I’m sorry about that. As I was writing that sentence I intended to make a direct apology because I agree that “I’m sorry you were offended” apologies are disingenuous, but I made an error. I’ve amended it.
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Mods, is there any way we can get the other thread off of slow mode and see if it will stay on track for a bit? its impossible to have a good conversation in slow mode.
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I’m hoping that folks look at the poll as something more than a majority outcome, either yes - they did the right thing, or no - they need to resolve it differently.
If it’s close to 50/50, does it mean it’s okay to leave half the community unhappy with the outcome? If it’s 66/33, is it okay to ignore that third, 90/10, it’s okay to leave 1/10th unhappy, etc.
I don’t have a hen in this coop, but I’ve IDed enough observations, where folks added them to LGBTQ+ Naturalists and have attended many naturalist events where the same folks attended, that I think there’s a big overlap between the two groups.
If that’s the case, and given that queer-folks in this topic have already and repeatedly expressed themselves, how the resolution affects them and makes them feel, what portion of them would it alienate from using iNat to interact with nature? I think that’s the issue the poll highlights.
At least from how I’m reading it, the bigger issue is that @nonbinary-naturalist expressed its resolution to the misgendering posts and although moderators did something, it repeatedly expressed that this didn’t resolve the issue.
I’ve previously seen @nonbinary-naturalist as an enthusiastic forum contributor and identifier, who is appreciated and tagged in for help with IDs. I think its being banned from the forum AND feeling alienated from iNat is a net loss for the community, personally.
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We’ve been talking with sedgequeen and she’s asked us to remove her original post, which we’ve done. She’s also asked us to remove a sentence in the second post that, upon reflection and feedback, we felt was disrespectful and inappropriate. The sentence can be found in the edit history there.
We’re sorry it took us so long to come to that decision on the second post. We hope this can help everyone move forward, even though it’s not what everyone was asking for.
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It is also not sound in terms of integrity to speak in generalities like this when you know what the issue is. The issue is whether @nonbinary_naturalist is competent to know when it has been misgendered. And tiwane has stated that it is not:
What if it was you who was misgendered? Or, for that matter, deadnamed? And then some third party – perhaps a staff member – came along and said, “No, you weren’t.” Under what circumstances would you consider that acceptable?
It seems disingenuous to speak in generalities about “people can listen and disagree” when you know exactly what the issue is.
And amid all this drama, what do we see?
The irony: the person who wrote the offending posts put more effort into fixing the situation than the mod team did.
Nice words, but systematically portraying nonbinary naturalist as some kind of irrational or juvenile person who foolishly “wants everyone to be perfect” doesn’t fit with that sentiment. We are told that the hidden posts contained personal attacks; but we are unable to view ignored content so that we cannot fact-check that claim. We’re just supposed to take their word for it.
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Can you just stop with the aggression, you’re not helping the conversation at all.
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i don’t think this is a completely fair characterization of what happened, but regardless, doesn’t everyone prefer a resolution where the person who made the comment that caused offense had the opportunity to address the situation themselves rather than to have the machine step in to force a resolution? to me, this always seemed like it would be the best possible sort of outcome, although, to be clear, i don’t think there are any winners in this kind of conflict.
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I’m going to close this topic, it’s run its course. Explanations were given by staff, responses were made by the community, and after consultation with the poster, one of the original inciting posts was removed while the other was amended.
I hope everyone can take some time to step away and get outside if they can (or use Explore on iNat if they can’t). As has been said by others here, we’re all passionate about nature and enaging with other folks who are also passionate about nature.
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Well, depending on your point of view, what some consider “off-track,” others would consider to be discussing their experience of being queer on iNat. Criticism of iNat mods and staff does fall under that umbrella.
I can say that during that big kerfluffle, I pulled back. I used to spend hours every night here on the Forums and on the Identify tab. I don’t foresee that coming back. There are things I could say about my reasons, but it has all been said, many times, by several people, and in the end, it made no difference.
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2 posts were merged into an existing topic: LGBTQIA+ and iNaturalist