The way people react

Published on May 6, 2004 By KarmaGirl In Blogging

I have been trying to give polite suggestions to people to point out things that they say or do that could be seen as breaking JU's rules. It's funny, some are quite nice and say "I didn't know I did that" while others fight it tooth and nail.

If your boss came up to you and said: "The 3rd graph in this report is done wrong. Please make sure that next weeks report is done correctly." How would you react? Would you say: "Wow, I'm sorry. I will work on that." Or, will you fight with the boss and say: "It's my right to do it this way!" And, please realize that even though that graph may be better than the ones you previously did wrong, it doesn't mean that it's still not wrong. Don't expect your boss to dig up the worst case and only comment on that one.

The admins on this site mention things only to try and help you. Otherwise, they could just wait until your actions are so egregious that they just ban you. Which makes more sense? I would hope that sooner or later people would realize that the admins are just trying to make this a nice place for everyone. Their job is no different than the peace officers, in that they have to help people see their mistakes and resolve them so that the other citizens don't get harmed.

If an admin says something, don't fight it. You don't have to respond at all if you don't want to. But, admins are only saying things to help. If all we get is backlash for that help, we will just quit saying things since it's not worth the grief.

Comments

Poetmom99

on May 06, 2004

Thanks for everything you do, Karma...and keep up the good work!!

Solitair

on May 06, 2004

I assume you do at least make it clear that you are an admin when you correct people?

Otherwise there would b no way anyone would know that you were an admin and not just a prankster.

Keep up the good work and I hope I never require chastisement,

paul.

KarmaGirl

on May 06, 2004

Actually, all you have to do is check somebody's profile to know if they are an admin.

Brad and I are the two that you see all the time, because we blog a lot. But, there are more admins. For example, there are 3 admins that work on coding and bug fixing this site all the time. You may never hear anything from them, but they are here.

T-Man

on May 06, 2004

T-man raises his hand and points to himself and proclaims, "I'm an admin".

Ok, I'll just shut up and walk away.

Gene Nash

on May 06, 2004

While I appreciate where you're coming from, I think the analogy to a boss/employee is seriously off. A cop catching you doing something wrong who tries to give you a break by giving you a chance to stop it would be more accurate.

For instance, once on an out of state trip a highway patrol officer pulled up beside our car. He looked at us for a while, then he got on his loudspeaker and said, "Slow it down." My dad slowed down. Now, had he flipped the officer off and hit the accelerator we'd have had a problem.

Another example. During P.E. Basketball in Jr. High I was hanging out under the opposing net away from the action since nobody paid any attention to me anyway. The teacher-cum-referee looked at me meaningfully and pointed at the ground. I had no idea what he meant. He waited a few seconds then blew his whistle and hit me with a 3-second violation (which by now was more like a 20 second violation). If I'd had a clue what a 3-second violation was (they never taught us, we were just expected to know this stuff, being boys and all) I could have taken the hint and avoided the penalty.

But a boss/employee? That's a whole different relationship.

MadPoet41

on May 06, 2004

But, admins are only saying things to help.

KarmaGirl~that's how I tend to see it too. I'm actually grateful. Keep up the good work!

~MadPoet

Draginol

on May 06, 2004

I tend to believe that people have the right to say pretty much what they want on their own blog. If someone wants to say they think I'm dumb -- on their blog, I'm okay with that. I can just not visit that blog. And if they annoy me on my blog, I can black list them.

If they start going from blog to blog here slamming me then I'd probably draw the line there.

Mr_Frog

on May 06, 2004

Brad, I'm glad you see it that way. Before, I was somewhat critical of you because you seemed whiny at name calling directed toward you. When you put it that way, I have more respect for you.

-- B

KarmaGirl

on May 06, 2004

smartaz, it the employee/boss was just an example of the *type* of thinking. It wasn't meant to be taken literally. A boos/employee relationship is not much different than a police officer/citizen. Both the boss and the officer are trying to maintain order and have rules followed. The main point was how you *react* to somebody giving you a suggestion.

I see that T-Man showed up. I'd watch out for that guy! He could hide JU from us with a couple keystrokes!

I agree with Brad. Unfortunately, a couple comments that I have made were not where the "worst case" was, so they might not have ended up in the most appropriate place.

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