True Crime Wave: A Conversation With Our Moderator

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[00:03:10] Content warning. This episode contains discussion of murder and possibly some cursing. There is a perception that the online true crime community is out of control. Today, we are going to talk about a group of people who have quite a bit of power over small segments of that community. The moderators. Moderators are responsible for running, enforcing rules, and making decisions in places like Facebook groups or subreddits.

[00:03:39] We want to know. Can we moderate our way to a better future for true crime? Is kicking someone out of a Facebook group a gross violation of that person's freedom of speech? How can we responsibly deal with the online spread of speculation, rumors, and conspiracy theories? Why are some subreddits and Facebook groups landscapes strewn with hot garbage, riven with bloodthirsty rival factions, something out of a dystopian story?

[00:04:08] And why are others just filled with cool, nice people? How do we lift up the cool, nice people and marginalize the cranks? In our new segment, True Crime Wave, we'll be talking about issues endemic to true crime. At its best, we believe true crime offers the audience a way to learn about stories of crime, social issues, legal realities, and the real human beings at the heart of cases we care about.

[00:04:34] It can be educational and compassionate and cathartic and thoughtful and incisive. And it can help raise awareness of cases. Good true crime can showcase all kinds of different perspectives. It can center journalism, advocacy, legal analysis, investigative approaches, the experiences of survivors or victims' families, and more. That is all very good. But all too often, we see true crime devolve.

[00:04:59] We've seen online mobs, harassment, conspiracy theories, ethics washing, and more. True crime won't get better on its own. We think that talking about these things will help. One area that we are very interested in is content moderation in social media spaces. Creators get a lot of attention, but so do audience members. But what about the people responsible for running the true crime communities we know and love, or despise in some cases?

[00:05:27] To get a better sense of some of these issues, we talked to Elle. She's the moderator for our Facebook group. She does an awesome job and has a no-nonsense approach. We love Elle, and we love our Facebook group, and think it is the best people in it. We hope that this conversation can inspire some more people to consider moderating online communities of their own. We really need more rational, thoughtful moderators out there, because we feel it would make a positive difference. Today, we'll be reading a transcript of an interview I did with Elle.

[00:05:57] Kevin will be reading my questions and comments, and I'll be reading Elle's responses. My name is Anya Kane. I'm a journalist. And I'm Kevin Greenlee. I'm an attorney. And this is The Murder Sheet. We're a true crime podcast focused on original reporting, interviews, and deep dives into murder cases. We're The Murder Sheet. And this is True Crime Wave, a conversation with our moderator.

[00:07:08] Elle, thank you so much for not only joining us today, but also moderating our Facebook group. My pleasure. I enjoy it. Thank you. Before we get into true crime moderation and what that looks like, can you tell us about your background in moderation, sort of how you got started and what about it appeals to you? That's a great question. I think the way that it got started, I was an early adopter of the Internet. Kind of everyone in my family was. So we all had the dial-up CDs.

[00:07:35] We've experienced the best and the worst of AOL back in the olden days. So I've been online for a long time and been part of online communities for a long time. But I think really the way I got started in moderation was in my offline career, just managing people. So I've managed a ton of people just at work and seen all the challenges of that kind of come with that, all the weird dynamics and the little quirks that you have to deal with just in an office environment.

[00:08:00] And so I kind of, you kind of get into all the, you got all the burrs rubbed off you if you're doing that in real life. And then because I was such an early adopter of the Internet and was part of a lot of different online communities, I actually did some work professionally moderating for a long, long time. And I also had some of my own large online communities that were sort of niche, sort of true crime. I had a very large Discord group and I professionally moderated in a couple of different industries for a long time before I found y'all.

[00:08:27] And like the big nerd I am, I responded to your request for someone to help moderate your group. So I kind of jumped at that chance and I was really excited that you took a gamble on me. Well, we feel like it was less of a request and more of a red flare shot up over the stormy sea after our ship started sinking. Now, we really appreciate you for answering that and helping us out so much. I think our group is wonderful. I think we have some wonderful people in there. I really enjoy the community aspect of it.

[00:08:57] And I really don't feel like that's common in my experience with a lot of groups. And so thank you because we both credit you with that. Yeah, it's funny because as Facebook and all these places developed, you probably saw the same thing I did. You're like, I like knitting, so I'm going to join this knitting group. And then it just devolves into chaos, even something like knitting. And you're like, what happened? You know that meme where the dog's sitting there and everything's on fire? And you're just sitting in your knitting group going, what's happened here?

[00:09:26] How did this happen? And so I studied that. I'm not going to lie. That's one of the things I love about true crime is just trying to figure people out. And I did study that for a long time. How does a group go off the rails? And why can you take such an innocuous topic like knitting and turn it into an all-out war with significant casualties? It does happen. I know you've seen it. We've probably all seen it. Oh, we've definitely seen it. I'm curious.

[00:09:52] In your work on the Murder Street Discussion Group, I remember you asked us early on what our values were and what we wanted to implement. I honestly don't even remember what we said. I know we didn't want a lot of fighting. We wanted civil discussion. No attacking of families of victims. And we wanted a lack of speculation or at least keep it to a reasonable speculation within discussions. So how do you take a list like that and then implement that to run a group?

