Announcement : Behavior Towards Instructors, All members should read this Options

[Andrew Cockburn]

Announcement

There have been in the last week or so 3 regrettable unrelated incidents in which our instructors have been the target of disrespectful activities. Whilst I wont go into details, suffice it to say that Kris, Tony & I are saddened by this.

Our instructors are what breathes life into the site. Without the hard work of every one of them GMC would be a lot less than it is today, and they occupy a position of honor within GMC, for their achievements and willingness to help us all.

Kris works hard to keep the new instructors coming in and working with them to ensure they make a good start with the high quality lessons that are a hallmark of GMC. Occasionally we lose instructors as they reluctantly decide to move on, so Kris can never stop his search for new instructors.

Given the above, it should be no surprise that we are particularly upset about the disrespect that has been shown to our instructors in the cases mentioned above. If this were to continue, and an instructor were to leave because of something a member said or did, the whole of GMC would suffer.

For this reason, please observe the following guidelines, and don't force us to take action in this area.

• Lesson comments are a great way of giving feedback to instructors on how much you liked their lesson, and to provide suggestions on what you would like to see in future. Please keep all comments positive and constructive (especially if you see elements that need to be improved). Negative comments will be immediately deleted, and action will be taken against the member involved
• GMC does encourage feedback about its instructors. If you have an issue or concern about an instructor please do not make public comments. Instead, report the matter privately by PM to Kris or any moderator and we will take it seriously
• The instructors forums and sub-forums are the personal space of the instructor concerned. On an instructors board behave as you would if you were in their house. Show respect to the Instructor and do not flame or argue in their forums no matter what the provocation. Any such posts will be immediately deleted, and action will be taken against the members concerned.
• On the boards in general, Instructors are due the courtesy and respect that would be afforded to any other member and more. Disrespect to instructors on the general boards will be treated in exactly the same way as above.

I am personally sad that I have had to make this announcement - we will be enforcing the above policy rigorously from now on.

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[Fsgdjv]

I'm sorry, but I have to step in to Lithuanians defense here. It's not the same thing to call someone stupid and to call someones opinion stupid, at least for me. HE's just stating his view, and well, he also kind of proved his points with one of the answers he got. I don't want to start a fight or anything, I just wanted to say what I though. Hope it's ok.

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[Andrew Cockburn]

However phrased, comments like that are inflammatory - fortunately Matt is mature enough to not rise to it. There are better ways to say these things such as "I don't agree".

I'm not disagreeing with the point made by Lithuanian, courteous discussion is great. Calling peoples opinions stupid however is not, and we will mod it accordingly.

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[RobM]

However phrased, comments like that are inflammatory - fortunately Matt is mature enough to not rise to it. There are better ways to say these things such as "I don't agree".

I'm not disagreeing with the point made by Lithuanian, courteous discussion is great. Calling peoples opinions stupid however is not, and we will mod it accordingly.

I understand both sides of this conversation but it's not as easy for someone non english speaking to rerphrase something to sound "politically correct" as it would be for say me or you Andrew. For someone with little english speaking never mind writing (a whole new ball game there) abilityit's hard to say what they really mean.

I'm sure most of you know that a lot of words in the english language can be spoken as many other words in another language. So when someone says that's stupid maybe they meant that's not too bright or I disagree or thats wrong? Who knows I'm just trying to play the devils advocate here.

I've noticed since there were so many people named to be senior members/moderators some of them have the tendancy to circle the wagons and join forces really quickly whenever there is someone on the board saying something even at the fringe of the rules. If this kind of thing continues GMC could get the reputation that you are not allowed to make mistakes without having people jump on you.

I can tell you from past experience on other boards that if this proves to be the case you will end up having a lot of people who are looking for trouble come here and you mods will end up spending all of your time editing posts and issuing warnings/banning people.

I'm all for having a board free from foul language and other insults, but when the editing of posts etc.. gets to the point where the true feel and flow of the discussion(s) is affected then thats being too heavy handed. people should have the right to discuss things the way they want to within reason or else they will just sit back and ot say much of anything and then you mods will have only yourselves to read and moderate.

Lot's of us are not as gifted as a lot of you when it comes to writing what and how we feel and when I see someone get jumped on several times for saying something is stupid then I start to worry where GMC is headed. I hope you guys get what I'm trying to say here?

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[Andrew Cockburn]

My initial comment was quite mild actually - more in the nature of guidance and suggestion than anything else. This should not be a surprise to anyone who has read the posting guidelines. Debate and discussion is encouraged, name calling is not, that's all. As moderators we are always walking a line between letting people interact freely, and keeping order, we take it seriously, and often agonize behind the scenes over whether to let things be or to step in. I'm gratified that several people stepped in to reinforce the point - none of them were mods or seniors. Most of the time the GMC community is self policing in this respect - I just got there first this time.

Regarding English as a second language, yes I have a lot of sympathy for that. However, if I misunderstand, then the person it was aimed at might also misunderstand. I am just trying to keep things civil and nip any potential problems in the bud.

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[RobM]

Regarding English as a second language, yes I have a lot of sympathy for that. However, if I misunderstand, then the person it was aimed at might also misunderstand. I am just trying to keep things civil and nip any potential problems in the bud.

I understand that but correcting someone in public even the first time might make them decide to never post again and then go off and talk about their bad experience here at GMC. I feel that when it's something minor like the situation we're talking about then it should not even have been made into anything and then handled behind the scene with a PM explianing the rules and how what was said could have started something that is not wanted here and to choose their words more carefully the next time. He even asked if what he said came out correctly.

I mean you're the mod you handled it how you saw fit, it's just that when I saw it and whoever else may see it in the future they might feel like I did that it was over kill.

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[Andrew Cockburn]

I understand that but correcting someone in public even the first time might make them decide to never post again and then go off and talk about their bad experience here at GMC. I feel that when it's something minor like the situation we're talking about then it should not even have been made into anything and then handled behind the scene with a PM explianing the rules and how what was said could have started something that is not wanted here and to choose their words more carefully the next time. He even asked if what he said came out correctly.

Thats a fair point, but handling it behind the scenes with a PM is generally more serious and gets him a warning on his record - I was trying to take the kinder option and keep things low key believe it or not ...

Anyway, this feels weird because we're talking about Lithuanian in public and that seems wrong.

Lithuanian, what was meant to be a minor reminder about being polite has been picked up by others and blown out of proportion, that was not my intention - sorry. However my original point stands - lets all be try and be thoughtful about how we phrase our comments to others - which is in fact the original point of the original thread in the first place

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