 [11 favorites]

Yeah, not many people realise how many it takes just to squeeze out a small bottle.
posted by dg at 3:14 AM on April 9, 2014 [1 favorite]

In UK supermarkets, vegetable oil means what Americans call canola oil. There are other oils-from-vegetables available, but that's the only one called that.

In packaging ingredients lists, however, vegetable oil means, "palm oil, canola oil, or whatever happened to be cheapest."
posted by daisyk at 4:35 AM on April 9, 2014

I always took it to mean sunflower oil, which is very common here, or olive oil. I've never heard of canola oil.

oil. oil. oil. word has lost all meaning
posted by billiebee at 4:43 AM on April 9, 2014

I always assumed "vegetable oil" meant "not olive oil".
posted by Rock Steady at 4:46 AM on April 9, 2014 [1 favorite]

Canola oil used to be called rapeseed oil, but was rebranded to avoid unfortunate implications of the latter. Wikipedia says the name "canola" was created in the 1970s, but I think it's more recently — I want to say only since the early 1990s, but I could be off there — that the name has been in common usage in the US.

Wikipedia also says canola refers to one particular type of rapeseed oil: "In the international community, Canola is generally referred to as Rapeseed 00 or Double Zero Rapeseed..."
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 4:55 AM on April 9, 2014

Oh, it's still called rapeseed oil here. It's getting more popular I think. I might know the difference between vegetable oil and olive oil if I ever cooked anything...
posted by billiebee at 4:59 AM on April 9, 2014

I once bought a tin of hot peppers with a list of ingredients in Greek. The first one was essentialy (forced sex)+(black combustible goo out of the ground): it took me a while to realize this was rapeseed oil run through an auto-translator. I can see how the name would be problematic, but Unspecified Vegetable oil doesn't sound much better.
posted by Dr Dracator at 5:08 AM on April 9, 2014 [1 favorite]

Yeah, rapeseed fields seem to have got a lot more common in the UK over the last few years, roughly matching the time I started getting really bad hayfever. (I can't really prove a causal relationship, since I'm at the age for it and I've since moved away anyway.)

I generally use sunflower oil wherever vegetable oil is called for, anyway.
posted by daisyk at 5:20 AM on April 9, 2014

I always assumed "vegetable oil" meant "not olive oil".

Yep, that's my experience to as a deeply amateur DIY chef in the US.

I might know the difference between vegetable oil and olive oil if I ever cooked anything...

It's worth learning to cook like one thing that requires olive oil, just to be able to enjoy the smell of olive oil warming up on a skillet. Especially if step two is tossing some minced garlic in for sixty seconds once the oil is warmed up. I don't even care what step three is, you can just pour that all out and eat a banana if you like, but man oh man that smell.
posted by cortex (staff) at 7:17 AM on April 9, 2014 [10 favorites]

Vegetable oil includes olive oil--it's any plant-derived oil. The primary contrast is with mineral oil. There are, however, a few animal lipids that are liquid at room temperature: fish oil and whale oil are a couple of examples.
posted by drlith at 7:28 AM on April 9, 2014 [2 favorites]

drlith: "Vegetable oil includes olive oil--it's any plant-derived oil."

Yes, olive oil is a type of vegetable oil. However, in recipes, "vegetable oil" means a neutral-tasting (often semi-refined) oil such as canola or sunflower, rather than olive oil.
posted by desuetude at 7:46 AM on April 9, 2014 [3 favorites]

Palm oil is bad, mmkay.
posted by asok at 8:05 AM on April 9, 2014

that smell

It's a beautiful smell isn't it! The smell is all of the complex aromas and delicate flavours of the oil being boiled off as they are destroyed by heating. Anyway, I still do it very occasionally.

Spaghetti aglio, olio e peperoncino

180 g (6.3oz) Spaghetti
•1 Good pinch of salt
•2 Garlic cloves, peeled and finely chopped
•1 Small red chilli, finely chopped
•6 tbsp Olive oil

1. Put plenty of water in a saucepan, add the salt, bring to the boil and throw in the pasta. Stir, then cook for about 5-6 minutes, until nearly done.
2. Now start the sauce by heating the olive oil gently in a frying pan. Add the garlic and chilli and fry for a few seconds, or until the garlic starts to change colour. Take care not to burn the garlic.
3. The pasta will be ready and al dente in those few minutes. Drain it well and put in the pan with the `sauce', adding a little salt and perhaps 1-2 tablespoons of the cooking water. Stir a couple of times and serve.
posted by asok at 8:18 AM on April 9, 2014 [4 favorites]

