mattp

I failed the belay test at Stone Gardens and they were not very impressed with my assertion that I had been climbing longer than they had been alive and that I could assure them I've never dropped anybody. They told me that they always hear this crap from old guys like me and they didn't really need that kind of attitude in their gym. I think the gym operators feel that they have to make sure everybody does things a certain way or they may be either perceived as an unsafe gym (which might affect their bottom line if mothers wouldn't let their kids climb there) or legally responsible for an accident. The best policy for them is to have a specific rule, and forbid their staff from allowing any exceptions.

In the interest of truth, justice, and the American way, I should apologize to Fern. I misconstrued her words yesterday because I said she had admitted not following the Big Four/Colonial thread closely on Friday, but what she had actually said was that she had been following the thread but couldn't be sure what was there at the moment that I erased it. I misread her words to suggest that she had not been following the thread very closely. Sorry, Fern.

Post deleted by mattp

Another way to view the question of whether a hiking traverse is the actual traverse is to look at other mountain routes. Both Shishipangma and Broad Peak, for example, have difficult summit ridges and parties commonly climb to the fore-summit and call that a complete climb, though the actual summit is perhaps a half mile distant or something and slightly higher. Here in Washington, most climbers report climbing Mount Rainier when they haven't not crawled over to the actual highest point on the crater rim. Or another example: what people normally call the "North Ridge" of Mount Stuart, for example, enters onto the ridge at mid-height, and leaves it a few hundred feet below the summit. So one could call this "Part of the North Ridge" and reserve the name "North Ridge" for those who climb the lower portion of the route and the gendarme pitches (probably less than 5% of the climbers who climb the "North Ridge". The Ptarmigan Traverse was first done WITH the peaks whereas the N. Ridge may have first been done WITHOUT the start and finish but my point is that the usage of names for routes in the mountains is highly subjective, and you have to ask questions to be sure what is meant. If somebody says they did the Ptarmigan Traverse, you know that most people consider that completing a hiking traverse with perhaps a peak or two added in, so if you want to know what they did you have to follow up and ask them which peaks they climbed. If they say none, I wouldn't bother to argue that they have no right to claim they did the traverse.

Dan - Did you try that steep line a couple hundred yards left of the NE Slabs route, that starts with a vertically trending pitch to a diagonal left trending ramp? Were you planning to follow the ramp and head around to top out on the S. Face or to bear up and right to complete the climb on the E. Face?

If you are interested in the discussion of moderating the route reports forum, most of it is on pages 1 and 2, and 5 through 7. For the spray, simply read three posts in a row anywhere in the discussion and you will be up to speed.

According to the sprayers, Mr. K, you can easily just scroll through pages and pages of what you don't want to read and pick out what is important to you.

Ray - Let's wait and see if now there is now a rush to climb Sperry Peak. Sweet ice climbing with an easy approach !

That was one of the better trolls we have ever seen around here.

I state this just about every time this topic comes up and just about every time I state this I get flames for it, but I have found pickets to rarely be useful in the Cascades because for the most part the snow is too soft for me to really think I could rely on a picket and if it is technical ground I'm looking for rock pro or ice instead. Occasonally there is some good harpack of some kind or maybe rime but I usually don't belay on that kind of surface and, if I do, I am hesitant to trust a picket alone. I carry pickets on most winter outings, and in summer snow they sometimes make a pretty good anchor if buried sideways like a deadman. Oh yes, and I like the two footers.

I think you have your history wrong there, Greg. It was Cavey who complained about "Strong Arm Tactics" when there was Seattleite resistence to an Eastside event. If I recall correctly, there had been a regular rotation of an east side event once a month, and attendance had been low over there, and there was a discussion about putting off the Eastside event for a week or two.

So maybe I should have called you a buttnugget and said fuck off if you don't like it? Just kidding, Ray.

At least Fern tried to say what she thought about my actions on friday, and the business of moderating in general. Oh, sorry. This is supposed to be a "spray" interlude.

It IS a frightening prospect indeed.

Fern - You offer a good suggestion in pointing out how Courtenay manages the fitness forum. But first, let me respond to your more pointed remarks. You initially stated that I had erased posts in a capricious matter and then you stated that you think I misrepresented the content of the exchange that I erased. How else would you expect me to interpret that other than to suggest that you thought you knew what was erased and that you thought that what was originally there was OK? Now you say that you weren't actually following the thread closely and you don't really know what was there, and that is the point (at this point): I did not save a copy of it so we cannot go over every post and debate each single erasure. I have tried to explain my reasoning, and I described the general sequence of the discussion and the kind of language that was used in the posts I deleted. Again, in reference to your complaint that I had been capricious, following the statement that I had misrepresented the situation, I assumed that you were rejecting my explanation. Pardon me if I a misunderstand you, but I read your last post to suggest that you may still be unable to discern my reasoning. I honestly don't know what else to offer. Maybe we just don't agree. As I said, you make a useful suggestion when you cite Courtenay's management of the Fitness forum for how it has worked to wait a week or two before cleaning up threads that have been sprayed on. The merit I see in this approach would be that it would be less controversial because, as you put it, the sprayers would by then have moved on. Indeed, I have discussed with other moderators the idea of doing exactly that with the Chair Peak thread. The downside is that the spray remains there for that period of time in which people who seek to use trip reports in planning their next trip (those people who are generally the least likely to want to have to wade through a bunch of spray) are most likely to want to read those trip reports. Meanwhile, I either have to lock the thread or allow the spray to accumulate and I fear that if I am going to wade through three or four pages of BS and try to sort out which posts are worthy and which are not, it will take quite a bit of time. On Friday I thought I'd try a different approach – to fire a warning shot in hopes of staving off four pages of crap. Maybe I did so in a clumsy manner, but I have a hard time thinking that there would not have followed at least a page of spray had I not done what I did.

