7 ms·

Admittedly I'm not an expert on the censorship rules of the site but I was under the impression that the mods had the ability to unflag comments. It was never m

Admittedly I'm not an expert on the censorship rules of the site but I was under the impression that the mods had the ability to unflag comments. It was never made clear to me why that comment was flagged or why it was considered "flamebait" and that's why I consider HN's censorship rules arbitrary. There was nothing rude or personally antagonistic or unscientific about that post.

DoreenMichele 8y ago
Insisting over and over that you are not being offensive while people keep repeating their disagreement with the idea by downvoting and/or flagging your comments suggests your social skills could use some polish. You are entitled to your opinions, but you do not get to unilaterally determine what others do or do not find offensive. That's not how the universe works.
- comesee 8y ago
  Hey, no need to insult my social skills. I get that maybe the content of my post offends some people but it is scientific fact. There's a difference between being intentionally rude / antagonistic, and civilly presenting data that some people find offensive. Just because people find the data offensive, that shouldn't be cause to censor the data on a forum for civil discussion, should it?
  - DoreenMichele 8y ago
    The data isn't being censored. Flamebait actively undermines civility and that's all the mods were trying to address. There are ways to make similar points without it being flamebait. If you really feel it is important to discuss such things, you could work on improving your framing and diplomacy instead of continuing to complain about the incident two months later in an unrelated discussion. There's also no intent to insult your social skills. But the reality is there are only two reasonable ways to interpret your behavior here: 1. Either you legitimately are failing to understand. (There can be myriad reasons for that. Disability is not the only possible reason.) 2. You actually are a troll. The first is the more charitable interpretation and the one I am most prone to because I raised two special needs sons. So I default to assuming someone honestly doesn't understand for some reason because I've dealt with that a lot in life. It sometimes gets me into social hot water when I am sincerely trying to be helpful. Like now.
    - comesee 8y ago
      I think what you are failing to understand is that merely offending people is not punishable by censorship in a liberal society. "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." I antagonized no one, merely provided an observation. Flamebait is not an objective term, anyone can claim anything is flamebait if enough people agree. Indeed, I was flaming no one, it was only used as a smear against me to justify censoring me and there is no greater insult to free inquiry than that. As long as you condone the censoring of my comment based on what you perceive is poor tact, you oppose the foundational principles upon which our modern liberal society is built. As long as HN maintains the flag on my comment, they too oppose those same principles.
      - DoreenMichele 8y ago
        No, I'm not failing to understand that. If I weren't a big proponent of free speech and inclusion, I wouldn't be bothering to engage you. Just ignoring your complaint is the easiest answer here. I'm not required to stick my neck out. I'm not a mod. I can just flag and downvote and move on and that's the cover my own butt option that most people will take, which tends to help keep such things intractable because if the flags and downvotes worked to convince you to do something different, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Opening with an assertion on your part that I am failing to understand is borderline personal attack and disrespects the fact that I am choosing to talk with you and give some of my time and energy to you. Above, you say there is no need to insult your social skills. Now you turn around and insult my intelligence and character. In other words, you are taking a position that I need to be civil and respectful and work hard to not inadvertently insult you, but you don't have to do the same, for me or generally. Expecting the same of you is framed as censorship and as a moral defect on the part of people who don't agree with you and are expressing that fact, whether with words or downvotes or flags. They aren't allowed to express their disagreement because that's censorship of you in your eyes. I'm a woman. I'm quite open about that. This is an overwhelmingly male forum. I routinely deal with downvotes and such because I'm a demographic outlier. I am unwilling to be broken. I am unwilling to be cowed and trained to not give my actual point of view in order to be able to stay. Staying on such terms strikes me as pointless. This disposition has helped get me thrown off of several other forums. But I've worked hard at trying to figure out how to respect others while expressing myself here. I've worked hard at figuring out better ways to express what I want to say so I'm actually heard and not presumed to be some man-hating feminazi with an axe to grind. For a long time, it was a hard row to hoe. So I'm very sympathetic to people who are frustrated with trying to participate here and feeling mistreated. So I occasionally try to talk to folks who are having trouble fitting in to try to say "Hey, I get it, it's frustrating and a sucky experience. But there are things you can do on your end to make this work better." And that's my reason for engaging you. But now I'm being lumped in with "those people" who are silencing you, never mind that I'm giving you ample opportunity to talk here. At this point, I'm feeling pretty darn disrespected and like I'm a fool, "as usual", and feeling like only an idiot would reach out to someone under such circumstances and it's no wonder your comments get so many downvotes and flags, because ugh this is feeling like all down side for me. So I will likely be bowing out of the discussion because I'm aggravated and it doesn't look productive to me. That's not a personal attack.