Take the oil off the heat as soon as the garlic starts to brown, the oil will retain enough heat to fry the garlic to perfection.
posted by asok at 8:24 AM on April 9, 2014

Rapeseed oil vs. canola oil, Google Books Ngram viewer.
posted by DevilsAdvocate at 10:29 AM on April 9, 2014

Given that this thread is still open, I hope you all won't take it too amiss if I interrupt the cooking with a brief return to the titled topic and something I wrote earlier, "I think there's a tendency to let a kind of more circumspect obnoxiousness go and attending to only the more direct kinds." I return to it now only because this instance is a fine example of my point. Someone walks in, in this case Alia, and drops a turd into the conversation. A couple people reply (myself included to be transparently clear), a mod steps in, deletes a few comments (one of mine among them), the discussion continues.

Which, fine. Not a big deal. If a comment of mine gets deleted in the course of contributing to a pile-up which the mods wish to avoid, I mostly don't care. But watching the replies to a provocative remark disappear (but not all of the replies) while the original turd remains is a little exasperating and looks pretty arbitrary. I'm really unopposed to peace through moderation but if there's a reason why Alia's comments in that exchange were more worthy of permanence than the replies rated for deletion, then I'd be delighted to hear it.
posted by octobersurprise at 11:53 AM on April 9, 2014

How I look at—and here I'm talking both generally and specifically since I was the one minding that thread when yours and another user's comments were deleted—is it's not so much the question "did her comment have more worth?" but rather "is an ensuing Alia-centric derail going to improve the thread?"

The timeline was:

1. User makes a sort of dumb but not deletable comment.
2. A little back-and-forth ensues, is sort of a needless derail.
3. A mod, LM in this case, leaves a note asking people to drop it.
4. People do in fact drop it.
5. Hours and hours later, a couple people un-drop it by trying to get into it with original user.

Now, the deleted comments were the ones from step 5. A mod's already dropped a "please cut it out" into the thread, if Alia had for some reason not cut it out we'd have cut it out for her by nixing her followup attempts and if necessarily leaving another more personally pointed note. Didn't happen, all was about as okay as it can be, the system works.

Why pick up the gauntlet at that point? What's the plan, in terms of making thread better, in ignoring the mod note, ignoring the topic of the thread, and pointedly re-engaging with someone who we'd already by implication told to cut it out?

It's not a question of the worth or merit of yours or someone else's rebuttal. It's a question of what you're doing for the thread by broaching it. You can send her a mefimail if you want to have a continuing political argument, but the thread was about an ex-president's paintings, not your feelings about someone else's feelings about the Obama admin, yeah?
posted by cortex (staff) at 12:04 PM on April 9, 2014 [2 favorites]

Why pick up the gauntlet at that point?

Because I didn't see the comment until hours later? I mean, I definitely don't want to sound more annoyed by this than I am, which isn't that much, but tbh, I do find the whole attitude of "we won't delete crappy comments but we will delete any replies to them" very exasperating for some reason I can't precisely put my finger on. It's true that there's no very necessary reason I needed to reply to Alia, but then, there's no very necessary reason she needed to drop a turd in the punchbowl, either. I dunno, it's all sounds very I HAVE HAD ENOUGH! to me.

It's a question of what you're doing for the thread by broaching it.

I think you mean "stepping in it." Imagine that metafilter is a park. We won't scoop up every turd, but we'll thank you for stepping over them, not in them! :)
posted by octobersurprise at 1:06 PM on April 9, 2014 [2 favorites]

Because I didn't see the comment until hours later?

But by the time later rolled around, there was also a comment from a mod there already asking people to cut it out. That's part of the thing; once we've gotten to the point where we have visibly, conspicuously taken action to get someone to cut it out, ignoring that and re-engaging isn't happening in a vacuum and "why delete my comment left after you guys said to drop it when you didn't delete their comment left before you said to" is a hard thing to answer with other than "because of the irreversible flow of time".

Basically I feel like there totally is the broader question of those tricky someone-is-being-obnoxious scenarios that I actually basically agree with you is not perfect and we'll keep thinking about how to navigate; but the example you're bringing up here is a bad one because what you're asking in practice in this specific case is "why didn't I get away with ignoring the mods?"
posted by cortex (staff) at 1:12 PM on April 9, 2014 [4 favorites]

what you're asking in practice in this specific case is "why didn't I get away with ignoring the mods?"

