Getting involved

[Adrian]

OK – I see you want some data!

Here is a Pareto chart showing the postings to the forum (modestly excluding posts by the webmistress!).

If you don’t know how to interpret a Pareto chart is try looking here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pareto_chart

The 80/20 rule would lead us to expect that 80% of all the posts would be made by 20% of the members.
In fact the graph shows that 80% of the post come from just 12% of the members.
And on the tail of the graph 40% of the members have never posted!

Enjoy!
Amanda

[Kristen_james]

Oh my! I’m getting flashbacks to year 10 maths classes & I don’t like it!!

[Anonymous]

I think my posts fall within the 0% – 0% range on the Pareto chart !!!

I’m assuming that helps with the totals?

Clare.

[Anonymous]

On this issue i am behind Amanda 100%. Living in a very remote part of Australia demands that i stay in contact via this website and my local West Australian website. I would be in a right mental state if i couldn’t communicate with others like me around Australia. Thank god for the net!!

[Anonymous]

I have to have a little say here.

I don’t know if you classify me as a voyeur or not in this regard, having posted a few times.

I was one of those who used to just read and try to find information. One of the 40%. Then, further into my journey I started to get a bit more active.

Then, I crossed the lines on the posting rules and found postings amended, or even deleted. I did not feel that I had strayed far from the rules, but the Forum Administrator, who not only decided it best to alter or remove what I had put in, but also pointed out that I was wasting her time by doing what I had done. (in spite of a pre-emptive apology)

As a result, I find myself performing a self analysis and vetting my thoughts before commiting anything to the forum. Maybe this is a good thing, maybe not. If I am afraid of commiting any of the sins against posting rules, the number of posts I will commit to will, by nature, be far greatly reduced.

I am not talking about personal attacks or criticism of another’s beliefs. It was one line, to which I was criticized and attacked by another member. The rest was merely an attempt to clarify and defend.

Of course, the opposite of this is complete anarchy, not necessarily a good thing either.

Oh well. Can’t complain if people are afraid to speak up. Especially when they have been given good reason to doubt the very words they are reluctant to utter in the first place. This may possibly be my last post?

Damned if you do. Damned if you don’t.

[Kathy_1]

I am concerned that the numbers are so small, however as a new member I have been trying to understand both my new community and myself, thus some reluctance to post.
I encourage more participation by all, more sense of community and possibly more courage from other hesitant girls like myself.
The chat room is a good place to start, but it too could have more members participating.

Kath

[Anonymous]

Quote:

I have to have a little say here.

“I was one of those who used to just read and try to find information“

“Then, I crossed the lines on the posting rules and found postings amended, or even deleted“

I have to agree with some of the points that Portia has made. I too, tend to read more than I post on forums such as this. It’s not that I have nothing to say or no points of view in regards to some of the posts, but I have found from experience that some members seem to like to spend their time being extremely critical and judgemental of others. Yes, even from within our own community.

I am not talking specifically about TR as I have come across this on other trans related sites as well. There has always been enough prejudice from the general population in society and I have always found it extremely sad that some people who claim to be part of the transgender community seem to think that is their god given right to challenge another’s self worth.

What makes me really mad is when I see comments in posts that question another’s journey (transition) or motives, and if their transition is not on par with the person making the snide comment, then they are not really transsexual in this person mind.

I received a small hiding from admin for commenting on what I perceived as an unreasonable comment made to a particular member who was just seeking some advice. I found the comments made in one post quite offensive and although I didn’t personally attack the person who made the comment, I was offended enough to want to say so. Subsequently, my post was edited and comments were removed. Remarkably, the offensive comment was still there and it was not removed. I can only conclude that my personal thoughts on the comment were far more offensive than the comment itself.

The sad thing with society (including online forums) is that people who behave in this fashion seem to be allowed to do so. Sure they get a “slap on the wrist” but people like this really don’t care, it doesn’t bother them in the slightest and they will even defend their actions and claim that they themselves are being picked on. If more members of a particular community stood up and said “that’s not acceptable” then perhaps these type of people would either amend their ways or move on. Not only do people turn a blind eye to this behaviour because they don’t want to get involved, but when some people do stand up, the powers that be prevent people from doing so.

The comments I found offensive were made by a person that has a history of this type of behaviour. This person is guilty of the exact same offences on another larger international site. This is not isolated behaviour that is occasional, there is a pattern here. I too have been on the receiving end of this person’s venom on another site. I joined TR because it was a local site and I do want to participate but became completely disheartened when I discovered that this person is a member of TR as well and it is clear that they conduct themself in the exact same fashion.

Yes it is true that these types of people are a minority, but it only takes one to spoil it for everybody else. Some will say that I am only disadvantaging myself by allowing this person to spoil my experience and this is true to some degree but I have put up with a lot of these types of people throughout my life and simply won’t put up with it anymore. As an example, if I know a particular pub has a reputation for allowing the entry of patrons that are violent, I don’t care how good the music is or how cheap the drinks are, I am not going to frequent a place and deliberately allow myself to be a possible target for some moron that thinks preying on others is a constructive pastime.