[00:10:23] So I remember vividly asking you that question. And I had my fingers crossed that your values were going to be the same as mine because I really don't think I could moderate a group where the values were not the same as mine. It's just not in my nature. You probably know that about me. And I want to say this because I'm in a bunch of groups. I'm in a bunch of true crime groups. I'm sure people have seen me in there. I was in the Delphi groups from early on. I followed that case from the very first day that the girls were reported missing.

[00:10:50] And I want to say that there are a lot of true crime groups that I'm in that have a very different philosophy from our group. And I get it. There are some groups that are just like the Wild Wild West. You just come into this group and say whatever you want and we're going to minimally moderate or we're not going to moderate at all or we're only going to moderate on certain things. And I get that. However, if you really want and I think this is what we see in our group and I love our group. We have great people in that group.

[00:11:16] And that's a credit to the content of the podcast, I think, because I think you just attract people who want the type of conversation that you have on the podcast. But your community can go a couple of different ways. And I've seen all of those ways. And what I wanted for our group was to be able to have a group where we spend more time on ideas and conversations than we do on moderation, if that makes sense.

[00:11:38] So what you can have, you can set up a dynamic where all you do is ban people or suspend people or talk to people about the rules or I don't know, make posts about things that you shouldn't do. And I've had to do that a couple of times. But I think I can say that's not the focus of our group. I don't have to do that very often. And the reason that I don't have to do that very often is I have a zero tolerance policy for stuff your mom should have taught you. We love that. So if you don't know how to be a functional adult, and I actually put this in our rules. We did notice that. Yeah.

[00:12:07] If you're not functioning properly as an adult and you don't know how to interact with other humans, that's your mom's problem. That's your dad's problem. Your parents should have instilled that in you. That's not my problem. And I can't teach you that. I can't take the time to teach you that in our group. I don't have an interest in teaching you that in our group. It's not the purpose of the group. Purpose of the group is for functional adults to come in and have intelligent conversations about, issues around the podcast and true crime.

[00:12:33] So if someone wants to come in and say, hey, you're an asshole on someone's post, I don't have time to teach them how to not do that. And I don't have an interest in it. So I'll just remove that person from the group and I don't have to ever deal with it again. And I know that can be perceived as draconian. And I don't really care because the result of that is that people who are left in the group, number one, feel safe in the community. They don't feel like, I mean, you've probably read these comments even in our group. New people come in and they have such bad PTSD. They'll start their post with, please don't attack me.

[00:13:02] And I have to go onto their post and say, yeah, we don't allow that here. And if it happens, I will throw that person into the sun and it's only going to happen one time. So don't worry about it. You can see how traumatized they are from the experience of being in other Facebook groups. Yeah, we feel sad when we see things like that. I mean, the rule of the group is really just don't be a jerk. And I think that's worked. It has worked. And what you see, and I've seen this in real life with other communities, I've been a part of what you see after people get that.

[00:13:29] They're like, oh, OK, it's not like this here. And their shoulders drop a little bit. And what they start to do is they start to help you. And I'm not going to name any names, but there are some people in our group who are as protective of the group culture as I am. And you let me know if there's something I miss that isn't right, doesn't sit well in the group, or it's something somebody not being a functional adult. And they'll let me know. And there's a lot more of that than there is bad behavior. There's a lot more of, hey, did you see this post? Or did you forget to pin the podcast or whatever?

[00:13:58] And it's just these conversations about normal stuff in the group. And it's not conversations about bad behavior because those can just take over. They just dominate. And it's the reason a lot of moderators do burn out. Probably read articles about Facebook moderators. It can be a devastating job in certain instances. And it's because they don't do those things. In our group, you get one chance to be an ass. And when you're an ass, you're going bye-bye. And I'm not dealing with you again. And this has happened in the group. So I'm not completely extreme.

[00:14:25] I mean, there have been times where people just made mistakes interacting with each other, especially with a case like the Delphi murders. So many people are so invested in that story and the families and what happened to those girls. We've waited for so long for the right thing to happen. Emotions can get really high. And I feel like I've gotten good at telling when that happens in good faith. I feel like I can tell when it happens in bad faith versus good faith. And if it's good faith, you just have a conversation like an adult with that person.

[00:14:53] And I know there are people listening that we've had that conversation with like, hey, that wasn't really cool. You shouldn't have done that. Please don't do that. Or maybe I just suspended a person for a day or two instead of banning them from the group. And you know what they do? They say, I'm sorry. It got the best of me. And honestly, a case like Delphi has gotten the best of all of us at some point. And so the people that are in good faith, you know, they just come back. You get another chance. I know it was in good faith. And when it's not in good faith, I just don't have time for that. So they're going away.

[00:15:20] What are some clues that someone is more on the good faith side of things rather than just someone who's trying to cause trouble or doesn't know how to act like a regulated adult? That's a good question. I think it's dependent. And this is probably going to sound really hokey. But one of the things I look for is just are people in any way supportive when other people post? Do they hit the button on post that they like? Do they start their sentences with, I understand?

[00:15:48] Is there a button in their sentence anywhere? You know, even if they're quiet, a lot of group members actually don't really participate too much in the group. They just observe. And that's totally fine. It's probably the majority, honestly. But in general, if people are supportive or they're just, you know, on the fun posts like, you know, post your pets. If they're posting their pets, they're willing to have some currency in the group in that way. You can usually tell it that if they just happen to lose it one day, it's probably just the pressure of the conversation. It's probably just a mistake.

