What is WP for?

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There’s no rule that says we have to stay completely on topic, unless of course the OP asks for it. There isn’t even a rule against derailment even though it isn’t terribly polite.

The other rules still apply whether a thread goes off-topic or not. For example no one should be doing personal attacks or indirect attacks against a person or a group of people.

Most of the time the presence of something irrelevant is harmless: it doesn’t break rules and we can just remind the person to be more respectful of the OP or the topic at hand. Other times we can just ignore it because that happens all the time in “real life” conversations, and we are here to learn how conversations work. We all have to roll with the punches and improve our self-advocacy if it’s our own thread and we don’t like the direction. I see it as a learning opportunity rather than a reason to freak out.

If someone is habitually derailing others or shaming / excluding members for having a different point of view, they can be dealt with by mods.

I know how annoying it can get when you create a thread only for it to go off-topic, but veering slightly off-topic but still answering the OP's question shouldnt be altered by the mods unless it does become an argument or changes the topic entirely. Otherwise, if a response is answering the OP's question but isn't quite the same as the other responses then it shouldn't be down as veering off-topic, because that is just dictating what people can and can't answer and defeats the purpose of a discussion board. You can't expect all yes or no answers except for in a poll.

For example, starting a topic on asking what age you were when you got diagnosed only for the item of the discussion to become about kings and queens is annoying and should be against the rules.
Starting a topic on asking what age you were when you got diagnosed and a few responses were, say, by members who haven't been diagnosed but want to or something, should not be against the rules, because it's not entirely off-topic. Unless it becomes an argumentative debate where personal attacks or back-and-forth bickering is involved.

Like IsabellaLinton said, it's how conversation works. So I don't agree that the mods just came and changed my post about autism being genetic in the born prematurely thread and created a new topic with my post, as all I was doing was putting my input and I felt that answered the question (not saying that was the correct answer to the question, I'm just saying that I felt it was my answer to the question). When starting a thread like that the OP must be open to a lot of different perspectives. This is a discussion board after all.

It's a bit like creating a thread asking if cars are more likely to be involved in an accident and someone posted that they felt motorcycles are more likely to be involved in an accident, and that post being declared as off-topic and forced to be made into a new topic.

Expanding on this, grown adults ought to be able to respect an OP's wishes for a thread, whether it's avoiding going way off-topic after OP says to knock it off, as well as to not get caught up in rule-lawyering another person's thread.

There's a few posters who like to act like mini-mods and insist on imposing their sense of order on other people's threads. It might be related to how their ASD symptoms express themselves but not withstanding, it's rude and uncalled for.

It seems fair that so long as a thread isn't in violation of ToS that an OP can set boundaries regarding what's on-topic vs. which tangents should be shutdown or spun-off. Posters who refuse to respect those wishes should receive correction.

That should not be declared off-topic.  What could be declared off-topic is if the discussion becomes dominated by a debate between Honda owners and Harley-Davidson owners as to which brand is better and which owners are 'real' Americans.

What is WP for.

When I first came here I was at a bit of a loose end. I'd never been a member of a forum before.

I liked it, I met some really cool people so I just ended up staying.

The discussions are great and I like how they evolve and loads of people get stuck in. Sometimes it's funny as well.

It's unfortunate that some people get offended sometimes but c'est la vie.

Personally it should be upto the op to decide if a thread had gone too far, if a thread has run it's course or if it has been derailed.

If in the event the op has abandoned the thread then maybe moderation intervention is required.

I disagree with any Tom Dick or Harry deciding the fate of a thread where the op still might be involved.

Sometimes jokes in a (serious) thread can be more off-topic than an opinion but that's never against the rules. The OP "just needs to get a sense of humour".

Just to give an extremely recent example of what I'm talking about, in the "Trump Demands" thread in News, any mention of the Hunter Biden laptop controversy was deemed to be off topic (and not by the OP either) and forced into a separate thread, despite the fact that said controversy was the reason Trump was citing in making his demands. How are we supposed to discuss the news when the context surrounding the story is classified as off topic?

Just what I was trying to say only you worded it better.

Like you said in your op. There seems to be certain camps who don't understand the difference between an organic conversation that can sometimes branch out and explore areas that may seem less related to the original topic (yet still do have some connection) and a complete and utter derailment ending in utter wreckage for the thread.

The most interesting thing about conversation is that you can learn things.

If the thread you mentioned didn't talk about other things related to the op then how would someone like me who is ignorant on American politics have learned anything.

For some people, I think that's the point.

Ironically, that would be the "everything I don't like is derailment" crowd.

Agreed, especially given how often it appears to be done tactically instead of just to maintain order.

At risk of derailing, there's a handful of these sorts of tactical whining behaviours on here, from insisting valid tangents are off-topic to complaining about tone after an exchange where condescension or barbs were mutual but one party was less effective making their case. It all boils down to hoping to alter an otherwise unfavourable outcome without anyone noticing what was done.

Yes, that's largely how I see it as well, selective usage of a strained reading of the ToS by the losing side of an argument to try and "win" through means other than making the better case. Even the "the rules are the rules" crowd has an extremely situational view of what they rules mean and when they apply, happily allowing threads to go in various directions they approve of or frequently and flagrantly violating the group disparagement rules (which I've largely given up on reporting as nothing ever seems to be done about even the most blatant violations), while suddenly becoming sticklers when a thread takes a direction they don't like or it's their ox being gored. Definitely a "soccer players taking dives" energy to some of it.

i thought it was supposed to be a support site . they banned that guy who was obviously upset. its damned mean , he cdould hurt himself

I agree. I've learned a lot about how to have conversations from WP and also a lovely Twitter community called #KindnessTrain Some lovely people on there.

I think Conversational Flow would be:

If I post about the very hot weather we've been having, then others come and talk about their own hot weather experiences.

Derailing would be:

If I post about the very hot weather we've been having, then others come and talk about how they don't like cold weather and have to wear jumpers when it gets to winter.


Does that sound well defined?