In conclusion, I guess this can be considered a rant but the question was asked about participation regarding posting and rather than just saying “because I don’t want too”, I wanted to express why. I joined TR, paid for a membership and agreed to the T&C’s of the site.

As Portia said, this will probably be my last post. I strongly believe that my honest thoughts in this post will be perceived as an attack on another member and at the least, this posting will be removed and may even result in my membership being cancelled. If the admin/management of a particular venue want to penalise me for disagreeing with the behaviour of another member, then so be it. If they value the narcissistic behaviour of one person, but are willing to discard a member who finds this behaviour antisocial, then perhaps the venue is not the place for me if that’s the calibre of member that they value.

I am certainly not challenging admin or their decisions. Their site, their rules. What I am saying is that I am surprised that this behaviour was treated so lightly in my opinion and my personal feelings on the matter warranted more attention. I was under the assumption that I could at least express an opinion, I was wrong. If my opinion is not of any value, I prefer to keep it to my self then and am now very hesitant to post anything for fear of expressing myself.

My gut feeling is that no one will see this posting.

Moderator

Quote:

Sometimes I guess your gut feelings let you down!

[Anonymous]

Portia and Jessica, I can totally see where you are coming from and why you are as well. We should be allowed to defend ourselves but this is where things do come undone because as a result I feel that some posts are being misread by others which leads to problems that weren’t even intended. Both of you are definitely on the money here, what you have said gives me reason to believe people when they say that go into places like Facebook which allows them to say what they want to without it being edited or removed.

Sometimes in life we do have a point of view that is genuine and unfortunately those views do sometimes upset people, it’s how people respond to those views here that brings the problems to light as a result. Maybe folks need to stop and take a deep breath before they respond sometimes (not suggesting you two abovementioned at all ok?), things might then work in a much more calming manner which is will be good for all of us. No-one here needs to criticise particular individuals I agree but yes we can and should be able to criticise particular circumstances WITHOUT criticising individuals. Everyone needs to remember to think before they act or speak, maybe then things will work better for all of us.

Peta A.

[Anonymous]

HI girls

There is also another graphline that could be added, the one that shows replies typed but not submitted. At times I think I would like to have a say and put ideas or random thoughts down on “Paper” well screen actually. But after looking at the result and considering the risk of adding to the confusion I tend to hit the Cancel Button.

I do love hearing about all of the challenges we face as a community and stories of people overcoming each of them. The how to section is my main help as getting the image to match the reality will take far more than a few stories from 8% of our members.

Keep up the great job Amanda, we need it even if we don’t say it often enough.

Kerry

[Anonymous]

christina – you have raised an interesting and complex issue. i, too, wonder whether there is anybody out there. aside from posts and reasons for not posting (more on that later), i am usually a little suprised at how little some posts are viewed. many posts seem to be of genuine interest to those in this community, but when you look at the number of views, some posts hardly make a couple of dozen. so what is it that this mass of 716 want to read about? if nobody is interested in the posts, there is no point in putting them up.

as for posting and commenting, i believe that a community such as ours should be as forgiving as possible and encourage participation. no participation is equivalent to no community.

so in my view, moderating should be undertaken with that principle in mind. equally, moderating (and we should be the first to moderate ourselves so that what we post is logical, coherent, and not personalised) should err on the side of the policy that less editing is more likley to promote participation. freedom of speech is something that i stand behind as the cornerstone of democracy, even if we have to put up with opinions bordering on hate speech (not that there is anything like that on tr).

we have all been on a journey of some sort. no one journey is the same as others, and yet, there is a lot of commonality amongst our journeys, so sharing these is important to our well being and sense of identity. and for those who have never posted – give it a go. there must be something on your mind that you would like to share – even if it is in a personal blog – this is a great place to keep your journal, and record your travels. there is nothing that we all can’t learn from each other.

maybe there are other outlets/channels for a community like ours. there’s facebook, of course, although there is no tr page there, and there are other similar forums about (how many yahoo groups of varying shaddes of grey are there?), not to mention chat rooms. perhaps that is why tr involvement is as low as it is.

if you want to really see a community that has low participation, check out the nsw seahorse society forum. the seahorse victoria site is in the process of being upgraded and has no forum or chat facility. the carrousel club of south australia web site is non-interactive, and the forum in the chamelons of western asutralia site doesn’t seem to be as wide ranging as the tr one, although there is a chat facility. perhaps tr doesn’t offer enough local content.

anyway, i look forward to lots more participation, even if it is to read more posts. we are as good as what we give. portia, jessica – the worst thing to me (apart from hate speech) is to see the words, “this is my last post”. hang in there. my view is that even with all of these other forums and channels, we can still take part in as many as we can (without threatening our work/life balance), so participation in one shouldn’t prevent participation in any other.

virginia xo

[Anonymous]

Hi Girls , I look forward to checking the forums ,but dont always comment as some of the posts are to long winded ,confusing or repeating previouse posts . Keep it short and sweet and have a clear idea of what you wish to say .Its good to know im not the only one who has been moderated lol .. Good job Amanda , Ive needed a bit of moderating over the years xxoo

[Alison_2]

Speaking for myself, I would be willing to participate in postings but, yes there is always a but, I have never met anyone in the group and therefore feel shy/nervous etc.