[00:16:18] But if someone just comes into the group and their initial comments are very baity, which happens a lot. I know people have seen it. And then they see those people disappear. That's just rage baiting on a very controversial topic like Ron Logan or something like that. It's pretty easy to see from the jump that they don't really have good intentions in the group and that they didn't come to the group because of the podcast. Because the most important thing to me is people coming to the group because they listen to the podcast. So we all have that in common. That's what holds the group together is the podcast.

[00:16:46] And I can tell when people join the group that they have never listened to the podcast or they were in another Delphi group or they saw something on Twitter and they felt like they needed to come to our group to talk about it. And oftentimes, if they're not willing to adapt to the culture of our group, that doesn't last very long. Yeah, that makes sense. Or they want to actively fight the podcast or something. I've definitely seen that. One thing that strikes me is there's plenty of other groups to do that in. Plenty.

[00:17:14] I think some of those are poorly moderated, but we're not going to change our overall culture and our group to suit them because basically there's plenty of places out there you can do that. We're a hamburger stand. If you want a hot dog, there's a lot of hot dog stands all around here. So go there instead. And I tell people that very freely. I say if you want a conspiracy Delphi group, you have your pick. But that's not what we do here. You know what a lot of people love to say?

[00:17:43] They're like, that's censorship. It's it's not. It's just a Facebook group. Don't overinflate the importance of it. It's just a Facebook group. I'm not taking away anybody's rights. So you're not like a shadow president operating out of the White House, dismantling our cherished First Amendment rights. Well, I am the shadow president. That's what I suspected. You heard it here first. So, yeah, actually, I do want to touch upon that.

[00:18:08] The idea of censorship or free speech, it gets thrown around a lot when we're talking about Facebook groups and conversations. What are your thoughts on that? Having done this for a while, when people start throwing out those sorts of terms in those contexts? Yeah, well, it's indicative that they may have an overinflated sense of self or sense of social media in general. So that's always kind of a red flag for me because the Facebook group is not America and this is not your rights.

[00:18:36] It's a Facebook group about a podcast on social media has nothing to do with your rights. It's a niche interest group that has specific rules. And don't let me forget, I do want to say something about rules later. But, you know, we're talking about a niche community that has rules and is organized around a single thing, which is the Murder Sheet podcast. And so obviously not everything is going to be allowed in that group. I mean, that just seems so obvious to me. But a lot of people love to scream about censorship on social media.

[00:19:04] And you just have to tell those people, here's what you need to do with your feelings about Ron Logan. Instead of posting them in the Murder Sheet Facebook group where we've discussed the conviction of Richard Allen ad nauseum, go out in your yard and just scream that into the universe. And no one is stopping you from doing that. You still have all your rights intact. You can go to the mall and say it. You can go to a lot of different places in public and say those things. You're fine. You just can't come into a Facebook group with rules and say whatever you want. You just can't. I mean, in some groups you can't.

[00:19:33] In our group, you can't just spread conspiracy theories and nonsense. Staying hydrated is a key part of health. But how can we stay hydrated without breaking the bank when we've got all kinds of microplastics and impurities and weird tastes to contend with from our tap water? Those weird tastes definitely get me. I tend to prefer the taste of bottled water, even though that's not the most budget-friendly option. That's where AquaTrue comes in for us.

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[00:20:56] Today, our listeners receive 20% off any AquaTrue purifier. Just go to AquaTrue.com. That's A-Q-U-A-T-R-U dot com. And enter code M-Sheet at checkout. That's 20% off any AquaTrue water purifier. When you go to AquaTrue.com and use promo code M-S-H-E-E-T. Hey, censorship would look something like the government coming in and arresting you

[00:21:22] or taking away your job and house because you said something about the Delphi case that they did not approve of. And while I would love to have arrested some of the people who came into our group and caused problems, I have not yet done that. Well, maybe eventually it'll have to happen. Eventually, yes. If I get the powers I'm seeking, yes, it will. You'll become a complete dictator. It'll just be a murder sheet regime from then on. But no, in all seriousness, I think people do get confused about that.

[00:21:50] They think that any sort of minor challenge or inconvenience to them is some sort of infringement on their constitutional rights. So for everyone else who doesn't want to deal with someone screaming and trying to fight everybody, that's just called good moderation and good editorial control. Right. And at the end of the day, good manners. Where is that gone? Why don't you just have good manners and then very few bad things will happen to you? But on the rules, I did want to just say one thing about the rules because this is another

[00:22:19] thing I've seen a ton just in this kind of work. So let's say you have a person that comes into the group and one of our rules is you cannot share screenshots from other groups. And that's a safety thing. We're not members of that group. I don't know what that group's rules are. It's a privacy thing. It's just respect. It's a safety thing. Just let's not do that. And also the quality of information other groups is I can't necessarily vet it. So we usually just don't allow it. But so someone will break that rule and then their response is, you know, I'll remove the post or whatever.

[00:22:48] And their response is that censorship. If you screenshotted true crime 69, true crime swine 69 comment on Reddit, that's not a news source. But there are these little gray areas where I will let certain things through that maybe are not in the rules, like like a YouTube video that isn't from a news outlet. But I watch the whole video and I feel good about the content. I'll let that in. But then other YouTube videos, I might not. So then people are like, Mom, you're treating my brother different than you're treating me. Well, yes, I am. Those two things are different.

