Concerns related to support threads

[Martin]

Hey peeps,

There are concerns amongst the staff about how females are able to use this site for support and advice. It has been noted that various threads about female issues (such as periods) tend to get a few comments along the lines of "ewww vaginas". These comments seem to be causing numerous females to feel uncomfortable with using EC for support, and causes them to have reservations about posting threads when they feel they could do with the advice.

It is not appropriate for anybody to go into a thread and make unnecessary comments like that. The support forums have to remain spam-free and on-topic at all times, and it is unacceptable for anybody to go into a thread and make insensitive comments like that. I get that most people will be doing it as a joke, but when it starts making other people feel that they cannot use EC for support then that is taking things way too far. As EC is primarily a support forum the focus has to be on offering the best support possible, and comments that are mocking and/or off-topic are not welcome.

The staff are now undergoing a clampdown on this issue and will remove any posts that contain such comments. If somebody posts a thread on an issue that cannot affect you for biological reasons then just leave it be. If you're not a fan of penis or vagina then fine, but nobody cares enough that you should announce it in a support thread. If a person is seeking advice about such a private issue then common sense should tell you that going "ewww" isn't going to make them feel all that good. EC has to be able to offer support for both males and females equally, regardless of which gender has a higher membership base. Anybody found to be posting any innappropriate comments in the support section will have their posts removed without warning, and anybody who notices another member doing it should report it so that it can be dealt with.

I get that most of those who have done this will not have meant it maliciously, but as a support forum we have to make everybody feel as comfortable and welcomed as possible. If members are worried about posting because of these jokes then we are failing to fulfill the sites purpose and have to fix that problem. The majority of you use the site appropriately and never cause problems, but there are a small percentage of members who don't think before posting and end up making a group of people feel ostracized from the site.

It would be greatly appreciated if members would refrain from responding to support threads if they are not offering any advice. It is vital that EC accommodates everybody, and the staff will not tolerate comments that make members feel excluded, nor will they allow such comments to remain visible any longer. If you are not comfortable reading a certain thread then just leave it immedietly. These jokey "eww" comments have to stop right now so that we can focus on making everybody feel welcome.

This is specifically referred to under the Respect Clause in the Code of Conduct:

The EC community is based upon mutual support and discussion. We welcome and encourage questions, opinions, viewpoints, commentary, spirited discussion, debate and similar contributions. However, it is not appropriate to create posts, threads or messages that disrespect the viewpoints, sexual orientation/identity, religious beliefs or other personal views of other members.

From EC Staff.

[Tim]

The only thread to my knowledge I've ever responded to with a comment like that is one.

And it was because of a simple reason:

The Title.

Now, not to like, call out the creator, but the thread "And then she squirted everywhere!" alone just makes me gag. In fact, even if it had said "he" it would make me gag, simply because using words in that order should not be done for a thread title, as even the creator admitted, the title was pretty much baiting those types of comments. (Only bolded to make sure that wasnt overlooked).

Link to thread: http://www.emptyclosets.com/forum/sh...543#post542543

Quote regarding the title from her:

Originally Posted by Numfarh

And yes, I did bait the gay men a wee bit. But come on! You can't deny the awesome in that title. It just grabs the attention.

Is there any rule in effect that says try to keep the "eww" factor (as you said, vagina/penis/etc) out of thread titles, unless it is directly related to the thread? If the thread had said "Female Ejaculation" I never would've even posted in said thread, but it would've gotten the attention of the people it needed to get the attention of, and give all the guys who did post about the eww factor more explanation as to what the thread was about, and if they decided to post after that, then I would agree, they would be disrespectful.

I did post in the Lesbian Sex thread, however, I did say it was informative, which it was, and I was curious if any other guys read it due to curiousity. However, one of the comments (not saying which) would prob. be under something you said. In fact, it was probably one of the most informative things I've read on this site, to be completely honest.

TLDR; (Too Long, Didn't Read): Is there a rule that states you should keep thread titles actually related to the problem, without using unnecessary baiting words or words other members may have issues with that aren't relevant?


Sorry about this, but it's just my 2 cents. :S I do understand + agree with everything you said, but I just wanted point a few things out.

EDIT: And I'm totally expecting to get in trouble for this post, for one reason or another O_o I don't know why either, just a gut feeling.

EDIT2: And to clarify why I'm bringing this up: At least half of the posts that are being addressed by Martin are in threads such as the ones I described. They have titles purposely meant to make the gay guys go "eww", and some aren't even that relevant, they just wanna make a title that grabs attention.

[Martin]

Nobody is going to get into trouble for discussing things posted by the staff. Discussions like this are welcome and encouraged.

