Hey all,
Moderation philosophy posts started out as an exercise by myself to put down some of my thoughts on running communities that I’d learned over the years. As they continued I started to more heavily involve the other admins in the writing and brainstorming. This most recent post involved a lot of moderator voices as well, which is super exciting! This is a community, and we want the voices at all levels to represent the community and how it’s run.
This is probably the first of several posts on moderation philosophy, how we make decisions, and an exercise to bring additional transparency to how we operate.
Does not check out, anyway. This is most definitely a “sanitized space”. Just for liberals, not leftists. Reddit 2.0. https://beehaw.org/comment/606420
It’s in good faith. Follow the link. Check that community’s modlog if the big tree of removed comments isn’t sufficient.
TL;DR - OC shit on people who don’t vote for Democrats. I replied saying the current state of affairs is thanks to people like them who vote for mainstream parties, with the same kind of snark they used against the implied target of anyone who doesn’t vote or votes third-party. The mod removal based on “needlessly antagonistic” started with me—the leftist—and left alone the reactionary liberal who blamed leftists and working-class voters for the state of U.S. politics. Removing whole conversation trees for the sake of people who want to defend the honor of Democrats looks an awful lot like a liberal “sanitized space”, I’d say.
with the same kind of snark […] “needlessly antagonistic”
From a meta point of view, sounds like you started the antagonistic comment tree; was it needed, or could you have addressed the issuse while trying to deescalate? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think some of the moderation philosophy docs address favoring deescalation and disengagement, as opposed to escalation, even when it is "in kind’.
I already see Beehaw as a sanitized space, to be honest. It was the first instance I had signed up for, but I switched almost immediately due to the lack of content and constant defense of censorship. I can sympathize with people who may want a safe space of sorts, but a safe space is just an echo chamber, the same way that the right has created communities where no one can challenge their deranged views.
90% of posts I’ve seen in Beehaw have devolved into arguments of equity where everyone must take in every advantage or disadvantage that every marginalized group has ever experienced and factor that into their position, or they’re guilty of posting from a “white” point of view, or else disenfranchising every group of minorities. Not to mention that thread about Affirmative Action, in which the comments seemed to espouse a purely Black point of view, not taking into account how it may have a positive effect on Asian admissions, and completely ignoring the discussion of how admissions should be merit-based no matter what (even if that means all of our ivy-league colleges are filled with Asian students, who historically place a much higher importance on education than the rest of the world).
I don’t have high hopes for any sort of meaningful discussion happening here.
Not to mention that thread about Affirmative Action, in which the comments seemed to espouse a purely Black point of view, not taking into account how it may have a positive effect on Asian admissions, and completely ignoring the discussion of how admissions should be merit-based no matter what
Honestly, there was no shortage of people arguing the type of position you’re discussing, but if you see a lack of it, you’re more than welcome to post/comment.
I don’t have high hopes for any sort of meaningful discussion happening here.
Then have discussion elsewhere, nobody is forcing you to post or participate here. You already said yourself that you have an account on another instance because you feel that way. There’s no need to come here and wax poetic about how you don’t see any “real discussion” happening, and doing so isn’t going to dramatically alter moderation policy. If you disagree with a discussion, again, feel free to post or comment. If you don’t think any real discussion will come of that or you disagree with moderation policy, you’re welcome to find community elsewhere.
As an aside:
Asian students […] historically place a much higher importance on education than the rest of the world
This isn’t really historical so much as it is stereotyping. Asian people aren’t a monolith. We don’t all align culturally, and we don’t all have the same attitudes. We aren’t all treated the same as other Asian people, nor do people in Asian diasporas all have the same socioeconomic outcomes.
From a logistical standpoint: we simply cannot privilege your personal discomfort over anyone else’s, and we cannot always cater specifically to you and what you want. Your personal positions on right or wrong are not inherently more valid than someone else’s when weighing most questions of how we should moderate this space. There are often plenty of people who do not feel like you that we must also consider in moderation decisions.
This doesn’t take into consideration forces of oppression, and is thus incorrect and very badly constructed. Was this jointly authored, or is it one admin’s take alone?
If you have questions, I would suggest asking them and not making assumptions. This response is incredibly vague and I don’t know how to address it. Help me to understand your concern?