[00:23:17] There is a little judgment. There's a little gray area that kind of trips people up who are very obsessed with the letter of the law. And I understand that. But if you're not willing to hold to your better judgment in the gray areas, you will also have chaos. It's sort of like writing. There are rules for good writing. If you become well-versed enough, you can break some of those rules at times in certain contexts. And it's OK. Maybe it's even good because it's the context. But that doesn't mean that the rule is necessarily bad.

[00:23:46] Then you have to have judgment. You have to have somebody who's just like, I'm not going to take a risk on this post because something doesn't feel right. Which, I mean, that's happened to me thousands of times in the group where I'm like, something doesn't feel quite right about this. Can't quite put my finger on it. But I'm going to tell you, it's never the wrong decision. It's never the wrong decision. Well, what's interesting is people sometimes get upset with us if, you know, we don't moderate the group. You know, we might approve of someone's post if we think it's funny and we happen to be

[00:24:16] looking at it. So we do do a tiny, tiny, tiny bit of moderation. But you do the majority of the work, maybe 99.9% of the work. And people would get upset with us. And it's like, oh, my God, why did you delete my post? And it's like, I wish that people would take it a little less personally. It really is not a reflection on how anyone thinks of you as a person. There might just be a number of different things going on behind the scenes or maybe didn't really look at the rules.

[00:24:45] There could be any number of things. Now, I do understand the feeling of rejection. I'm not above that. Or I'm capable of thinking, oh, no, they hate me now. Oh, for sure. But it's like, I do wish people remember that it's really, really not personal. It's not personal at all. And if it were personal, I would have just removed them from the group. Meaning if I thought this was a bad actor in the group, I would have just kicked them out. I wouldn't have bothered deleting their comment and leaving them in the group. And I've said this a few times in the group.

[00:25:13] There were times during the Delphi trial or leading up to the Delphi trial during hectic news times. I went into zero tolerance mode and I announced that to the group. I said, we're entering a period where I'm going to be a lot less discerning and I'm going to err on the part of keeping stuff out of the group. Just because of the volume of things are being posted and the volume of new members. Because we would get these huge waves of new members at different times over the last few years. And I would try to be really, really careful. I don't know who these people are. And there is a high volume of posts.

[00:25:42] So it was a delete fest for a long time. And then there were a few times too where I basically had to turn the group off for a little bit. Like the famous convoy of cop cars going to Delphi. Yeah, I remember that. We were very grateful to you that day. Of course, we're always grateful to you. But I remember when that happened because we were out of town. We were on our way to a date in Ohio. Oh my gosh. We're driving to Ohio to go to date on a mystery train of all things. So it was an odd experience to suddenly be getting calls from all these reporters at TV stations.

[00:26:11] Hey, oh, is there an arrest in Delphi? So we had to say, no, not that we know of. And of course, there wasn't. And you really, really held down the fort, even as we felt like so much of the rest of Facebook, not all groups, but a lot of groups were crumbling, just imploding. It went absolutely nuts. And I will say I got a lot of flack for shutting down the group that day. But it stopped misinformation in our group. It stopped because nobody could post.

[00:26:37] And as the fog of that stupid event cleared, actually, people reached out to me and I even saw comments in other groups that said that this was probably the best decision. We just shut it down. At first, it was like, oh, my God, the murder sheet is evil. I'm not allowing discussion. And then they were even saying we started the rumor, which we didn't. It was another group. It was a group or a Facebook page. And then it just spread like wildfire. And again, it was the point where actual journalists were seeing it and getting yelled out by their assignment editors to cover it.

[00:27:06] And want to know if we'd heard anything. And we were trying to tell them we haven't heard anything. We're not omnipotent, but be really careful with this. Our gut was it was wrong, but it was like, geez, you know, we figured out it was fake. But the way you handled that was just perfect. And it was like, I understand where people in the moment, there's a communal thing. It was like we're all watching something big unfold together, like event television. But this is real life. And social media is not trustworthy.

[00:27:37] It's just not. It's not the same thing as watching journalists on TV news or following updates from a reporter on social media. You wouldn't have a bunch of liars and lunatics come into your newspaper office and then lock all the staff in the closet and put out an issue based on what the nutjobs say and then rush it off to print. If an editor had the chance, you'd expect them to stop the process before any of that got out.

[00:28:03] We're not going to just let them print that stuff and go out to people because they're going to be getting wrong information. Because what would happen, the natural result of that is a screenshot of a completely fictional post from our group where our reputation lives. It gets posted on someone else's group or posted elsewhere on Facebook or whatever. And then we get attributed with this terrible lie. God knows what effect that has on the family, which is always top of mind for me. So you can't let that happen.

[00:28:32] And if that means that people can't post in the group for a day, so be it. No one's going to die. It's just Facebook. But it was it was kind of like wildfire management. I just kept it down. People did come around. But oh, boy, did I get some hate mail over that. There's also the matter that people tend to believe the first thing they hear. This is one of the things that's so pernicious about misinformation and disinformation. If you put out something that's not true, many people will keep that in their minds because they heard it first.