I am always aware how easy it is to make a fool of myself and how easy it is for people to misunderstand what I am trying to say. They haven’t read it the way I meant it to be read, instead they have put their own interpretation on it.

I’m sure many of you, as you read this, are feeling the same and while it’s nothing to do with confidence it is to do with the fact I don’t want to look/sound silly any more than I already do. Maybe that is a lack of confidence after all. lol

I also feel that in some way I do not have the experience to comment, even after crossdressing for 53 years, because most of that has been on my own.

Having said this, I will try to participate.

Good grief I have spent over a hour trying to write this

[Anonymous]

alison – at work, we create what are called “safe environments”. these are group sessions where we want to brain storm and at the same time create a team spirit that is conducive to working together. in these sessions, the primary rule is “no question and no answer is dumb”, and the second rule is that everyone knows a little something that no one else knows, so if these are all aggregated, a powerful amount of knowledge can be transferred across the group.

i would like to think that tr is a safe environment and that no one should feel intimidated when posting their thoughts.

virginia xo

[Adrian]

In a couple of posts earlier in this forum members claim they going are making their last post. Presumably in some over-dramatic way trying to give credibility to their personal position that it is the moderation of this site that results in lots of members not posting.

I make no apology for the moderation that occurs on these forums. In my opinion it has saved them from being hi-jacked by a few who have an over inflated view of their own opinions and a lack of empathy with the life choices of others.

Despite the image portrayed by some of an admin giving members “a small hiding” for transgressing innumerable minor rules, the reality is that the number of posts deleted and/or members expelled is very very low – it just attracts a high profile. Why? Because we have a very limited time to devote to ‘tidying-up’ the forums and there are lots of posts to read and categorise.

There are just two triggers for deleting posts – our zero tolerance for people criticising each other (because it destroys other forums), and multiple off-topic posts in a thread (because it essentially high-jacks what the original poster wanted to talk about.

If everyone took Peta’s excellent advice to “take a deep breath” before posting, and “think before they act or speak” there would never be any call to moderate other than moving posts between topics (which I regard as general housekeeping).

Generally those who transgress these simple guidelines find themselves being “punished” in ways that range from a harsh email to being thrown out. Many seem to think that the rules are only there for others, and feel indignant that after paying their $10 they are chastised. But I can assure everyone that the moderation, is as far, as possible carried out without fear or flavor.

So how does that leave the implication that it is moderation that results in people not posting?

Well firstly, as the moderators would never just delete someone’s first post, those 40% who have not posted could never have posted. I spend a lot of time on occasions coaching new members so they can understand the appropriate netiquette and avoid trouble. It is not the moderation that persuades them not post, as most of the moderation is invisible to them.

Secondly, having seen the damage that some people inflict on other unmoderated forums I think that the moderation encourages people to post their opinion – because they know that they are safe from being cut down by comments from a few. That I think helps achieve the “safe environment” Virginia refers to.

Finally on a personal note, I do wish people wouldn’t post saying “I am certainly not challenging admin or their decisions” and then challenge the admin by posting “I expect this post will be removed”.

So if moderation doesn’t discourage the 40% is it just being “shy/nervous” like Alison that holds the posters back?

[Anonymous]

I fully sympathise with the task that you have at hand Amanda, it is a hard one (well at times for sure!) and if this site wasn’t worth it to me then I wouldn’t have remained here at all. I want to ask you to think outside the square if I may however?

In a recently started thread about passports, right after one of my posts there was a moderator comment about people taking their arguments elsewhere. I figured that it was in regard to something that I had said because it followed my post and there was no indication of who the moderator comment was directed to in particular, simply an across the board comment. I made a point of the fact that I was only seeking info. in a further post and that was when I found out that the comment wasn’t directed at me.

There was also a very heated thread recently where a lot of people were directly criticising someone for their decisions and the straying off topic was terrible as well. I put two posts in about people hijacking the thread etc. and yes, one person did get “sin binned” but nearly everyone else did keep on going however with their own beliefs/thoughts which were mostly in breach of forum rules. Maybe you didn’t pick up on the rest of the comments Amanda because it seemed as though there was no moderation of that thread really and people were just going beserk in a thread that they shouldn’t have been.

To experience this makes you wonder at my level as to when things are ok to do/say and when they’re not. I also wondering where the other moderators are as well because there used to be a few more when I joined. Maybe that is why we’re missing some uniformity at times, you can’t be everywhere can you Amanda?

I do support you alright(?) Webmistress Amanda! Never forget that.