“Right and wrong”—as it is being used here—must always take into consideration hierarchies of oppression (e.g. white supremacy/racism, patriarchy/sexism, hetero-normativity/homophobia/queerphobia/transphobia, capitalism/classism, etc.). The quoted statement seems to ignore this, and take a reductive view that such issues are simply a matter of personal “discomfort”. While the quote alone might be taken more…forgivingly, the context within an article presenting a binary choice of either removing “bigoted or distasteful content [to make it a] sanitized space” vs. letting such content be and letting the community simply try to change minds on it does not lend confidence in that kind of forgiving interpretation.
What about misinformation?
Without downvotes it will slowly bubble up to the top because the only barrier is finding enough people gullable or ignorant (precisely, not demeaning) enough to believe it. Or if it’s “pop culture misinformation”, it rises to the top by virtue of it being popular misinformation.
Both of those are not ideal for quality conten, or fact based discussion and debate when vote counts exist. As more often than not more votes = more true to a layman.
We’ve seen this on any other platform that has “the only direction is up” mechanics, because the only direction is up.
Another risk is promoting misinformed communities, who find comfort in each other because their shared, incorrect, opinions of what should be fact based truths find common ground. I don’t think those are the kinds of communities beehaw wants. Thankfully community creation is heavily managed, which may mitigation or remove such risks entirely.
What I’m getting at is what will the stance be here? If beehaw starts fostering anti-intellectualism, will that be allowed to grow and fester? It’s an insidious kind of toxicity that appears benign, till it’s not.
To be clear I’m not saying these things exist or will exist on beehaw in a significant capacity. I am stating a theoretical based on the truth that there is always a subset of your population that are misinformed and will believe and spread misinformation, and some of that subset will defend those views vehemently and illogically.
I would hate to see that grow in a place that appears to have all the quality characteristics I have been looking for in a community.
The lowest common denominator of social media will always push to normalize all other forms and communities. It’s like a social osmosis. Most communities on places like Reddit failed to combat and avoid such osmosis. Will beehaw avoid such osmosis over time?
Most misinformation is poorly veiled hate speech and as of such it would be removed. Down votes don’t change how visible it is, or how much it’s spread. You deal with misinformation by removing it and banning repeat offenders/spreaders.
I would argue that only a subset of misinformation of veiled hate speech. The rest, and majority, are misinformed individuals repeating/regurgitating their inherited misinformation.
There is definitely some hate speech veiled as misinformation, I’m not arguing against that. My argument is that’s not the majority. There are severity scales of misinformation, with hate speech being near the top, and mundane conversational, every day, transient factual incorrectness being near the bottom.
There exists between those two a range of unacceptable misinformation that should be considered.
A consequence of not considering or recognizing it is a lack of respect for the problem. Which leads to the problem existing unopposed.
I don’t have a solution here since this is a broad & sticky problem and moderating misinformation is an incredibly difficult thing to do. Identifying and categorizing the levels you care about and the potential methods to mitigate it (whether you can or can’t employ those is another problem) should, in my opinion, be on the radar.
If you’re volunteering to take it on, feel free to put together a plan. Until then you’ll have to trust that we’re trying to moderate within scope of the tools we have and the size of our platform, but we’re still human and don’t catch everything. Please report any misinformation you see.
Question:
What’s the stand on discussing points of view on charged subjects?
For example, I got banned from Reddit for discussing the possible thought process of someone who might be attracted to minors. Reason for the ban: “sexualization of minors”… even though the content policy refers to the act itself, not to its discussion.
Is it allowed in here to discuss negative or controversial points of view expressed, or actions taken, by third parties? Or does it taint the whole discussion? Are there some particular “taboo” themes that would do that, while others might not? Would such discussions be allowed with a disclaimer of non-support, or get banned anyway?
I sometimes like to reflect on, and discuss, some themes that I understand some might find uncomfortable or even revolting. I also understand that there might be themes not allowed in the server’s jurisdiction.
If this was the case, then I think a clear list of “taboo themes” could be useful to everyone, even if most of the moderation was focused on applying a more flexible set of rules.
Any discussion topic which involves potentially dehumanizing others is not a topic that should be ‘debated’. So talking about whether phrenology has any merits is off the table, because it dehumanizes anyone who isn’t white. Discussing what constitutes rape can often lead to dehumanizing women.
