(2017-09-07, 10:20 AM)Laird Wrote: Recently, moderators have made two decisions with respect to defamatory posts:
These decisions were basically made on instinct / gut feel. We don't have an official moderation policy on this issue. I'm starting this thread to see whether the community supports these decisions and what, in general should be our policy on defamatory posts.
- Ian (Ninshub) deleted a post by Leuders which made unsubstantiated allegations of sex crimes against a (deceased) public figure in mediumship.
- I edited out of two of Max_B's posts defamatory insinuations regarding Dean Radin and IONS after Max refused to retract them.
We apparently in the jurisdiction in which the forum is hosted (the USA) have no legal responsibility for defamatory posts made by members, so "covering ourselves" is not an issue. The issue is more ethical (it's not right to defame people) and practical (public figures in parapsychology might be less willing to join the forum or be interviewed by us if they know that they can be defamed on our forum without consequences).
Sci, too, has raised this issue. I forget which post it was in, but he asked whether, in the potential conspiracy theory forum, members will be free to speculate on supposed crimes by public figures without the need to provide compelling evidence. My thoughts on this are that it appears that the poll will result in us having essentially private forums for both politics and CT, and that we can tolerate if not endorse that sort of thing in private.
Your thoughts on all of this welcome.
The question at its heart is: should someone yell fire if they can't prove there is a fire? To impugn someones character by unsubstantiated allegations should not be allowed.