WPA-List Participation Guidelines

The goal of the WPA-listserv is to provide an inclusive space where scholars and educators of all backgrounds and rank can interact safely. While we expect and encourage members to engage in difficult and even potentially uncomfortable conversations, members should be able to do so with the confidence that they will not be insulted, mocked, or marginalized as a result of the perspectives, feelings, or concerns they share or pushed to respond to others’ posts should they choose not to do so. To achieve this goal, we ask that all listserv members participate in such a way that promotes a supportive, collegial, and respectful experience for our community.

The following guidelines are designed to help our community achieve these goals and apply to all content shared on the listserv. The guidelines are a living document that we will annually update to account for changes in rhetorical online practice and the needs of the listserv.

To protect the integrity of our community, the listserv moderators reserve the right to take disciplinary action in response to conduct that we determine to be inappropriate or harmful. Such actions may include removal of content, a tag of past violations, and/or suspension of posters(s). The end of this document provides a Glossary of terms used.

Posting Etiquette

Posters should seek to engage with each other in a mindful, considerate, and open manner. To achieve this goal, we recommend reviewing your messages for the following:

Tone: Many messages can quickly turn toxic when posters are not considerate of tone. We encourage all posters to write with respect and consideration for other members of the listserv, especially those who may not share the same experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives. Posters are encouraged to use their best rhetorical judgment when discussing issue that are contentious or charged. Repeatedly sending impolite, condescending, and disrespectful messages may lead to a warning.


Man/Race/Able/Other/splaining: A type of condescension that derives from the original term “mansplaining.” Mansplaining involves a man interrupting a woman to explain a topic that a) was not asked to be explained, b) she is already an expert in, or c) he is not an expert in but assumes he can speak with authority on. The “splaining” also occurs when white individuals explain topics to people of color that they are not experts in, abled people to disabled people, and so on. We encourage you to reflect on the relationships between the positions of power you hold, the expertise you have, and what your audience is asking of you before you attempt to “explain” in this way.


Content: Online communities often distinguish between high-quality content and low-quality content. High-quality content refers to content that is thoughtful in its address of a specific topic, meaningful in the value it brings to the community, and engaging in what can be done with it/what further conversations can emerge from it. Low-quality content refers to things like “copy paste,” referring to content that is copy and pasted from elsewhere without curation or contextualization, posts with the express purpose of agitating or trolling other posters, or posts that express an opinion with no elaboration (for example, sending “wrong” to the list as a response to another poster).This content would also not engage with the needs/requests of other listserv members


Drive-by messaging (“DMing”): A subset of low-quality content, drive-bys enter a conversation simply to say something provocative and then disappear. We encourage you to ignore the thread rather than derailing or disrupting conversation simply for the sake of irritating other posters.


Warnings

Posters who repeatedly violate any of the above Etiquette Guidelines or rely on tactics defined in the glossary may be issued a warning. A warning serves to notify the poster that they are engaged in behavior that is not conducive to the professional environment and objectives of the listserv. A poster who receives (X) amount of warnings will be temporarily suspended from the list. Repeated suspensions will result in a permanent ban from the list.


Depending on the severity of the violation (for example, DMing list members with aggressive or unwanted sexual content), we may decide to issue a full ban with no warnings. Any member of the listserv who experiences DMing of such content on another platform should contact <INSERT MODERATOR EMAIL ADDRESS> and include a screenshot or other copy of the inappropriate direct message, noting the nature and level of concern (e.g., from discomfort to fear for physical safety).

Suspension Evasion

Suspensions are binding until expiration or removal upon appeal. Any attempt to circumvent a suspension by using other email accounts, identities, personalities, or presence on another user's account will also result in suspension. Suspension evasion will not only increase the length of suspension, but it may lead to an indefinite suspension. Violence, threats (direct or implicit), impersonation, and hateful conduct are considered zero-tolerance offenses; for other offenses not considered zero-tolerance (e.g., distributing unauthorized advertisements or posting large amounts of repetitive, unwanted messages or user reports):

  • For a first-time offense, a suspension will last 48 hours.
  • For a second-time offense, a suspension will last 7 days.
  • On the third offense, the user will be indefinitely suspended.


Suspensions must be agreed upon by at least three moderators, at which point action will be taken to officially suspend the account. Notice of suspensions, plus their expiration/removal date/time, shall be given by a moderator via email. A record of past warnings and suspensions shall be kept by the moderators (we need the how of this).

