report confidentiality (split from another thread)

I'm just gonna go out and say that I don't support any hard and fast "private stuff must remain private" sort of thing. Like the example I said above, if there's some kind of shitty or abusive behavior going on behind the scenes, I'd actually kind of like it to be something I can know about, because it's relevant to me picking who I interact with and how I do it.

I've been to a fair amount of places where a lot of pretty absolutely awful things went on in backchannels (ie adults soliciting literal children, people sending death threats, stuff like that) with people at large not knowing that said person was dangerous bc they insisted on taking care of it in private. If I know Placeholder John has been secretly reprimanded for sexting minors, I'm going to treat him differently than if I didn't know, and I consider that pretty important.

As a member of the community, I kinda have a vested interest in knowing when shit like that is going down, so the idea that there are some situations where it is totally cool to disclose info about ostensibly private communication is something I support.

Not to mention that the specific phenonmenon of "I can accuse mods of saying things they didn't say in private and if they correct me I can whine about them disclosing the thing I chose to disclose first" is just straight bullshit.

 

i don't wanna ping because they're distressed and this is the last place I want them to be while upset, but I'm leaving a "be safe, beldaran. you didn't deserve having this happen at you and i hope you feel better soon." in case they wind up sweeping near this again.

 

Hey Rigs? Leave Sam alone. Like full stop, leave her alone. You'd been aggressing against her, specifically, while you were a mod for a long time in plenty of public spaces. You are not being a hero here, you're being a bully. Like the other day that ganymede comparison to someone who is open about being a CSA survivor? That was really fucked up! Stop it!

Like, leave her alone! Please!

Imo she's allowed to talk about this because she's been receiving pretty sustained harassment from you. You belittle her, put her down, and idk if you think there's some witty back and forth going on here but you've seriously hurt my friend and I'd like you to please stop and apologize.

Also I'm just gonna say that in my doctor and therapy offices, confidentiality stops if there's a chance I'm going to hurt myself or others, and if anyone is using the report feature or the void or any other confidential medium to hurt people I don't think that should be subject to confidentiality because it just provides a free abuse zone.

 

As far as I know nowhere in the process of becoming a kinstugi mod does one sign a confidentiality agreement.

 

Bullying. Causing harm to people who are rendered unable to respond to it in public due to the nature of the communication. It creates, by nature, an actual missing stair situation. You can't directly acknowledge it due to the rule you're bound up in but you know it's there so you just have to watch yourself more and be careful.

I've said before that I am deeply uncomfortable with the idea that reports, the void, and other private communications are a thing that Must Be Confidential Always because it can lead to zones where mods can be freely abused. It's extra fucked up when the person on the receiving end of the harassment, bullying or abuse has to keep quiet about it or else they get more heaped on them. If I ever snap and decide to go on a harassment campaign using those features, I expect and hope confidentiality would have a limit.

 

To expand: On kinstugi, the only real punitive measures are “go on post mod” and “people think you’re a dick”, and maybe for mods “your modhood is revoked.” No matter the type of hurt, these are the results- and I’m not here to argue about whether or not that is a good thing. But in a case like this, where the is an expectation of privacy but no actual guarantee, then it is purely up to the community to decide who is being a dick, and to what degree. If it is evident that the mod is the one acting inappropriately, then we can all think they are a dick and they may or may not lose modhood, I really don’t know where you stand on that. But in this case, Beldaran is very obviously not the dick. So she has broken no real rule, other then the vague expectation of privacy that rigorist seemed to hope would keep her silent about cruelty. So we all agree that He’s The Dick, and if in the future there arises a situation where a mod reveals information from reports or the Void in a dickish way, then we decide that That Mod’s A Dick.

 

FWIW, while I do not particularly like B or agree with her very often, I do not want to cause her harm. I apologize for doing that. I didn't know that particular phrase was triggering and if I had known, I would not have used it and I will do my best not to do so in the future.

(deliberately not tagging her. if she wants to look or someone else wants to forward, that's fine with me)

 

My take on it is that reaching out is fine, and that individual incidents can be forgiven. Like, context is everything. If it's someone lashing out once because they are in a bad place, then unless it involves something like a suicide or death threat it can probably stand to remain confidential.

Using private spaces to yell at, vent frustration on, bully or abuse moderators though? That's where it ends for me. Full stop flat out. Ya'll have lives. You're allowed to have opinions. You don't have to be emotionless automatons. Reminders for self care are great! But expectations that none of you will ever get upset at or voice upset at content on this site are impossible ones.

 

A problem in this discussion: only Staff has access to the report itself. Everyone else is relying on Staff's characterization of it. I didn't save a copy and only have a vague recollection of the actual wording. I doubt it was very "nice", since I was pretty angry about the dogpiling on G that was starting up again and my opinion that Staff is being a bit hypocritical about what insults are allowed in-thread.

 

Sure.