Aw, shucks, cortex, you know I ain't thinking I can get away with over ignoring no mods.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:43 PM on April 9, 2014

Fwiw, though, you did kind of dodge the question of why it wouldn't have been simpler to just delete Alia's obvious attempt to stir shit in the first place. But no worries. I more-or-less have the answers I sought so I won't harp on this any more.
posted by octobersurprise at 1:50 PM on April 9, 2014

It's a balancing act, we have to look at the stuff as we see it, which isn't necessarily immediately when it happens, and make a judgement call. There's not some clear bright line here, there's not even general agreement whether deleting more proactively and aggressively is a net good or net ill compared to the general balance we try to strike.

So, I don't know what to tell you. I'm not dodging the question, I'm just not an oracle who can give you some concrete clairvoyant ledger of the exact costs of deleting that comment in an alternate universe vs. not deleting it in this one. As it stands, the system seemed like it pretty much worked in that thread, for the imperfect world we live in in which sometimes people say things that other people find mildly obnoxious.
posted by cortex (staff) at 2:00 PM on April 9, 2014 [2 favorites]

I mean, we seem to have roughly evenly balanced MeTas between "the mods are fascist thugs who delete far too much" and "this place is a noise chamber, why aren't we deleting derails." I feel like the deletion level is probably pretty right-ish, most of the time.
posted by Chrysostom at 2:08 PM on April 9, 2014 [2 favorites]

To be fair, there's a vocal contingent of people that think the mods should delete whatever said vocal contingent disagrees with.
posted by entropicamericana at 2:32 PM on April 9, 2014

Kind of in cortex's defense:

My ex used to have some awesome phrase about "It's a 'when did you stop beating your wife' question." I wish I remembered his exact phrasing. His point was that sometimes people put you in this situation where there just is no good answer -- they suggest you used to beat your wife and don't allow for the answer "No, I haven't stopped beating my wife because I never beat her in the first place." They frame it so that if you say "I haven't stopped doing that" then you just have admitted that you continue to beat your wife.

That may be a terrible example but just because cortex can't answer your question in the form you framed it out the gate doesn't mean he is dodging the question. Maybe he just never beat his wife. So he can't tell you "when" he "stopped" because he never started so it's just not even the right question to try to answer.

If you don't like what the mods do ("to" you in a specific instance), it's easy to frame their actions as commie, me-hating, whatever. That doesn't make it true. Sometimes, they are just doing their job. Honest.
posted by Michele in California at 2:48 PM on April 9, 2014 [1 favorite]

I can never recall what BND stands for, so I substitute a random phrase until I do remember. Today's is BIG NOISE DANCEFLOOR.
posted by Celsius1414 at 2:56 PM on April 9, 2014 [1 favorite]

Brand New Day.
posted by Michele in California at 2:58 PM on April 9, 2014

Yeah, I though one of the conditions of St. Alia's BND was that she wasn't supposed to participate in political threads at all.

No, that's overstating it a lot. We talked to her about basically avoiding the old patterns of behavior that had been a consistent problem, a couple of hard specific "do not go there" topics, and she has by and large done a decent job of abiding by that. Her continuing to press in that thread after we said something would have been an issue; her occasionally commenting on political topics at all is not so much.
posted by cortex (staff) at 3:02 PM on April 9, 2014

Brand New Day.

Bitchin', Net Denizen!
posted by Celsius1414 at 3:10 PM on April 9, 2014

Yeah, I though one of the conditions of St. Alia's BND was that she wasn't supposed to participate in political threads at all.

What cortex said. We've had other BND people where we've been a lot more "You need to stay out of political threads if you can't moderate your own behavior" I personally dislike that "Just saying..." style myself, but it's not against the rules as much as it can be obnoxious behavior by someone who is otherwise mostly okay here. The fact that it's by someone who was less okay about this in the past is what seems to get under people's skins but that's sort of their own issue to deal with.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 3:11 PM on April 9, 2014 [1 favorite]

I think from the perspective of other users, a BND is supposed to be just that - a Brand New Day. I don't think it is kosher to bring up past behavior that happened under a different username. It may be impossible to totally disassociate someone from their past if you know who they used to be, but Alia should be judged on Alia's actions, not on the actions of a user who, in theory, is a completely different person.