[00:29:01] Debunking doesn't have much of an effect. It's called the anchoring bias. I feel that many poorly moderated online spaces contribute to problems like that because their moderators have washed their hands of even trying to get it right. But it has a real negative impact because it can set the tone and the wrong information can't necessarily just be overwritten later. In our animal minds, it's less chalk on a chalkboard that can be swiftly erased in more of a stain that is difficult to wash out.

[00:29:30] It is something that calls for a certain level of responsibility. And the reason we love working with you is we know how seriously you take it. We take it very seriously ourselves. We don't take ourselves seriously. Me neither. But we take our job seriously. I know if we don't do a good job, there can be really negative effects on real people. And it's better to just sit something out or see where something goes in reporting as well. I don't think moderation is the same thing as reporting.

[00:29:58] But there's some similar editorial principles in the amount of times we've gotten people who are annoyed or curious saying, oh, why didn't you cover this thing? And it's like some Reddit theory. And it's like, listen, I'm not saying that this can't be true or it's definitely wrong. But I am telling you, we don't have enough on this. And we're not going to put anything on our show. And we're not going to have a guest on our show unless we're reasonably certain about the veracity. Exactly. That's all it is.

[00:30:26] And actively just trying not to hurt people whose reality is whatever the story is. And what happens over time is people start to take on that philosophy. So this is what I've seen in our group is just from the great people in the group leading by example on that sort of thing. I've started like a lot more of the last year, actually, and maybe a year and a half, I would say. Instead of posting in the group, they'll send me a message and they'll say, OK, I saw this, but I just don't know. I don't know if this is real or not.

[00:30:53] And so they won't do the irresponsible thing of putting it out there in the wild. They'll ask somebody they trust and they'll say, have you seen this? They know they can ask me the question. I'll probably know whether it's true or not. And if for some reason I don't, I can ask you guys and then go back to them. But they do that more and more. And so they're moderating themselves and they understand that posting something like that in public in a public venue versus, you know, privately poses a huge risk for a lot of reasons.

[00:31:20] And so they just take the extra step that you would take on your show or that we would take in the group. And so it does kind of change the fabric of the community a little bit if you do it often enough. And I love that because I think so-called citizen journalism and whatnot has been vastly overrated because journalism is difficult. And most people just want to yell and pontificate online. But when you have people getting the chance to almost vet their own stuff, I think that's really empowering for people on some level.

[00:31:48] And that's what we try to encourage everyone to do. Unfortunately, media literacy is largely, at least for a long time, it's simply not been taught. And that doesn't mean anyone's unsophisticated or stupid. No, not at all. It's just a skill that is not taught or honed. I'm not going to fundamentally understand the subject of chemistry just by living in a world where there's chemistry. That is not going to happen. I need to be taught. But with this, it's like you really learn by doing it and reading about it and studying it.

[00:32:18] And I think something like that with Facebook. I think, unfortunately, a lot of us, and I've been guilty of this, almost write off some of the social media spaces and just say, I'm just getting out of here. This is a mess. Instead of trying to carve out a space where it's less of a mess. I can do that because, honestly, I don't get wound up about what people think. I never have. And that's a huge blessing. I just truly don't care. I'm jealous of you. That's the best thing. I know. It's a gift. My dad was like this, too.

[00:32:47] I want to be a good person. But if somebody is like, you're a big duty head because you deleted my post, I really don't care. It just doesn't matter to me. So that helps. If you're waiting in Twitter or Reddit or one of those places where people are just totally unhinged, if you're just like, yeah, I'm just going to block you now. I don't really care. Instead of taking that content in and letting it get to you, that's helpful. But the other thing is, you all have done an unbelievable job of this. And, you know, you probably don't even think about what you're doing here. But not gatekeeping.

[00:33:15] Letting people know exactly how you got information and how they can get reliable information is really important to the entire true crime community. You could say, I'm not going to tell you how I did this research. And what that would mean is there are a bunch of people out there who don't know about newspapers.com, don't know that that exists, don't know that they can look for actual journalism and real facts that were reported in newspapers for 100 years. And so I'd like to see more podcasters and true crime writers really show their work.

[00:33:41] The better the true crime communities will be because everyone's going to be a journalist. But it does. Everyone's not going to be a journalist. But it does help if people understand that going to Reddit to research true crime is usually a terrible idea. It's a terrible idea. And it's going to lead to sadness. I think some of the Reddit subreddits I see on true crime are garbage and should be blasted into the sun. Others, I think, are okay. I think there's some that are definitely okay. Some are even good because they have really good moderators. I will say that for Reddit.

[00:34:11] I know that may surprise people who have heard me talk about Reddit. I think there's some that are okay. And I think they have people out there who are really trying. And I think that's great. But it is so dependent on which one you get. You don't really know what you're getting into unless you're already in there. And the ones who are trying, I commend them because that's a difficult role, I imagine. And the ones that aren't, it's just a mess. And it's like, I think you mentioned Delphi.

[00:34:39] I think in a case like Delphi, where there's kind of a lull and there's not a lot happening out front, but there may be stuff happening behind the scenes. And the public doesn't really know what's going on. There's a tendency. And I'm curious if you've ever seen this. Almost like any information is better than no information. Can you talk about that? Absolutely, yeah. And the thing is, and that's kind of my point is with Delphi, because there wasn't any official information coming out there. So you would see people get into Reddit and they would just spiral.

