Comment by HaZeust
5 months ago
>"The comments on this have already amply fulfilled my prediction. People's interpretation of this 3-second video clip are determined by their prior feelings about this person."
There was absolutely nothing for millions of people to believe Elon had either nazi ideology or saw Nazi mannerisms as a valid populist angle before yesterday, I myself found this development very enlightening - and this is where I first found it.
As for the rest of your comment; ironically, I think flagging this as early as it was (I was there) was more reflexive than any comment you'd find in this thread. I understand where you’re coming from because moderation is crucial when discussions go off the rails. But there’s room for thoughtful conversation here, beyond the hot takes. Some comments will be reflexive or partisan, but letting the discussion happen (with supervision) can surface more reflective points, too. Shutting it down early misses those insights - in fact, it's caused more negatively reflective points on the trend of moderation here.
If that were true then yes, I could certainly understand why you think it's the wrong moderation call. But based on everything I know (or think I know) after 10+ years of doing this job, I don't believe it is true. It is too optimistic an assessment of the prospects of such a thread.
One point that might be worth adding (or maybe not, but here it is): when you say "moderation is crucial" and "letting the discussion happen (with supervision)", I feel like you're overestimating the capacity of moderation. It is a scarce resource in several ways, some obvious some not. Part of this is about trying to invest it wisely.
For example, I put huge effort into moderating the thread about pg's "origins of wokeness" essay (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42682305) and ended up, at the end of a long day, feeling like I had hardly made a dent. (The current case would certainly be worse.) So when you argue for letting a particularly flame-prone thread burn and posit that it can be turned into a thoughtful conversation by sufficiently effective moderation, my sense is "I don't think that's realistic".
Anyhow, that's a secondary consideration, but it is consistent with the primary considerations.
(Btw I had deleted the first paragraph of my comment because I felt it was cuttable, but since you quoted it, I've put it back.)
And yet, the PG thread went away after it had its time on the front page, and isn't as big a deal anymore. Conversations were had, perspectives widened, words - calculated or callous - were shared, and the spirit of discourse was there. I think it was a great thread to learn more about what "woke" means to different people, and how we can angle our takes for it.
I'm glad you can admit that your attrition in moderating another post to your self-satisfaction was what encouraged you to make the decision to not even bother attempting with this one, not sarcasm. Self-awareness in our consideration of things is critical, and something I find us all (including me) needing more work on.
Moderation is scarce, yes, but a lot of executive decisions on the visibility of threads and comments are delegated to active users. As it should be - mind you, but it's not like it's fought alone here. I think a lot of us are willing to help, if it means topics worth talking about - especially when a lot of people think so - can stay around.
I appreciate the thoughts! I still think you're underestimating the damage that flamewars, especially the shallow intense ones, do to the community, but I suppose we've each made our points and I shouldn't harp on it. I want to correct one thing though. This isn't true:
> your attrition in moderating another post to your self-satisfaction was what encouraged you to make the decision to not even bother attempting with this one
It was, as I said, a secondary consideration. The primary ones are the ones I've spent much more time explaining, because they're primary. If they had pointed the other way then I would have gone against that preference in myself. I do agree with you about self-awareness, though; it is a precious thing and probably the most elusive one.
p.s. for selfish reasons I'd be curious to hear your take on https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42787306, in which I attempted at unfortunate length to talk about this issue from a different angle. Don't read it unless you're actually interested though. It wouldn't be surprising if no one were; sometimes I just write these things to get them out of my system.
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