> Off-Topic: Most stories about politics
I'd welcome a firmer hand on eliminating these submissions.
replies(14):
I'd welcome a firmer hand on eliminating these submissions.
I feel people are given too many chances sometimes, especially when they "also make good comments". The problem there is that these are often quite active users with a lot of total comments, so "only n% of bad comments" means a lot of "bad comments". The standards should be higher for very active users, not lower, as their influence on the site is much larger.
For example I'm looking at at story where a single user posted 45 comments (~17%), quite a few in "flame war style" and (rightfully) flagged. Most other comments are fine, except the threads that user created. The topic didn't cause the flamewar: that user did. Now, everyone can have a bad day and that's okay, but I'm somewhat amazed some people are not banned as they frequently engage with a type of aggression, contempt for differing views, and bad faith nonsense in a way that really "destroys what the site is for", as Dang would say. I can name a number of them from the top of my head and I can virtually guarantee you they will have at least one flagged comment on their first two comments pages or so, and most likely several.
The reason these topics are derailed are these people (and others), not the topic as such. Don't ban topics, ban people if they can't bring up the maturity and professionalism to keep some basic level of composure (maybe HN needs better tools for this; e.g. topic-bans, temporary bans, etc. but that's a bit of a different discussion).
Especially on difficult topics I want to have interesting conversations that explain differing viewpoints, and criticise other viewpoints in a constructive and good-faith way, or provide additional context.
While I appreciate this is a difficult thing to moderate, this, in a nutshell, is my main criticism of HN's moderation.
Not useful for all people, but potentially useful for some.
Another problem: subjective matters often appear objective during disagreements, and people tend not to be interested in this important distinction at these points in time (whereas in abstract threads like this those skills remain intact).
Another problem: relative categorization, ie: "HN moderation is great [compared to other sites]" that I suspect is not realized as such, and again: during disagreement, this perspective tends to be "not appreciated", "JAQing off", <your culturally infused meme of choice>.