[00:35:08] Or they would get into YouTube and they would just spiral because there was no place to really go check the facts that were being alleged. And what I would tell people who feel themselves starting to spiral a little bit into a rabbit hole on any of these websites is just to stop. Stop and go watch a trial. Go pick any trial that's been on court TV or law and crime. Just go watch a trial and understand what kind of evidence makes a good case against a murder defendant. Because it'll keep you grounded. Oh, do you mean if I take a video and blow it up so you can only see four pixels

[00:35:38] and I look for the shape of Saturn in there? That's a bad idea. You'll realize that kind of stuff. Just training yourself to see and look and think like a prosecutor. Think like a defense attorney. What are they going to do? That's going to take you down a far more fruitful path that probably isn't going to actively harm a family member than just staring at four pixels on YouTube with somebody's favorite song overlaid onto it. And it's just not, those places are often just not a great place to get information. Yeah, garbage in, garbage out.

[00:36:08] When I look at some of the information, disinformation about true crime in these social media spaces, it's not even comparable to a fast food restaurant as opposed to a health food store. It's more of what if I found a bag of old fast food lying on the street? Would I eat that if I don't know where it comes from or how long it's been there? I mean, it might be fine. Geez, the hamburger may have dropped this mere seconds ago and it might still be good and hot and delicious. But does that mean I eat it?

[00:36:37] No, you've got to know where you're getting it from. And sometimes maybe you go to a fast food restaurant and maybe that's a tabloid and that's okay. But there's other times maybe it's been condemned by the health department and you shouldn't go there. And it's like eating. You've got to just be aware. And I think I've been guilty in the past where I'm like, well, I'll just consume a bunch of stuff and it won't affect me. But it does. You are what you eat. And it does affect you. And the same exact thing has happened to me.

[00:37:07] I get that. And usually it just happens in those information deficit times. But you can really recenter yourself if you just go look at something where there actually is evidence. There are a couple YouTube channels I really like where the only thing they talk about is the actual evidence. I love that. Just looking at police reports or whatever. So those are the few ones that I will take in. But other than that, I really just watch trials just to get a sense of what makes a good case against a person and what is a terrible conspiracy theory. And also I think that this is hard.

[00:37:36] There are two things that are just really hard to do. Number one, people just want to talk about information that they've just gotten. I totally get that. People are feeling passionate about it. There's some new filing that just happened and you want to talk about it. You want to learn about it. But I think what I like to see people is just think and this is all I wanted in our group. Just think, is Tara German going to read this comment? Is Becky Patty going to read this comment in our group? These are family members who lost a child.

[00:38:06] And I want people to think, you know, is this going to affect them? And if they do, have you done no harm? If they do read your comment, have you done no harm? No matter what your feelings are, if you phrased it poorly or whatever, just remember that the internet is forever. And these family members may come across the comment now or in the future. And I guess the question we should all ask ourselves is, did we do okay? Did we keep them in mind when we made that comment? Is this something that you would feel comfortable saying to them? Exactly.

[00:38:34] And let that just be the whole back line for everyone. When they're putting stuff on the internet, think about a victim's family. That's always at the very top of the pyramid, in my opinion. Let's just keep them up there. Now, there are some bad actors farther down on the pyramid that are probably going to be more fair game. Because that's really, really different from a family member coming across your comments. So I do try to tell. And I've had those conversations with people in the group. It's just like the way this would be perceived.

[00:39:01] I know you didn't mean it in this way at all, but it could be harmful to people. And in my experience, people totally, for the most part, they get that. It's no big deal. They understand. Sometimes it's just a matter of reminding people. I think people separate the internet from real life. But the internet is real life. It's not another world. It's just part of reality. And if you're behaving poorly or saying things without intending to, they're harmful on the internet. That still impacts people's real lives.

[00:39:29] Well, and I think that's happened to me too in the group. I'll approve a post and then I read it again and I'm like, oh, that was a mistake. I made a mistake. I've got to go take that down. That happens. It absolutely happens. Stuff will get through on that quick read. Maybe I didn't catch it and it could go off the rails. Or it could be just a perfectly innocuous post that will still go off the rails. And I might have to turn off commenting or whatever just to keep that down. Then I'll leave the post if obviously the person meant no harm.

[00:39:56] Then you never know when you're just going to have one of those days when everything comes across wrong to everybody else. But one of the things I would say about the other thing on that topic is it's really important to me for the most part not to take sides in the group other than the side of the truth and the rules and those kind of things. So I often really don't participate in the discussions in the group unless it's about like something super lighthearted about the podcast or whatever.

[00:40:20] Because I've been in groups where, I mean, I'm in several groups I think fall into this category where there are moderators and admins that are super active and have very strong opinions on one side or another depending on what the group focuses. If it's a single case or if it's a podcast group or whatever. And I've seen that go badly, badly wrong. How does it go wrong? What happens is it erodes trust for the people running the group.

[00:40:43] So if I'm running the group and not everyone's in the group, regardless of their opinion, feels like you want them to feel like I'm going to be fair with them just because I have a different opinion than them. If they don't feel that, then that's just not a good group dynamic to have. So I just choose not to. And I think it works. I mean, I'll talk about chupacabras. I'll talk about your pets. And I have a lot of opinions. Trust me. Oh, we know. I have opinions and I'll tell them to you. But I try to keep them out of the group just because we do. I mean, people are allowed to have different opinions in the group.