I am not aware of any official rule that refers to using thread titles that prevent baiting, but that could fall under the respect clause with a bit of tweaking. If members are deliberately using threads to try and provoke an "eww" response then they should be dealt with in the same manner. I'm not entirely sure how we could enforce a rule on thread titles without sounding like the thought police, but there wouldn't be any harm editing a thread title to make it clearer if the original one was unhelpful and baiting.

This whole situation with females feeling excluded is one that I actually underestimated. My first response to the staff discussion basically said that I didn't consider it to be a frequent problem. I, like you, can only think of one or two occasions it has popped up, but it appears that the other staff have had more experience with it and have been in contact with members who feel the same way. The respect clause has to work both ways, therefore an OP should be posting in a manner that is acceptable for everybody, but also clearly reaches out to those who can help them. You don't want to make a thread title so PC that it doesn't stand out, but it shouldn't be so in-your-face that it makes others feel uncomfortable.

The possibility of fitting thread titles into the mix will need further discussion so that we don't start sounding like we are trying to control how people post, but it is definetly something that should be taken into account if members are baited into such threads. All members should be able to feel comfortable when using the site, and that can be just as compromised for them if they're baited into threads by innappropriate titles. Whilst I would hope that members would have the decency to just walk away from such threads, I would consider the OP just as liable for those replies if they intended for that to happen. All members should be able to browse the site without being baited into threads they will not enjoy.

I'll put that suggestion to the staff who have more experience in these circumstances. I'm not much of a regular in the support forums so I rely on them to point out any problems that may pop up.

[Tim]

Thanks for sayin you'll be suggestin it to other staff.

Just saw another thread in Post Secret. Here's something Becky Wrote:

Originally Posted by Beckyg

First if you put in the subject line "warning.....guys, don't read this", you dang well know they are going to. lol

So although some guys are not being very respectful in regards to "Girl Talk", girls aren't being very respectful in baiting guys into the threads.

[Jim1454]

Is it possible that the female thread starters are pre-empting the comments with their titles? Perhaps they don't feel comfortable starting a serious thread because they know in advance someone will make some kind of immature comment in it.

I know I'd think twice about starting a discussion if I knew someone was going to make lite of it...

[Chip]

I would like to point out that a thread titled "concerns related to female members" may not get a lot of male readers to read it, which sort of defeats the purpose of the thread

[Martin]

^ Edited it to something more appropriate.

[Tim]

Originally Posted by Jim1454

Is it possible that the female thread starters are pre-empting the comments with their titles? Perhaps they don't feel comfortable starting a serious thread because they know in advance someone will make some kind of immature comment in it.

I know I'd think twice about starting a discussion if I knew someone was going to make lite of it...

Problem with that is: I've not made multiple support threads simply BECAUSE i know people will say something about it, as if it were a joke.

It's not all female related topics that get comments like that, they're just the one seen most often.

[fallendream]

Originally Posted by calchip

I would like to point out that a thread titled "concerns related to female members" may not get a lot of male readers to read it, which sort of defeats the purpose of the thread

but how would a male member help a female member with female ejaculation or anything similar?

as a gay male i have absolutely no knowledge of anything to do with female orgasms, ejaculation, penetration etc. so 'females wanting males to see' would be pointless with few gay guys here knowing enough about the female body.

[Tim]

Originally Posted by fallendream

but how would a male member help a female member with female ejaculation or anything similar?

as a gay male i have absolutely no knowledge of anything to do with female orgasms, ejaculation, penetration etc. so 'females wanting males to see' would be pointless with few gay guys here knowing enough about the female body.

This thread used to be titled Concerns related to female members.

Which is why he said it prob. wouldn't get many guys to read it, as they would think it's directed at them :P

[fallendream]

Originally Posted by Myzou

This thread used to be titled Concerns related to female members.

Which is why he said it prob. wouldn't get many guys to read it, as they would think it's directed at them :P

i thought he was talking about calling the female threads that title...ignore my idiocy.

Ah yes. I seem to be able to attract quite the controversy about myself, don't I?

As for the title of threads (including mine), I feel that a wee bit of levity is fine. In fact, it made me feel like less of a freak to be able to poke fun at myself and the situation at hand. That's just how I roll, folks. I would feel very uncomfortable if my ability to choose even thread titles was restricted. And I highly doubt that less men would have come into the thread in question if it had been labelled differently.

And the 'ew' factor, while it doesn't bother me, I have also noticed it to a certain degree. If members click on a thread and read it, they should be able to have enough self-restraint to say, 'Maybe it would be inappropriate to act like a five year old right now.' Just because you were 'baited' into a thread doesn't mean you can derail the discussion at hand. Also, what the heck does baiting even mean? An interesting title? I wanted people to read my thread and so I chose the title to attract more members to the discussion.

Anyways, please do crack down on the 'ew' bit. It's not just this website that experiences this. For example, we talked about male masturbation in class, but girls were left out. Girls are so sexually repressed in so many areas of society, a support site should not be one of them.