Subjects like this are often rife with bad actors, who weaponize language with techniques like just asking questions (JAQ), concern trolling, appealing to nature or other methods. Perhaps more importantly, they’re often discussions on topics for which no one present is an expert, and for which an expert opinion is necessary to have any kind of fruitful discussion.
In general you should ask yourself - is there someone who exists who could be seriously uncomfortable or harmed by this discussion happening in the first place? If you’re discussing any topic about which people have been seriously harmed or killed by (and not simply reporting the news), the answer to this is pretty much unequivocally do not have that conversation here. As a general rule of thumb, any topic which you have self described as the following:
some might find uncomfortable or even revolting.
is probably not a good candidate for this website. Minority individuals are subject to this kind of behavior practically everywhere else in the world and we’re not interested in having those discussions here, either.
As an aside, the very fact that you are self aware enough to see this is something others find problematic but have not questioned yourself as to why these discussions need to happen is something you should be questioning yourself about. Do you feel this way about every subject for which you have no education? Do you have these kinds of discussions about complicated medical issues or do you listen to your doctor? Do you hypothesize about the necessary conditions for deep sea life to thrive, or do you leave those questions to marine biologists? I mean this in as non-confrontational a way as possible, but rather as a question to someone who seems to value the process of thinking and arriving at a well-reasoned conclusion, why do you think that you have the tools to discuss these topics without having acquired the necessary education to weigh in with any kind of credence? I don’t discuss the theoretical limitations of spacecraft because I’m not a physicist and I realize that I need a physicist in order to come to any kind of reasonable conclusion.
OK, I understand the general rule of not making people uncomfortable, and agree that some subjects tend to attract bad actors more than others.
My reason for discussing —not “debating” as in a confrontation— some subjects that I know little about, is that I find it a good opportunity to learn more. Both through own research, self-reflection, and… you never know who might chime in with more knowledge from a different point of view. More importantly, there are actual experts on the Internet, some do offer their point of view, but even experts don’t have the full picture, may have outdated knowledge, and a respectful “non-expert” can sometimes add a bit that might help both learn something.
Education is not an all or nothing, thanks to the Internet (which has sources ranging from the Wikipedia to preprint papers), it’s relatively easy to acquire an education in a very narrow field, that is better than that of someone who has more education in a much wider field. Having expertise in one field, while acquiring narrow education in another, can lead to synergies and knowledge transfer that wouldn’t happen otherwise… which requires the parties to talk, or discuss the matter in the first place.
But going back to not making people uncomfortable… there is another issue: I’m not an expert in all the things that might make others uncomfortable.
For example, I only learned about the issues surrounding phrenology, by looking into it after seeing it mentioned in this instance’s rules. Previously, I just considered it debunked science and nothing more. I’m sure there are many other subjects like that which I don’t know the full implications of.
Wouldn’t it make sense to have at least a non-exhaustive list of some of the subjects to avoid, for those who might learn something from it? Or should people acquire that education on their own, before participating?
PS: In the particular case of listening to your doctor, I have actually learned more about a few particular issues, than some of the doctors I’ve met. Some have been grateful for the extra knowledge, some have been dismissive, some have switched to “patient talk” mode when they realized I actually understood them “talking shop”, which I find demeaning.
even experts don’t have the full picture, may have outdated knowledge, and a respectful “non-expert” can sometimes add a bit that might help both learn something.
You’re not wrong, but we don’t have the tools to screen out bad actors and to moderate appropriate, professional discussions on complicated, nuanced topics with experts to help address what’s signal and what’s noise. This is simply not the venue for that.
Wouldn’t it make sense to have at least a non-exhaustive list of some of the subjects to avoid, for those who might learn something from it? Or should people acquire that education on their own, before participating?
I want to point out two things here:
- We have taken an explicit stance against itemized rules to try and prevent rules lawyering behavior - an explicit list invites people to go “but it’s not on the list!”
- Yes, you should educate yourself by at least googling the subject first. If you see a lot of heated discussions, it’s probably something that makes other people upset. If it’s something that requires a lot of education to understand, it’s also probably not a discussion destined for this space.
