NancyLebovitz comments on Open thread, Apr. 18 - Apr. 24, 2016 - Less Wrong

2 Post author: MrMind 18 April 2016 07:19AM

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Comment author: OrphanWilde 21 April 2016 01:53:07AM 4 points [-]

On the recommendation of someone who may or may not wish to identify themselves publicly, I'm posting the contents of a private message I sent to them with regard to Gleb_Tsipursky, as they believe the ambiguity of what and why I was doing may be causing some people consternation/cause for alarm, and contributing to some overall negative feelings on Less Wrong, as my reasons for behaving the way I was weren't terribly transparent to some people.

"His pinging of my emotional immune system is, I'm pretty sure, a false alarm. I have no reason to disbelieve him when he professes to, effectively, be emulating a sociopath, particularly in light of how bad he is at it.

Most of the point of that lengthy 'attack' was in the exaggeration, as I wanted -Gleb- to know how he's taken, and he didn't react to my more subtle attempts to nudge his behavior; the purpose wasn't hostility for the sake of hostility, it was to try to get him to modify some of his behavior while giving him a redemptive path (not redeemed by me, but redeemed by his behavior; my role is that of the villain, providing an obstacle which requires him to overcome personal faults and which plays conveniently to his preexisting strengths), which worked to a limited extent, although he seems quite inventive about new ways to break social norms.

Honestly I think he is just an incredibly socially clueless person who wants to be liked by a community he respects, and everything he's doing is to prove his worthiness to Less Wrong. Unfortunately his... tactics aren't particularly well-received, being painfully transparent.

The public attacks encourage him to modify his behavior while giving him a sympathetic position from which to recover his reputation. He's done a decent job of being graceful about it, and has modified his behaviors somewhat, which helps his reputation along, but then turns around and transgresses again in some other fashion. Sigh. (They do serve a secondary purpose, in the doubtful case he -is- a predator, of making people more cognizant of his behavior patterns.)"

Comment author: NancyLebovitz 21 April 2016 02:52:06PM 2 points [-]

I'm the person who encouraged OrphanWilde to post that PM. I'm quite grateful that he did because this has recast the situation.

I don't know about anyone else, but my impression of Gleb is that he's annoying but mostly harmless. Mostly harmless because that early project of trying to promote rationality by turning it into an applause light was definitely a bad idea.

The PM has caused me to do some updating which I hope I will generalize. I started out with an assumption that there might be something wrong with Gleb for attracting that sort of animus, and something wrong with me for not seeing what was wrong with Gleb.

I think OrphanWilde's approach has made LW seem like a place where people can be attacked for unclear reasons, and as moderator, I probably should have moved much earlier to discourage this.

It literally never occurred to me that the animus was (or had shifted to) something strategic, and it wasn't trolling exactly but it was still not an accurate presentation of OrphanWilde's beliefs.

I haven't seen a clear explanation from anyone (though I may have missed some comments) of what they think Gleb misunderstands.

Here's the comment which OW's PM was an answer to. I don't have a copy of what I PM'd to OW, but it was tactful.It took me a while to get from "What the fucking fuck?" to "Thank you for the information". I believe that you can't force a mind. Shaming people isn't a reliable way of getting the behavior you want from them. Neither is anything else, but a light touch has fewer side effects.

Comment author: polymathwannabe 21 April 2016 06:40:44PM 0 points [-]

I think a fine line needs to be walked when addressing Gleb, if only because he evidently has media visibility skills that could be useful for the community if he were less misguided.