[Tim]

Originally Posted by Numfarh

Anyways, please do crack down on the 'ew' bit. It's not just this website that experiences this. For example, we talked about male masturbation in class, but girls were left out. Girls are so sexually repressed in so many areas of society, a support site should not be one of them.

The same could be said to an even higher degree about gay men. 2 Girls = Hot, 2 Guys = Eww is the general thought of GLBT relationships in Society, so trust us, we know.

But I still don't agree with your opinion on the titles. With a more descriptive title, less guys would have went in, because we'd know what it's about. "and then she squirted everywhere!" could mean pretty much anything, tbh, and it being in Post Secret didn't help, as we had no idea what exactly it was about, as if it was in Health, well, then we'd have a general idea it involved the body. For all we knew, it was an embarrassing story about some sort of ketchup bottle in a restaurant incident.

But I'm not really one to argue, I made a point, and Martin understood that's all I was doing, I wasn't trying to point fingers at you, nor make you feel as though you had something to do with my response, I was simply using it as an example.

[Tokarov]

I, for one, welcome our new Female Overlords.

[Just Adam]

Girls are so sexually repressed in so many areas of society, a support site should not be one of them.

i agree a place of supoprt shouldent be all ewwww to people... if you dont like it either keep your piece of if its a discussion make a valid contribution....

but i have to say ive yet to meet a sexually repressed female :S .... and in society well sexualised women are all teh rage ..... really everywhere i look its women throwing it about....

last night i was at worcester train station waiting to come home from a pride meeting and these two women about 17 at most... came out of the wiating room or office whatever with a guy who works there and he was trying to get rid of tehm they sounded drunk and they said as they walked off he should be so lucky etc etc etc they were dressed in heels skirts so short a nun would have a heart attack.. and the tightest tops how they could breath i dont know... ... and i just sat there writing on my pride agenda and couldent help but say out loud yea cos your such a catch throwing yourself at him...ok they were on the other platform or id be to afraid tehyd attack me or some shit...(coward:S) ... but litteraly i just dont see sexualy repressed women... i think tehy are sad and insecure which is why they try so hard to put it out there as it were>.> because they arent happy..... but someplaces are very behind the 21st century so there are repressed women in general.....

but i agree gay,bi..... well any man who likes other men... we do have teh stereotype of two women great that hot two guys gross sick disgusting.... yesteray i saw a guy from school hes now got a woman and a child and a house and im like oh yea lifes great for you ya orange haired jenson button wannabe with ay beard.... but nice ot see ya... and we got on to the context of two men and he said sick gross whatever...his mum well she was lesbian but now apparently is with a guy shes been kicking around with for 20 years....i dont know either i just said oh ok.. :S but even him who is really accepting of two women beeing together the idea of two guys it sickens him and that stigma or whatever you want to call it thats really hard to live with..

but back to topic i think people should refrain from the over....explicit titles or taounting people in... i got no problem looking at women based thread and if i have somthign to add from the male perspective i will.... but i think there needs to be a two way respect here guys not say eww if you dont like it theres teh back button see how fast you can hit it... and ladys dont taunt or TRY to gross out the guys.... allthoguh i do understand the make it more lighthearted to not make yourself seem such a weirdo thing.... but in the end it just makes people cringe... such is life... so i think the TMI warnings are good and if any guy says ewwwwwwwwww after fair warnign well.... >.> <- evils...

i know i gone so off topic here and it wasent an attack or anything... i just dont want this to become women are so hard done by... you might aswell bring up guys wanting to go into teaching or child care.... i dont see the point of it here.... this is a lgbtq somthign somthign darkside support forum and we are all minoritys and get discriminated against in teh big bad word lets jsut love and look after each other here XD

[Maddy]

^ Nobody's going to argue against the fact that groups in society are marginalised. Gay, bi, trans, male, female, disabled, religious, not religious, whatever political affiliation you can think of, you name it, there are situations where you're going to be worse off for it. But this thread's not about the issues of marginalisation in the real world. It's about one specific issue on this website - that some of the girls on EC are being made to feel uncomfortable asking for support in a place where they should be able to. EC is a safe space for everyone, and no legitimate question should have to be left unasked because of the fear of rude reactions. That goes for everyone, guys, girls and everything in between.

