...THAT IS MY PROBLEM WITH THE FEATURE! It messes up the FLOW of a thread. Person A responds to person B, person C responds to person B, Person A does not like what person C typed, so puts person C on block. Now comes along person D, who sees person A's response to person C, responds to person C, and person B be like, huh? Who is person D responding to? Person A or person C?
I am not sure I mapped that out properly, but the idea is the same. It messes up FLOW. If you cannot handle the FLOW, just ignore the thread, and not the posters of the thread. Stop with the block madness.
You should give
a link to a thread as an example of what you're talking about !!!
I'm confident that one of those persons has an issue with someone that has been trolling and is known to disrupt the flow of threads
intentionally.
Just as importantly, it is probably a thread not worth having a flow to other people nor do they give a shit as you do about the thread. Simply, it's just high school bullshit that's not going to give you a sleepless night unless it's a thread that you've created and consider it to be important to you for whatever reason.
Seriously, if you think the flow of a thread is that important to you when it's obviously not important to others in the thread...you're the one making this forum too important as if it's just a few friends having a polite dinner discussion.
It's not.
- Once again, give us a link to a thread that you consider to have lost its flow.
If you don't give us an example, that's my point. It's probably not even worth highlighting/bitching about which would be the reason why it is a thread that merits remaining anonymous. Simply, it's a stupid thread and probably already buried in the backlinks (no longer on the first few pages).
Personally, I no longer create important threads because there are too many people here at ET that come here for the sole purpose of intentionally disrupting a thread as if they've had too much to drink
prior to heading to the next party to then intentionally be that
asshole drunk that showed up under the façade of free speech.
Just the same, there are too many people creating threads for the sole purpose to target and attack others that they don't share the same philosophy in life...also known as trolling.
Baron has the following statement in the Political threads section...
- Not for the faint of heart. If you are easily offended, stay away from this forum!
I would think it's a statement that the words above "this forum" should be replaced with the words "these threads". Yet, maybe the above statement should be a statement for the
entire forum and not just for the political threads.
Regardless, it is a well-known issue with public forums but typically not an issue with
"private threads" or private conversations.
Thus, there's a solution...you can create a private thread and invite those that are like-minded on the topic to increase the possibility of the flow that you seek plus you'll have better control of your own thread...something not possible in the public threads that you create.
Your solution around the ignore/block feature that you do not like while others do like it especially when trolls abuse free speech by attacking the OP of a thread when they enter the OP threads while the troll is being ignore/blocked.
- Trolls are able to do such by clicking on the last message post icon while they're reading the thread while not logged in. That icon when clicked on will prompt the troll to log into the forum...enabling the troll to navigate around someone's ignore/block so that they can post a message in a thread that's blocking them.
Simply, you have a solution while others can keep using the ignore/block tool. Yet, at the end of the day, the below solution is the best way to keep a flow of a thread and to eliminate the trolling. A secret weapon against ETs known antagonists (aka dickheads).
Private Threads
P.S. A different topic...the last message post icon should only be available for those that are logged into the forum and
not available for those not logged into the forum. It is the most common way for trolls to navigate around the ignore/block feature of the OP of a thread that's blocking the troll.
It will help to keep the flow in some threads but not every thread.
wrbtrader