The same could be said for you though.

Per OP; pls self tilt.

he's being willfully obtuse, and the unnecessary pinups he keeps posting in this thread is exactly prototypical of a certain kind of response to being called out. what i mean is he thinks posting intentionally sexist stuff is an act of defiance, when it couldn't be a safer or more reactionary act.

Too much perversion, and we begin to loose a sense of social morality. Too little, and we feel like caged animals. This is why Pinside has moderators, to prevent the extremes.

If the new people are not registered Pinsiders, they will not see any thread with "Tilt"ed pictures.

If they bother to register, they still won't see any tilted photos - UNLESS they lower their tilt threshold because they WANT to see them.

Wtf does any picture that needs to be tilted add to Pinside? Nothing.

All those that want to post offensive, to some, pics can just go to reddit and start a subforum for pinball that allows this kind of material. Easy.

People are acting like Pinside is the only site on the internet their computer can visit.

The thing that pisses me off the most about this topic is one person wont let it go.... We are all now well versed in how butt hurt you are about this. Stop telling us over and over again about how wrong and exploitive pinball machines art, themes, and speech have been. How some posts are an affront to your personal need to cry "unconscionable". And how most of the funny things some people have posted here is making you lose your $hit. I joined Pinside for the tech and some of the humor available here. Some of it is not for everyone... What I didn't join for, is to have you preach or talk down to me. I am an adult and damn sure don't need your help or advise on how to be good at it.
Dude, you're a broken record. The more you try to make your point wont make it anymore valid, it just dilutes the message. And makes you seem like the only one who feels that way. Stop trying to be a want to be moderator or moral compass. Post something useful to help out somebody having a hard time trouble shooting a problem with a pin or a hard to find part... Not their taste in humor or moral standards. Like Robin said... Use the tilt and give it a rest.

Used to laugh when I was a kid and "old people" would apologize for swearing in front of me.

Always used to tell them, "I hear 10x worse than that in the hallways at (Catholic) school in about 5 seconds flat."

Stop treating your children like babies.

True, but completely irrelevant to the point of this thread. It's not about "insulating", it's about what kind of community we want Pinside to be. Is it a place where old farts share dick jokes and titty pics, or is there a place for women and kids too?

seems like the tilt feature allows it to be both...problem solved lets move on

Bowen,

I think there is some merit to your arguments, but where do you draw the line between offensive and not offensive, and how do you ensure that the standards are enforced uniformly?

Forums in general tend to devolve into a Lord of the Flies situation, augmented by the relative anonymity, and the security of not having to look someone in the eye when you grief them. I would say that while Pinside does occasionally venture into the area of the unsavory, for the most part, Pinsiders tend to be a heck of a lot more civil than the rest of the internet.

The problem I see with moving "adult" themes to a private area is that it would likely only apply to initial threads and posts, which doesn't really help prevent the more egregious stuff you're talking about.

And, if you do flag topics due to individual replies, you run the risk of burying a lot of good discussions behind a barrier, and you give the mischievous Pinsiders incredible power to sink topics just by posting something others might find offensive somewhere in the thread.

And then there's the issue of what people find offensive, and what constitutes vulgarity. While this is a privately-hosted forum, and the admins can set whatever limits on speech they want, the problem is that in several first-amendment cases, no one has ever been able to precisely define what obscenity is, and at which point is crosses the line. If we start weeding out posts that someone finds unsavory, pretty soon, everything is getting the banhammer.

I do have a few ideas, though, that may address your concerns.

1) Eliminate user names and require everyone to use a verified first and last name. I can't see that going over well with users, but people tend to be a lot more civil when they know their employer can find their posts in a Google search.

2) Set a rigid set of guidelines that the mods can spot-check threads to enforce: specific sanctions for posts of a racist, classist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic nature, or the posting of images that are of an explicitly sexual nature, or which portray violence.

Beyond that, though, I think that most parents know that they need to curate their kids' browsing.

For me given the choice of:

- Pinball with a locker room mentality
- Pinball where everyone feels comfortable showing up and talking about something we enjoy

I'll pick the latter all day every day.

It's really not about censorship or "ZOMG THINK OF THE CHILDREN", it's a simple matter of being decent human beings. Is that so much to ask?

Yes. I never met a decent human being that had any excitement about him whatsoever. Decent human beings wear beige.

just in case you're talking about me ... i don't believe i have ever complained here about the art on a pinball machine. i've only ever complained about some of the more egregious non-pinball related stuff that's been posted in various pinball threads. in the Whoa Nellie thread for example i had to go out of my way every other post to remind people i wasn't complaining about the game, i was complaining about a handful of gross posts in that thread that went over the line.

I agree with you in principle but the challenge is that bit about 'where everyone feels comfortable.' That is where you get stuck dealing with extremes on one side or the other and they are the group that, on both sides, are basically impossible to satisfy.

I still think the basic drain and tilt tools are very useful as is remembering not to feed the trolls.

Mr Hands?