[Just Adam]

Originally Posted by firecausesburns

^ Nobody's going to argue against the fact that groups in society are marginalised. Gay, bi, trans, male, female, disabled, religious, not religious, whatever political affiliation you can think of, you name it, there are situations where you're going to be worse off for it. But this thread's not about the issues of marginalisation in the real world. It's about one specific issue on this website - that some of the girls on EC are being made to feel uncomfortable asking for support in a place where they should be able to. EC is a safe space for everyone, and no legitimate question should have to be left unasked because of the fear of rude reactions. That goes for everyone, guys, girls and everything in between.

i agree with that but it must be conceded that women on this site also have a duty to their fellow Ec'ers to not gode men into their discussions or try to get a reaction. the fact is you cant stop people saying eww to somthing despite the pointless effort it is and even taking down teh post doesent retract teh effect of it. the only option would be design a systen that a thread can be created only female members and those that identify as female or have female medical interests can enter which is impracticle. int he end people just have to grow up. men for saying it and women for paying attention to it. jsut because a gay man will go eww is not a valid reason for a female member to not post a genuine medical concern or question and in the end if you dont think the advice of other members is worth the 1 or 2 eww, if you cant put up with that theres not much help that i see to be offerable other than pm kara or advisors.

im not trying to be heartless and people can be upset but as much as i dont like to admit it thats life not everything makes you happy and nothign is nor ever will be perfect this site included all that can be done it to just say be more thoughtful... liek i said in last post if guys dont liek it dont comment jsut hit that back button as fast as you can thats all that can be done really... because if we get into punishing people with warnigns and bannings on whats said if its not directly offensive tehn we are going to get really subjective and will cause alot of argument and it jsut aint a good route.

[Martin]

Originally Posted by Numfarh

As for the title of threads (including mine), I feel that a wee bit of levity is fine. In fact, it made me feel like less of a freak to be able to poke fun at myself and the situation at hand. That's just how I roll, folks. I would feel very uncomfortable if my ability to choose even thread titles was restricted. And I highly doubt that less men would have come into the thread in question if it had been labelled differently.

That would be the approach I think is best. I don't think it would be beneficial for anybody if there was a crackdown on thread titles, and it's not really the staffs place to be telling any members how they should be wording their titles. I think it would be good keeping them clean and not graphic, ie not allowing something like "OMG my anal leakage smells awful" or "lulz smegma tastes so bad", but it would be very difficult to create any guidelines that reflect what type of thread title is appropriate or not. I think for the most part it comes down to common sense, and a large part of the responsibility needs to be put on members to act their age and not respond if they aren't comfortable offering advice on issues like that.

The best approach would be editing threads which are blatantly too graphic and inappropriate. Thread titles *should* be clear at all times, but it would be a pretty unnecessary move for staff to start editing titles because they aren't as clear as they could be. If they're inappropriate, fair enough, but if not then I don't really see the point. If thread titles are designed to be deliberately baiting then I would support the thread title being edited *if necessary*, but I also don't believe that members should be babied and given no responsibility at all. If they can't resist the temptation to go "eww" because the thread/title refers to something that they aren't interested in then the real world is going to be a smack in the face for them.

Anyways, this situation with thread titles, baiting and people going "eww" is still something that is being discussed behind the scenes. There isn't really anything new to report since this thread was created, but I can say that thread title editing is something that we feel should only be done when it's necessary. That itself is a pretty broad term because we can't really tell when it will be necessary, but the basics of that agreement is that there won't be any enforcement or restrictions put in place to how people word their threads. The respect clause already requests that they respect other peoples viewpoints, so we would hope that people wouldn't word them in a way that I used as an example above, but I think taking a jokey approach to thread titles, as Numfarh claims she did, isn't something that falls under disrespect. There isn't really any harm adding a jokey element to a serious support thread, but "eww" comments can take it in a completely different direction altogether, and then we get back to the argument of whether or not it was baiting, and whether members should be given the responsibility to rise above that or should the staff intervene before it gets to that stage. I personally lean towards the former as members shouldn't be babied and controlled in that way, but that is my opinion alone.

[Filip]

Originally Posted by Numfarh

As for the title of threads (including mine), I feel that a wee bit of levity is fine. In fact, it made me feel like less of a freak to be able to poke fun at myself and the situation at hand. That's just how I roll, folks. I would feel very uncomfortable if my ability to choose even thread titles was restricted. And I highly doubt that less men would have come into the thread in question if it had been labelled differently.

You know, that was the only thread I've ever posted "Ewwww" in. Not really because of the title though. You basically explicitely invited us men to post "Ewww" in your first post. So I thought it was funny to oblige. I don't think I would have posted it without your official endorsement, though.

On the other hand, this thread has made me start thinking that it might have been wrongly interpreted by other people. I know you (Corina) can handle the Eww, but possibly some new member, or someone who's more easily impressed by "ewwws", or even some lurker seeing the thread without even making an account, might have been put off by it. Way more people read threads than the OP and the ones that post in the thread.

So for what it's worth, that one was my first and last Ewww

[Tokarov]

I never see anyone post "ewwww" on a thread...well except that one where "ewww" was in the title, that was just inviting it.

Some people are just immature, what can you do about it? You can't MAKE them say what you want. If they post like that then well, just ignore it.

I realize EC loves to provide a welcome and supportive atmosphere, but you can't control every single person on these forums.