[00:41:13] And I don't want my opinion to put a barrier between me and the people in the group in discussion. And I think we see takes in the group that we totally disagree with. But people are having a nice, respectful conversation about it. And we'd love to see it. It's amazing. Me too. Makes us smile. It's really refreshing. I mean, it's different. It really is a different dynamic in that group. And I remember very early on in the group when we had far fewer members than we have now. I remember those conversations and some of the people that I really took notice of early in the group for their ability to have those conversations.

[00:41:42] It was just wild to me because I'm in so many of these groups where these people are just unhinged over disagreements. And ours was just so different. Yeah, it gets personal so quickly. But with us, it's like, I mean, we keep talking about the Delphi case. I've seen people have all sorts of disagreements about the evidence and just respectful, nice discussions. We'd love to see that. What we always say about true crime is it's rarely actually about opinions.

[00:42:10] You have opinions form in a case where it's like pro guilt, pro innocence, pro whatever. Or I think this guy did it or that guy did it. But it really rarely is actually about the fundamental opinion. Although some opinions can be quite odious. I will say that. But oftentimes it's really more about behavior. I could agree with you, but if you're acting like a menace, then I'm not going to be like, oh boy, yeah, come hang out. No, just be respectful and listen to each other and just hear people out.

[00:42:37] I think that's kind of more important than anything else. I mean, there's exceptions to that. Sometimes if the opinion is, you know, if I think everyone involved in this is a secret cult member who's coming to kill me and they're evil, then yeah, that's pretty stupid. And there is some of that. And I will say since the Delphi verdict, obviously there's a much lower tolerance. Oh, yeah. I mean, Richard Allen is guilty. There's not a lot to talk about there. There's a case where there's a point rather where a case evolves. And that's at that point.

[00:43:06] Yes. And we were at that point after almost eight years. So that has shifted. That has changed. That's one of the dynamics that does change. And if you're going to be able to roll and you've got to be able to roll with that in a group. And we see and we talk about the next thing. But there are some things we're not going to revisit because they're subtle science and it is what it is. Exactly. Yeah, they're really good people in our group. We love our group members. Honestly, it makes me smile when we come in and see. They're just fun.

[00:43:33] You set aside all the drama and then there's just room for people having a nice time and having interesting discussions. And I personally far prefer that to some of the utter chaos we've seen in other groups. So one thing I wanted to ask you before we go is, well, I guess like you said, our approach can be helpful in true crime about showing your work. We really appreciate that. I guess I feel fundamentally at the end of the day, there are a lot of bad creators out there. There's a lot of okay creators out there.

[00:44:03] And there's a lot of really great creators out there. But I feel like in terms of moderation, I can definitely think of some other great moderators. And if you're somebody I talk to and you're a moderator, then you're one of them. But I don't really feel like I see a lot of very good moderation. I feel like an army of amazing moderators in true crime would actually have more of an impact at this point on making true crime less toxic than actually anything creators could do.

[00:44:33] Aside from creators selecting a good moderator, I guess. What are your thoughts on that? Okay. I have a lot of thoughts on that. So I think that the philosophy needs to be not tolerating bad actors in true crime and actively removing them from groups, actively removing their comments. Obviously, I have a bias because that's what I do. I'm just not going to let that in our group. But I think that if we, just as a subset of the internet, said in our groups, this is not going to happen anymore. We're not going to tolerate it.

[00:45:01] We're not going to tolerate ill-mannered, uninformed people. We're not going to tolerate the conspiracy theorists. We're not going to tolerate people who are obviously trying to profit off the misery of other people. We are going to remove this content from our groups. We're not going to create a safe space for it on this internet. Those spaces would disappear. Feel very strongly about that. If we marginalize what we don't like, it will be marginalized. And eventually, they're either going to form their own society on Venus or they're just going to shut up because it's not fun anymore.

[00:45:29] Because I really do feel like there is a sick pleasure in some of the torture that happens in these groups and on YouTube and on Reddit and on Twitter. These people get a satisfaction out of harming others. And if we don't marginalize it, no one else will. We're complicit. And there's no authority over true crime groups. There's just us. Well said. I think it's time. I can feel it. I can almost feel like we could be at a tipping point soon where I think there could be more good people than bad actors. But we better do it because there's some weird shit out there, man. I completely agree.

[00:45:57] And we just want to say thank you for fighting the good fight. I really feel like this stuff. It makes me laugh when a moderator makes some statement like, well, I believe in free speech, so I'll just let anything go. And it's like that's some sort of brave thing. But this is sort of a brave thing. It's like, no, you're actually not brave. You're a coward because you are ceding all moral responsibility for what you are responsible for. And that is not bravery. That's cowardice. That is laziness.

[00:46:27] That is incompetence and mediocrity personified. The whole celebrating the worst trend needs to die. It needs to die. We can't keep celebrating bad people. We just can't. Not in true crime. Especially not in true crime. You know, we're not talking about a sports game where if your team wins, great. If they lose, that stinks. But everyone can go home. We're talking about murder. We're talking about real lives. And I want to ask you about one thing before we go.

[00:46:52] If anyone listening to this is interested in becoming a moderator of a true crime space and doing a good job as you've done in moderating that space, what is your advice? Well, first, participate in as a good faith person for a long time. Join a bunch of different groups. That helped me a lot to get a feel for what different group philosophies were. And I would always say, ask for what you want. If you want to try it, pick a small group that you're in. Let's take your knitting group.