The mods obviously need to keep in mind someone's entire history; the rest of us, not so much.
posted by Chrysostom at 3:57 PM on April 9, 2014 [4 favorites]

Whenever I see Brand New Day mentioned here at Mefi, I always think of this line from Respect Yourself by the Staple Singers: "Take the sheet off your face, boy, it's a brand new day". And it's just such a great song, let's give it a listen!
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:54 PM on April 9, 2014 [2 favorites]

I actually don't consider St. Alia's comment to have been a big deal. In fact, the comment I flagged was one of the responses. Because -

1. As justified as it was, there had been a lot of Bush-baiting going on, and compared to all of that one tiny comment about Obama was REALLY not a big deal and hardly worth getting our boxers in a wad about; and

2. the comment I flagged was an attack on St. Alia rather than an observation about Bush.

It ain't just the folks we agree with that deserve their speech respected.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 5:43 PM on April 9, 2014 [10 favorites]

1) It was not an "attack."
2) I think Obama's a big boy; he can take criticism.
3) I turn Alia into a free-speech poster child and this is the thanks I get.
posted by octobersurprise at 6:26 PM on April 9, 2014

I always feel sorry for poster children, but rarely for the reason the poster wants me to.
posted by maryr at 7:46 PM on April 9, 2014 [3 favorites]

October - your comment wasn't the one I flagged.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 9:36 PM on April 9, 2014

It's true that there's no very necessary reason I needed to reply to Alia, but then, there's no very necessary reason she needed to drop a turd in the punchbowl, either.

I think the thing that makes you feel like you needed to reply to Alia is the same thing that makes you feel like there's a turd in the punchbowl, rather than just a comment that you didn't like. Like you can't allow a comment that you dislike to stand without vocally making it heard how idiotic you find the other person and their comment to be - you, singlehandedly, are fishing the turd out and heroically defending everyone's punch. But in fact, it's more like you walking up to a bowlful of salad and saying I HATE TOMATOES OH GOD LET ME FISH THEM OUT AND DRAMATICALLY STOMP ON THEM.

Alia's comment was bland as fuck. "I can't tell that the present administration is doing much differently." That is possibly the mildest fucking condemnation of Obama I've heard, and I mostly hear it from the left who are unhappy because they expected Obama not to continue the war that never ends, or domestic spying. What about that did you possibly find so shockingly provocative that it had to be defended with pistols at dawn?
posted by corb at 6:38 AM on April 10, 2014 [2 favorites]

Why are you dragging salad in to this?
posted by maryr at 7:22 AM on April 10, 2014

It's called "an analogy", maryr.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 7:30 AM on April 10, 2014

For punch?
posted by maryr at 7:32 AM on April 10, 2014 [2 favorites]

I was enjoying the canola oil discussion. Can we bring that back ?
posted by zarq at 7:34 AM on April 10, 2014 [1 favorite]

In fairness, tomatoes have been more vocally in support of the war in Afghanistan than any other vegetable.
posted by Bunny Ultramod at 7:41 AM on April 10, 2014 [2 favorites]

For punch?

*blink*

Jeez, are people so all caught up in attacking other mefites that they'll even go for "you switched the analogy from punch to salad how dare you" if there's nothing else they can think of?

Some people must just really wanna just fight. Or have really boring lives.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:09 AM on April 10, 2014

I think maryr was just kidding in the first place. (Could be wrong about this.)
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 8:15 AM on April 10, 2014 [8 favorites]

Yeah definitely a joke.
posted by jessamyn (staff) at 9:07 AM on April 10, 2014 [1 favorite]

Tomatos are no joke.
posted by shothotbot at 9:23 AM on April 10, 2014 [1 favorite]

October - your comment wasn't the one I flagged.

<Litella>Never mind.</Litella>

Anyway, on reflection, I should've heeded my wiser instincts and punched myself in the face a couple of times instead of even raising the question. The only thing sillier than some of the knuckleheads around here is calling attention to them.

What about that did you possibly find so shockingly provocative that it had to be defended with pistols at dawn?

It didn't have anything to do with Obama, you dodo.
posted by octobersurprise at 9:48 AM on April 10, 2014 [1 favorite]

asok: "It's a beautiful smell isn't it! The smell is all of the complex aromas and delicate flavours of the oil being boiled off as they are destroyed by heating."

Whaaat? Boiling? Gently warming olive oil for a moment, as cortex described, is not making any boiling happen.
posted by desuetude at 9:59 AM on April 10, 2014

Oils ain't oils
posted by h00py at 10:58 AM on April 10, 2014

I was just being a jokey smartass because it's finally warm out and the sun was shining and I was in a good mood and that's what I do when I'm in a good mood but everyone else seems to be way too serious.