Violence and Threats

Acts and threats of violence will be taken seriously and are considered zero-tolerance violations and all email accounts associated with such activities will be indefinitely suspended. This includes, but is not limited to:

  • Threats to physically harm or kill others
  • Invoking the ideologies of hate groups

Threats to hack, Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS, which attempts to paralyze an online service by overwhelming it with traffic), or SWAT others (by calling 911 to report a fake emergency at another person’s street address, often by obtaining the physical location through the other person’s Internet Protocol, or IP, address. Typically any device that can access the internet uses an IP address).

Hateful Conduct and Harassment: Hateful conduct is prohibited. It is defined as any content or activity that promotes, encourages, or facilitates discrimination, denigration, objectification, harassment, or violence based on: race, ethnicity, national origin, religion, sex, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, age, disability, medical condition, physical characteristics, social class, or veteran status. Any hateful conduct is considered a zero-tolerance violation and all accounts associated with such conduct will be indefinitely suspended.


Harassment is any content or activity that attempts to intimidate, degrade, abuse, or bully others, or creates a hostile environment for others, and is prohibited. Depending on the severity of the offense, the offender’s listserv access may be indefinitely suspended on the first violation.

We prohibit using WPA-listserv to facilitate hateful conduct or harassment, whether the targets are on or off the WPA-listserv. Individuals, communities or organizations that do so are not allowed to use our listserv. We may take action against users for hateful conduct or harassment that occurs off the listserv that is directed at listserv users.

Impersonation: Content or activity meant to impersonate an individual or organization is prohibited.


Posting under pseudonyms or false identities is considered impersonation (as well as evasive). Please use your authentic name when participating on the WPA-listserv. (For the purposes of this listserv, your “authentic name” is the one you use professionally.)


Any attempts to misrepresent yourself as a member of the moderation team is a zero-tolerance violation and will result in indefinite suspension.


Spam, Scams, and Other Malicious Conduct

Any content or activity that disrupts, interrupts, harms, or otherwise violates the integrity of the WPA-listserv or another user's experience or devices is prohibited. Such activity includes:

  • Vulgar, crude, and excessive and inappropriate use of foul language aimed at readers
  • “Trolling” participants
  • Posting large amounts of repetitive, unwanted messages or user reports
  • Distributing unauthorized advertisements
  • Phishing
  • Defrauding others, speaking for them, or “calling them out,” either directly or indirectly, and instead reporting harmful or inappropriate or offensive posts to moderators
  • Ad hominem attacks
  • Spreading malware or viruses
  • Intentional misinformation

How to Address Listserv Toxicity and Harassment

Bystander Intervention Training : While bystander intervention training is mainly used for in-person harassment and problems, it’s a useful framework when you see any signs of harassment or toxic behavior. There are several different ways to help (the five Ds), some of which may not be useful for online behavior, but are still important to know.


Lehigh University: https://studentaffairs.lehigh.edu/content/what-bystander-intervention

Hollaback Girl: https://www.ihollaback.org/resources/bystander-resources/


Different ways to help:

  • Direct: Involve yourself by directly addressing the situation. Step in and say or do something to stop the situation (Lehigh University). You may want to directly respond to harassment by naming what is happening or confronting the harasser. This tactic can be risky: the harasser may redirect their abuse towards you and may escalate the situation (Hollaback).
  • Distract: Interrupt the situation through distraction. Find a way to redirect the attention of those behaving inappropriately toward the topic being discussed; making a simple (or elaborate) distraction to diffuse the situation (Lehigh). Distraction is a subtler and more creative way to intervene. The aim here is simply to derail the incident by interrupting it. The idea is to ignore the harasser and engage directly with the person who is being targeted. Don’t talk about or refer to the harassment. Instead, talk about something completely unrelated (Hollaback).
  • Delegate: Initiate help by working with someone else to do a part and you do a part so you are not in it all by yourself or find someone else to address the concern (Lehigh). Delegation is when you ask for assistance, for a resource, or for help from a third party (Hollaback).
  • Delay: Even if you can’t act in the moment, you can make a difference for the person who has been harassed by checking in on them after the fact. Many types of harassment happen in passing or very quickly, in which case you can wait until the situation is over and speak to the person who was targeted then. Here are some ways to actively use the tactic of Delay:
    • Ask them if they’re okay and tell them you’re sorry that happened to them.
    • Ask them if there’s any way you can support them.
    • Offer to accompany them to their destination or sit with them for awhile.
    • Share resources with them and offer to help them make a report if they want to.
    • If you’ve documented the incident, ask them if they want you to send it to them.
  • Document: It can be really helpful to record an incident as it happens to someone, but there are a number of things to keep in mind to safely and responsibly document harassment. Check out this tip sheet from WITNESS for more details. (Hollaback). ALWAYS ask the person who is being harassed or the behavior is targeting if they are okay and what they would like you to do with that documentation.


