Off Topic

A friend of mine (may he rest in peace, chess.com's KGB made him disappear from the face of this site) gave me the idea to create a thread on an annoying habit some moderators have.

You may be wondering: which one?

Moving threads to off topic. Is there a reason to take a funny, interesting thread from the "general chess discussion" section and then move it to the gulag that off-topic is? Do they really need to destroy all hope for the author? Do they want to stop that thread from getting the attention they deserve? Is it some sort of punishment for trying to make chess.com a better place?

And meanwhile, in the general chess discussion section, we still have the same, repetitive threads once and again. Another guy asking why people like the Sicilian. Next to him, a user looking for a way to improve his blitz (not his chess, obviously, who would?). Let's not forget about the daily puzzle, where the best comments are the "easy" ones.

Why? Why are the creative, surprising threads moved to off topic, or even locked?

It would not surprise me if this thread also goes to off topic, but that would basically prove my point.

This will likely be moved to Off-Topic 

If it's not about chess, it's not 'general chess discussion'

This is not a matter of chess, but a matter of freedom!

I think you know perfectly well why the moderators had to step in to clean up chess forums from posts which were/are off topic. They had become a playground for abusive people pushing an off-topic hobby that many people found patently offensive. It was well past time to take the field trip to another playground, and thank David they have. The "war" it created between lovers and haters of the off-topic subject created a very bad image for the site which was very bad for business. The people who come to this site for chess were finally heard and it is a better place for moving other interests to specialized forums. While you and others may lament the loss of that once "vibrant" dysfunctional family, there are web-sites to celebrate every hobby and you can find or form one yourself or with your banished friend. This is a CHESS site. Chess is a complete hobby with it's own beauty and infinite depth and doesn't need to be embellished by other interests. The comments you criticize may not be educational as such, but express the joy of solving a chess puzzle. That IS on topic. But I'm sure you already knew that.

You're perfectly free to go elsewhere.

And you're perfectly free to talk in this thread despite the fact you disagree with me. However, there is not freedom for some threads.

Doing whatever you like isn't a protected freedom even in an open society and certainly not in a closed one such as this.  Your personal definition of freedom doesn't apply here nor should it.  Comparing moderators to the KGB is not only silly but rather vile.

Calling me vile for saying what I think, what a lot of people think...well, that is indeed vile.

I didn't say you were vile, I said the act of comparing moderators to the KGB is rather vile.   If that's what you and others think, your appreciation of history is extremely skewed or malformed.

Maybe it's your appreciation of the way these forums are moderated the one that is skewed...just saying.

I think when kingofshedinjas referenced the KGB, he was talking in the context of chess.com, where there may be certain parallels but clearly not nearly as extreme or bad.

Certain iffy parellels can be drawn between the KGB and Abraham Lincoln, but doing that would be equally ridiculous and vile.

What "friend" of yours did the KGB make disappear and why?  Maybe your perception based of supposition rather than reality?

Could you point them out then?

KGB is a cliché for excess of control here, where anything which doesn't affect us directly is never taken seriously, but could sound more unpleasant on other countries.

I'm interpreting your use of the term KGB to describe heavy-handed actions.  During the Amercian Civil War, among other things, Lincoln suspended the writ of habeas corpus, denying citizens remedy against illegal detention or incarceration.  He supposedly usurped powers exclusively reserved for congress, such a declaring war (which he declared indirectly by calling on a blockage) and raising an army.  As strange as it might sound, his proclamation of emancipation was debatably an unconstitutional confiscation of personal property.   This isn't to say I agree with any of these conclusions, but only that one could draw parallels to the heavy-handed operations of the KGB.

i think you may be overeacting.  perhaps in the measure the OP is.

I think batgirl's point is that disabling & banning an account is in no way like kidnapping & killing a person, and that someone making an equivalency between the two has no idea what the KGB was really like.