I'm pretty annoying.
posted by maryr at 1:38 PM on April 10, 2014 [2 favorites]

...but I do make cookies sometimes, so that makes up for some of it.
posted by maryr at 1:39 PM on April 10, 2014

I thought your jokes were funny.
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 2:39 PM on April 10, 2014 [3 favorites]

My dad just (like a few hours ago) almost didn't make it through heart surgery and I just wanted to say that I am grateful to be able to return to a place where people still talk about vegetable oil and tomato salad analogies and stuff, like nothing has changed. I actually mean it. Thanks guys.

(tomorrow we'll know more)
posted by Namlit at 2:49 PM on April 10, 2014 [16 favorites]

Free (((((HUGS)))))) for the taking (for Namlit or anyone else).
posted by Michele in California at 2:50 PM on April 10, 2014 [6 favorites]

Hang in there, Namlit, and keep us posted.
posted by languagehat at 2:54 PM on April 10, 2014 [2 favorites]

I send you good vibes, Namlit.
posted by rtha at 4:12 PM on April 10, 2014 [2 favorites]

Well, I thought your cookies were funny, maryr.
posted by ambrosen at 4:21 PM on April 10, 2014 [1 favorite]

My bread is hilarious.
posted by maryr at 4:40 PM on April 10, 2014

Why are you dragging bread into this?
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 5:10 PM on April 10, 2014

Because it knows which side it's buttered on.
posted by maryr at 5:17 PM on April 10, 2014 [1 favorite]

Butter makes the draggin' easy, natch.
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 6:04 PM on April 10, 2014

Why are you dragging bread into this?

Gravy?
posted by benito.strauss at 7:49 PM on April 10, 2014

Groovy.
posted by maryr at 9:46 PM on April 10, 2014

Why are you dragging

Gravity.
posted by Namlit at 3:03 AM on April 11, 2014 [1 favorite]

Why are you dragging bread into this?

Because bread just looks better in a pair of five-inch heels, a waist cincher, and a big blond wig.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 5:55 AM on April 11, 2014

I used to make little statues by squeezing bread in my sweaty little hands -- men and women, dogs, police officers, national guardsmen -- and then I would pretend I was Godzilla as I ate them up.

Helpless people on a subway train
Scream bug-eyed as he looks in on them
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 6:37 AM on April 11, 2014 [2 favorites]

Frank Gehry No Longer Allowed To Make Sandwiches For Grandkids
posted by maryr at 7:56 AM on April 11, 2014 [5 favorites]

1931: Famous Architects Dressed as Their Buildings
posted by The Underpants Monster at 8:53 AM on April 11, 2014 [4 favorites]

When we visited today, dad was still out, but they said that he's moving in the right direction.
It was kind of intense yesterday.

But yeah. Doctor made slight upbeat noises...

(Thx for being kind, folks! Carry on....)
posted by Namlit at 9:25 AM on April 11, 2014 [13 favorites]

Glad to hear good news, Namlit. Keeping you in my thoughts.
posted by zarq at 11:31 AM on April 11, 2014 [3 favorites]

For those people just waiting with baited breathe: I did, in fact, do my taxes yesterday.

That is all.

Also:
((hugs)) Namlit
posted by Michele in California at 12:40 PM on April 11, 2014 [2 favorites]

For those who asked: Few days down the lane and we still don't know much more. At least, dad's stable, infection-wise and so on, but waking up takes a darn long time, and I mean longer than the doctors are comfortable with (or so it seems). Visiting time after 2 P.M. every day, intensive care, you get the picture. The hospital people are great (and this is Germany. Thanks for the unexpected miracles).
posted by Namlit at 1:05 AM on April 15, 2014 [9 favorites]

Why can't one favorite favorites? Pony of the day.
posted by Namlit at 1:45 PM on April 15, 2014

I also wanted to say that I won at 2048 Doge Edition. Its been a useful way not to get crazy in this situation.
posted by Namlit at 1:47 PM on April 15, 2014

Why can't one favorite favorites?

Really. It is METAfilter, after all.
posted by Chrysostom at 1:48 PM on April 15, 2014

We should start a new MeTa requesting this shiny new favs pony, with glossy mane and pink spots...

;-)
posted by Michele in California at 1:50 PM on April 15, 2014

Going better. Finally. Progress is slow, but in the right direction.
posted by Namlit at 9:57 AM on April 17, 2014 [7 favorites]

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