Glossary

  • Ad hominem attacks - “a fallacious argumentative strategy whereby genuine discussion of the topic at hand is avoided by instead attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument, or persons associated with the argument, rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself” (Wikipedia).
  • Baiting - Similar to trolling, baiting a user includes “calling them out,” placing words in others’ mouths, using language that targets an individual or group, or asks offensive leading questions.
  • Brigarding - using followers or an online community to target/attack and individual (http://femtechnet.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Control-color.png)
  • Cyberbullying - We define “cyberbullying” as communication that threatens, humiliates, embarrasses, or shames someone, especially when practiced with the intent to silence. (https://cyberbullying.org/)
  • Dog Whistle - Coded appeals to discriminatory rhetoric, beliefs, and ideas. (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dog-whistle_politics)
  • Doxxing - Finding and sharing, as well as extorting, personal information of location, family, and work often as a revenge tactic. (http://femtechnet.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Control-color.png) (https://www.fastcompany.com/3046772/why-online-harassment-is-still-ruining-lives-and-how-we-can-stop-it)
  • Hacking: Intrusion into a private network / database that violates privacy and attempts to steal personal information.
  • Harmful language - hate speech, destructive language, policing language and culture (http://femtechnet.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Control-color.png)
  • Hate speech - Attacking someone on the basis of identity, such as race, gender identity, ethnicity, religion, sexual orientation, social class, or disability. Comments will target one’s character or attributes to deflect or hinder discussion of various issues and topics. Additionally, hate speech often attempts to aggressively undermine and question the validity/value of one’s identity and subjectivity as a means to discredit their ideas and experience.
  • Gaslighting - Coined by the 1938 play Gaslight; a form of psychological abuse in which the abuser selectively alters information so that the victim doubts themselves, becomes less confident, and instead increasingly dependent on the abuser. (http://femtechnet.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/06/Control-color.png)
  • Malware - Any software intentionally designed to cause damage or unauthorized access to a computer, server, client, or computer network. Users can begin to protect themselves from malware by ensuring that antivirus software is up-to-date, never approving unexpected requests for information, and never downloading files from an untrusted source.
  • Mob Attacks - The use of collective force to overwhelm and pressure individuals out of their beliefs/position. (https://www.npr.org/2016/07/06/484987245/jewish-reporters-harassed-by-trumps-anti-semitic-supporters)
  • Non-consensual Media - Sharing media of people as well as others’ media without their consent in a way that makes one feel threatened, antagonized, or shamed.
  • Online Impersonation - Creating hoax accounts to post offensive and inflammatory messages as someone else. In attempting to tarnish one’s ethos, impersonation may attempt to mobilize allies against the individual being impersonated. See sockpuppeting. (https://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/feb/02/what-happened-confronted-cruellest-troll-lindy-west)
  • Online Sexual Harassment - Often presented as hate speech and threats, online sexual harassment takes many forms. These forms include:
    • Non-consensual media: Publicly distributing media of others (and others’ media) without their consent
    • Exploitation and Coercion: Being forced into sexual behavior / sexual content
    • Sexual Bullying: Use of sexual material and content to exclude one
    • Unwanted Sexualization: Receiving unwanted sexual requests, comments, and content
    • (https://www.childnet.com/ufiles/Project_deSHAME_Executive_Summary.pdf)
  • Online Stalking - Unwarranted and unwanted contact, messages, and surveillance (especially from people in positions of power/privilege to those in more vulnerable positions) that makes the individual feel threatened, emotional distress, anxiety, fear, and humiliation. (https://www.wired.com/2016/02/ive-had-a-cyberstalker-since-i-was-12/)
  • Phishing - We define phishing as any fraudulent attempt to obtain sensitive information from others.
  • Sockpuppeting - From Wikipedia: “A sockpuppet is an online identity used for purposes of deception. The term, a reference to the manipulation of a simple hand puppet made from a sock, originally referred to a false identity assumed by a member of an Internet community who spoke to, or about, themselves while pretending to be another person. The term now includes other misleading uses of online identities, such as those created to praise, defend or support a person or organization, to manipulate public opinion, or to circumvent a suspension or ban from a website. A significant difference between the use of a pseudonym and the creation of a sockpuppet is that the sockpuppet poses as an independent third-party unaffiliated with the puppeteer.” See online impersonation.
  • Trolling - We define “trolling” as “intentionally baiting, antagonizing others online by posting inflammatory, irrelevant, or offensive comments or other disruptive content” See Lifewire’s “Internet Trolling” for more information on this