Bingo... Always complaining... Move on.

I agree.

let's back up. here's what you said:

and i've literally never done that. that's why this kind of thing is so frustrating - guys get so blindly defensive that they can't even be bothered to spend the five seconds it takes to even read what the other person is saying. you're right i've made a lot of posts on the subject -- so it really says something about a person who can form such a strong opinion about those posts without ever having comprehended them.

i think i'm going to take a break from this thread and go play some pinball.

Let me start by saying I agree with this for the most part. Some of the images do seem to get posted at random, but a large majority seem to be posted because they are the punchline to a joke the poster is trying to convey.

We all could probably take a second before we hit "post" to make sure we aren't being a dick for no reason. But....

Going to waste? That seems a little strong doesn't it? Bringing people together from all parts of the world also brings their cultures and ideals with them. What is acceptable and what isn't will always be a moving target.

Everyone has triggers. For me, it's the word "retarded". That gets tossed around here a lot, but I understand that people don't mean harm by it.

You don't have to be a feminist to understand that making women feel uncomfortable isn't cool, so I support you guys in trying to get people to use the tilt feature more often. I just want you also to understand that there is more to being put-off by an internet post than just some boobs.

All of that said, if I ever offended anyone with a post (and I wasn't trying to be offensive ) then I apologize. I mean no harm.

This whole thread is ridiculous.

True that.

Strange and wonderful culture.

You haven't figured put how to use it?

I have been self tilting my own questionable posts...I will not pretend to know what is ok for anyone else by titling the posts of others...there are enough people on here who seem to know exactly what is and is not acceptable, I will let them tilt

Bowen, I understand your concern, but please humor me for a minute. Log out of Pinside, and then read back through this thread. Then log back in and change your Tilt settings to not see any posts with at least 1 Tilt warning, and read back through the thread again. Then come back to this thread and give us your reaction to both scenarios. Does the Tilt mechanism make any difference? If it does, then that might help you qualify your recommendation to new Pinside viewers (i.e., women, men, young, and old alike).

I'm confused, was Pinside fine up until a few days ago, and now it's broken?
Or has it been a slow decay into Caligulian like excesses?

Bowen, suggest RGP to the fairer sex as well as young pinballers. No chance of any offensive photos there.
The site owner seems to have spoken here.

To whoever tilted Vid's WNBJM photo above; can I ask why?

Thanks Bowen for posting this thread, it's a discussion that needs to be had and it's good to see there was positive action from it.

I posted my thoughts in 'that' thread too. I actually walked away from my computer and didn't want to look at the result or replies of my post, thinking I'd just be lambasted and insulted. When I finally did look, seen this thread that you created as a result of that thread, I felt encouraged and (believe it or not) relieved that there are those that feel the same and something good happened from it, albeit not necessarily as much as what is needed. In the very least, a serious discussion was had and that's great.

If someone else's post seems questionable, I will tilt it. It doesn't necessarily mean I found it unacceptable or that it offended me, just that I thought it had questionable content.

The more people that do this, the more flexibility the tilt feature will offer. If the only tilting that happens is self-tilts, the only option available is to view them (threshold of 2 and higher) or not (1). If more people are tilting questionable stuff, the really bad stuff will hit higher numbers while the PG level stuff will receive fewer tilts. This will give people more flexibility over what they want to see.

I've always wanted a weird uncle Vid.

I didn't know what tilt warnings were until this thread.

Its a dutch site, so, that might be a bit different then when it was an us site.

Found it a bit weird an american asks a dutchman to change his site policy.

So the tl;dr: tits on a pinball machine are perfectly ok for kids and ladies to see, tits on a real woman are not.

more like one is on topic and the other is just dudes being dopey and needlessly inappropriate.

You didn't go and play pinball long enough... Still high jacking this thread, huh?

Perhaps the OP might want to consider starting a new website where he and all his fans can gather. It will be just like watching an old episode of Father Knows Best.

So, you're saying there should be a different site for American pinball fans?

im offended that vids pic of the 'modern confident' lady playing juicy melons was tilted.

You should probably start by talking to Vid, since he tilted the post himself.

Pretty depressing, watching Pinside come down so hard on Bowen. It means a guy like me doesn't stand a chance of having an opinion.

And this thread is now the Pinside equivalent of Town Square Madness.

Yeah.Poor bloke is probably too scared of witchhunters.
For the record ...I was making the point .. not having a moral crusade

Why does it mean that exactly?

Bowen himself said his opinion should carry no more weight than anyone else's on this topic.

And why would your opinion have any less value than his? Not everybody in this hobby believes in bowing down to anyone. That's what makes this website so great. We are all allowed to be ourselves as long as we are not trolling or making personal attacks. At least for now.
Pinball includes people from all walks of life, from all parts of the world.

Don't worry. I'm not passing judgment. Just pointing out that Vid self-Tilted the post, like he does on a bunch of his other posts, as per Pinside policy. I'm sure Robin appreciates that.