I get why the forum is now closing

I've also seen absolutely nothing dodgy. I once had a woman contact me for sex talk (she wanted to role play a little girl), but big deal, I just declined. Doesn't exactly derail my life or taint the support.

Prairie gal wrote:Let's say people like me (not a pedophile) were targeted just to get them into trouble. If I was dumb enough to give out my e-mail address, I might have had child porn sent to me and on my computer. Would that get an innocent person in trouble? Yes? No? I dunno.

Does it ever bother you that this is the way the law works? It sure as hell bothers me that I can't definitively answer "no" to your question.

Yes, it does YRR. I see your point. I'm not worried for myself because when I was invited to engage in an exchange of stories via PM I said Well, I'm not a pedophile. I'm not interested. I'm just here to learn about a group of people I don't understand at all and to represent children who have been abused.

He was not a member who had ever even posted on Psych Forums. That was oh, back in June maybe. I did not keep the message. The guy was very polite, and I can imagine a vulnerable person might have gotten into it with him. Maybe it was a trap set by the police???

I once had a gay friend from out of town visiting, and he stayed overnight for a couple of nights
and used my laptop. After he left, I noticed sex-related pop-ups coming up on my laptop. (This was years ago.) I thought What the heck? So I told a techie friend, and she said, That's what happens when you watch porn. I said I haven't been watching porn. Then I realized my friend was here and using my laptop while I was at work.

I found out how to check history, and sure enough... gay porn sites showed up. No CP though. I see how an innocent person could get into trouble if it had been CP.

The forum is closing because some people apparently used it in very inappopriate ways.

I'm glad I never received requests to share fantasies or any crap like that. Just want to let people know that if you send me stuff like that I'll report you immediately. Just saying. It's sad to see how so many nice people won't be able to use the forum anymore because of a few messed up people

Oh, come on people! Can't you spot an excuse when you see one? Here's the reason for the closure. Think about it. Will freezing the board stop people being contacted by unscrupulous types? No, it doesn't address that problem. Is it therefore a proportionate and fair response? No. Was this unverifiable problem widespread? Only a few of us seem to have been contacted, and even then they weren't exactly bombarded. Report and ban would be enough to deal with that. Has a mod already let slip the position on the board? Yes (see linked thread). Has that position subsequently and consistently been corroborated by a conspicuous lack of effort on his part to moderate here? Yes. And has there been any effort to address this problem by advertising for an alternative mod? No. Does this suggest they were serious about keeping the board in check? No.

We can't force a mod to police a forum that makes him/her feel uncomfortable. The conversations here alone, while many of us may have become desensitized over the years, still may cause a lot of emotional pain and anxiety for them. (I still can't believe some of the stuff posted here, and I've read a lot of disgusting rhetoric over the years!) Along with that, there are messages and illegal content posted in PM which we never see - but the mods have to deal with everyday! Can you imagine how disheartening that must be? We need to remember that mods are people too.

Erastes wrote:Oh, come on people! Can't you spot an excuse when you see one? Here's the reason for the closure. Think about it. Will freezing the board stop people being contacted by unscrupulous types? No, it doesn't address that problem. Is it therefore a proportionate and fair response? No. Was this unverifiable problem widespread? Only a few of us seem to have been contacted, and even then they weren't exactly bombarded. Report and ban would be enough to deal with that. Has a mod already let slip the position on the board? Yes (see linked thread). Has that position subsequently and consistently been corroborated by a conspicuous lack of effort on his part to moderate here? Yes. And has there been any effort to address this problem by advertising for an alternative mod? No. Does this suggest they were serious about keeping the board in check? No.

I have to agree with this....

G!r wrote:We can't force a mod to police a forum that makes him/her feel uncomfortable. The conversations here alone, while many of us may have become desensitized over the years, still may cause a lot of emotional pain and anxiety for them. (I still can't believe some of the stuff posted here, and I've read a lot of disgusting rhetoric over the years!) Along with that, there are messages and illegal content posted in PM which we never see - but the mods have to deal with everyday! Can you imagine how disheartening that must be? We need to remember that mods are people too.

I had stepped up and offered to mod this board since I'm a paraphile myself and totally desensitized to the topics here, I wanted to save it and avoid the situation we're living now (closure), but after seeing how months passed by without news and without a clear, definite answer from the mod/admin team (I probably didn't seem ready or good enough), I lost both patience and interest. Now the forum is going to close and no one can do anything about it except for who's in power. I agree some other mods wouldn't be able to stay here and moderate all the time since the topics can be uncomfortable for many, and this was one of the reasons why I offered my help. Yes, they made no effort to accept it and give me a chance to try to make this a better place, or maybe it's my fault for being unstable in the past, either way there is nothing we can do about anything anymore. I have to agree, at this point, with Erastes and say that they had no interest to keep the forum anymore. I can't totally blame them anyway since it became a mess recently, but again, very little effort was made to save the forum and make it a safe place again.

Ah, So we pro-contact were partially responsible.
*Sigh* Figures. Again, sorry guys.

Actually, I looked into this, and the results were surprising. Although most of the recent debates seem to have been initiated (inc. by 'hijacking' threads) by pro-contact types, back when WitchitaLineman said that, and for quite some time, over two thirds of the debates were initiated (again inc. by 'hijacking' threads) by the staunchly anti-contact types, who seemed to be baiting the pro-contact members. That's from a fairly swift count perusing the back catalogue of threads, but I think it's fairly accurate. My point being that I wouldn't place the blame squarely with one camp. Furthermore, I think over time members have become more or less self-moderating, or simply tired of a battle that couldn't be won. Either way, I stand by what I said above about reasons for the forum closing. They haven't moderated it at all and are now seeking to blame the members.