Dru- That was some of the guys who woke up in the dirt the morning after my bachelor party.

Dru- I am hesitant to reply directly to your inquiry because, as ChucK noted, some of those clever sprayers who frequent this site will take any rule and find a way to pervert it into a license to spray, but here goes. First of all, I have already noted that the introduction for the "Route Reports" sections all say "post your reports and ask questions about routes." I have also stated that, as I see it, "this does not suggest the discussions cannot be funny or entertaining and there is no rule that says you cannot be irreverent or that you cannot argue with something that is posted there." If you were to call somebody on their chest-beating in a trip report, it would probably fall into one of those grey areas where I think the decision as to how to respond will have to be made on a case-by-case basis. Such a response to a chest-beat should be done with (as you put it) "panache and style" and, in my opinion, you have proven pretty good at calling B.S. and mocking people without being mean spirited about it. So as long as you didn't call the poor sap a complete loser or use some offensive term like buttnugget, I'd probably leave it be -- but if it was Bumbly Climber's first post on the board or if I had some other reason to be sympathetic, I might consider posting some response in their defense. If you flamed the poor bastard, I'd be inclined to cut your post but there might be other options -- I might wait and see who else jumped in line behind you and the sad fact (in my opinion) is that what would most likely happen is that somebody else would jump in and call the guy a buttnugget or something. The point is that the "Route Reports" forum is not supposed to be lifeless but it IS supposed to be a forum where all climbers can post their trip reports and share or seek information on the routes -- not just those climbers who are thick skinned or who you or I think are "cool." Clear as mud?

This censorship business is going to be hard work if in addition to cleaning up the Chair Peak thread I also have to go back and cut the crap out of the Mt. Persis thread and somebody else is going to have to go after the Personal Web Pages. I think I'll go have lunch instead.

Sorry you feel neglected, Muff. Jon has said before, and I agree, that the route reports section is intended to be a resource that can be used by people who don't want to have to wade through copious amounts of gratuitous insult and off-topic B.S. If Jon and Tim set it up as you suggest, those who entertain themselves with spray would be free to do so in that forum and history has shown that pretty soon the entire forum would be taken over by spray any time the weather is bad. I should also tell you that there have been private discussions about how maybe even allowing any follow-up discussion should be eliminated from the "route reports" forum so that if you had questions or comments, you would have to fire off a personal message or start a separate thread in a different forum. I am not in favor of this, but it would certainly eliminate the need for there to be much moderating in that forum.

Clear as mud?

Ray - I agree with you that that thread in the "personal web pages" section is B.S. and should be shipped to spray. As to whether you can slam anybody in any forum other than route reports, I think you will find that there are broader tolerances in some areas of the board than others, but even in spray there is a limit. Jon has said repeatedly that certain kinds of gay bashing, talk of sex with children, and threats of violence will not be allowed anywhere on the board. I am sure there are some other highly offensive things you could think of that would similarly not be allowed. I have tried to set forth what I see as a clarification of the simple introductory defnition for the "route reports" forums and To The Top has set forth a similar clarification, in the "Access" thread that Sisu started. That thread was originally on the Climber's Board, so that may give you some guidance as to what may be allowed in the Climber's Board forum.

Fern- I will acknowledge -- for at least the third time -- that I may have misunderstood the discussion on Friday and that I may not have skillfully drawn the line. Had I saved the initial posts that I cut, though, I believe you would see that Caveman did in fact tell Dru to fuck off and the word Buttnugget or a similar insult was used, and that there were a couple of replies in kind. You apparently don't find those kinds of posts inappropriate in that forum, and I have tried in this thread to discuss that very point. I have also tried to explain what I sought to do, and apparently you reject that explanation. Rather than repeat how unfair I was, might you explain how you think I might not misstep so badly again? Do you think there should be any moderation in the route reports forum? Are you in the all-or-nothing camp or do you think there should be some flexibility? If there is to be moderation of any posts, how should it be done?-Matt

Greg- I've tried that "take it to spray" message several times. It was respected about one out of four attempts. Jon has said he is committed to continuing to provide a place for spray, but that he also wants to see some fundamental rules of restraint practiced in some of the forums: keep spray out of the route reports, keep flames out of the newbies forum, etc. I agree that erasing posts SUCKS. How about shutting down threads? Does that SUCK too? Nobody has yet discussed my statement that the definitions of what are to be inserted into route report threads appear pretty clear. What do you think -- is it clear enough what is to be tolerated there? Do we need a detailed outline of what words constitute intolerable insults, kind of like the 7 forbidden words on radio? Do we need to have a description of just exactly how many lines of banter unrelated to the route discussion are acceptable? Should we take either an all-or-nothing appraoch to moderating the board?

Ray- Do you mean that if I am going to clean up a route report, it should be all or nothing? I understand that some (including you) think that I did not draw the line correctly on Friday, but I am trying to figure out how there might be some flexibility here -- and I think that one or two posts off track, or even four short posts off track are OK, but if it looks like it is going to deterioriate to a whole page of B.S. that is unrelated to the route being discussed, and particularly if that includes calling each other asseyes and buttnuggets, it is time to step in.

That's my point, Ray: what do you think would be "doing it right?" Freeclimb suggests there should be no moderating of any kind. Do you think there is room for any moderating on any portion of this board, and if there is, how might it be "done right?"