[00:47:18] Go to your knitting group and say, hey, I'd like to be a volunteer, to be a moderator, or on YouTube if you have a favorite YouTube creator. Volunteer to be a moderator for their channel. See if, number one, you have the temperament for it. I will admit there is a temperament for it. Yes, and we do not have that temperament. You have to have a thick skin. We are not very thick skinned. You have to be patient. But I would say start there. Start by signing up to be a moderator with a group that you just love or a niche that you just love. But before you do that, you've got to participate.

[00:47:46] You've got to see what it's like to be in a group and see what you like and don't like from an admin or a moderator and what you do different communication style wise, rules wise, whatever. But just try it. And if you feel like you're forced for good, true crime needs you desperately. Desperately. Yeah, someone needs to make an Uncle Sam picture of like Anya in a giant patriotic hat pointing at everyone and asking them to do their part in the true crime internet war. We are concerned about true crime.

[00:48:14] We feel like there's a very toxic element to true crime that is boiling over. And I hope it sort of boils itself out and we can start over. I believe the vast majority of the audience in true crime has no interest in causing harm and in fact wants to help. But there is a small and allowed group that is doing harm. I think it really does require good hearted people to fight back against it. I don't think we can be passive in the face of this. We can't. And one thing I would like to see go away is the idea that there's no objective truth.

[00:48:42] There is absolutely objective truth. So, for example, in the Karen Reed case, the whole turtle boy harassing witnesses thing, that is objectively bad. There's no argument there. There's no room for argument. It's terrible. And you have to have that at the heart of your group, that there are some things that are objectively true and you're not going to tolerate a challenge to those things. Harassing witnesses in a murder trial is bad. It's objectively bad. And there's a lot of sentiment out there that's like, well, that's my opinion.

[00:49:12] You can have your opinion. No, I'm talking about the truth. You're talking about something that's not true. And I think we have to be a little take a stronger stance there because I see a lot more of that. Like, oh, that's how you feel. No, that's not how I feel. That's an objective truth. One problem is that smart and reasonable people want to hear others out and don't want to push too hard because they respect others' opinions. But frankly, people who are not smart and rather unreasonable do not have those same inclinations.

[00:49:41] So you end up hearing a lot of that and perhaps other people are not pushing back. And then characterizing actual evidence as an opinion is ridiculous and stupid. People just need to stop doing that. It just pollutes everything. We're going to have a spirited conversation. It should it shouldn't be about it shouldn't. It should not be about the basic facts. It should be about things we don't know yet. So what have I not asked you about this topic that you think it is important for people to know?

[00:50:06] Well, number one, I would like to tell all the people in the group that they're awesome because it really is such a great group. And I enjoy it. Even though I don't participate a lot, I really, really enjoy reading everyone's conversations. I've learned a ton. There's so many smart people in there. We have every sort of person in there. We have legal people. We have nurses. I mean, just from every walk of life. And that's really fun. And I do want to say to the people who I won't name, who do help me every single day, point out the things I may have missed, that I appreciate you a lot.

[00:50:32] And also, I think the people feel like they can't send me a message when someone's being a complete weenie. Just send me a message and I will nuke them. It's fine. You don't have to put up with anything, any snarky little comments or anything. Don't engage with them. Don't do any of that stuff. Just send me a message and I'll call them, take care of it. But I really just want to say thanks because it's a group that I enjoy the hell out of spending time in. And that's very rare on the internet in true crime, I think. So you should be proud of that.

[00:50:58] Well, we are proud to be working with you because we don't feel like we could have done that on our own between running the podcast and doing the reporting. And also, we just simply don't have the temperaments to be moderators. And I'm going to tell you that the success of the group is your success. And we want to thank you so much for that. So now I'm back to being Anya again. And we really hope this conversation inspires some of you. If you've got the temperament, if you've got the personality, to consider moderation.

[00:51:25] I really think more hands-on, thoughtful moderators like Elle could clean up the worst elements of true crime. Anyways, we want to thank Elle again. We couldn't do it without her. She rocks. Some would even say that she is dope. Yes. And so is everyone in our group. We really appreciate everyone for participating in the Facebook group. And you should join in if you're not in it. It's great. Just follow the rules and listen to Elle. Thanks, everyone, so much. Thanks so much for listening to The Murder Sheet.

[00:51:50] If you have a tip concerning one of the cases we cover, please email us at murdersheet at gmail.com. If you have actionable information about an unsolved crime, please report it to the appropriate authorities. If you're interested in joining our Patreon, that's available at www.patreon.com slash murdersheet.

[00:52:17] If you want to tip us a bit of money for records requests, you can do so at www.buymeacoffee.com slash murdersheet. We very much appreciate any support. Special thanks to Kevin Tyler Greenlee, who composed the music for The Murder Sheet, and who you can find on the web at kevintg.com.

[00:52:41] If you're looking to talk with other listeners about a case we've covered, you can join The Murder Sheet discussion group on Facebook. We mostly focus our time on research and reporting, so we're not on social media much. We do try to check our email account, but we ask for patience as we often receive a lot of messages. Thanks again for listening. Can we talk a little bit before we go about Quintz, a great new sponsor for us?

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