DoreenMichele 8y ago

Insisting over and over that you are not being offensive while people keep repeating their disagreement with the idea by downvoting and/or flagging your comments suggests your social skills could use some polish. You are entitled to your opinions, but you do not get to unilaterally determine what others do or do not find offensive. That's not how the universe works.

comesee 8y ago
Hey, no need to insult my social skills. I get that maybe the content of my post offends some people but it is scientific fact. There's a difference between being intentionally rude / antagonistic, and civilly presenting data that some people find offensive. Just because people find the data offensive, that shouldn't be cause to censor the data on a forum for civil discussion, should it?
- DoreenMichele 8y ago
  The data isn't being censored. Flamebait actively undermines civility and that's all the mods were trying to address. There are ways to make similar points without it being flamebait. If you really feel it is important to discuss such things, you could work on improving your framing and diplomacy instead of continuing to complain about the incident two months later in an unrelated discussion. There's also no intent to insult your social skills. But the reality is there are only two reasonable ways to interpret your behavior here: 1. Either you legitimately are failing to understand. (There can be myriad reasons for that. Disability is not the only possible reason.) 2. You actually are a troll. The first is the more charitable interpretation and the one I am most prone to because I raised two special needs sons. So I default to assuming someone honestly doesn't understand for some reason because I've dealt with that a lot in life. It sometimes gets me into social hot water when I am sincerely trying to be helpful. Like now.
  - comesee 8y ago
    I think what you are failing to understand is that merely offending people is not punishable by censorship in a liberal society. "I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." I antagonized no one, merely provided an observation. Flamebait is not an objective term, anyone can claim anything is flamebait if enough people agree. Indeed, I was flaming no one, it was only used as a smear against me to justify censoring me and there is no greater insult to free inquiry than that. As long as you condone the censoring of my comment based on what you perceive is poor tact, you oppose the foundational principles upon which our modern liberal society is built. As long as HN maintains the flag on my comment, they too oppose those same principles.
    - DoreenMichele 8y ago
      No, I'm not failing to understand that. If I weren't a big proponent of free speech and inclusion, I wouldn't be bothering to engage you. Just ignoring your complaint is the easiest answer here. I'm not required to stick my neck out. I'm not a mod. I can just flag and downvote and move on and that's the cover my own butt option that most people will take, which tends to help keep such things intractable because if the flags and downvotes worked to convince you to do something different, we wouldn't be having this conversation. Opening with an assertion on your part that I am failing to understand is borderline personal attack and disrespects the fact that I am choosing to talk with you and give some of my time and energy to you. Above, you say there is no need to insult your social skills. Now you turn around and insult my intelligence and character. In other words, you are taking a position that I need to be civil and respectful and work hard to not inadvertently insult you, but you don't have to do the same, for me or generally. Expecting the same of you is framed as censorship and as a moral defect on the part of people who don't agree with you and are expressing that fact, whether with words or downvotes or flags. They aren't allowed to express their disagreement because that's censorship of you in your eyes. I'm a woman. I'm quite open about that. This is an overwhelmingly male forum. I routinely deal with downvotes and such because I'm a demographic outlier. I am unwilling to be broken. I am unwilling to be cowed and trained to not give my actual point of view in order to be able to stay. Staying on such terms strikes me as pointless. This disposition has helped get me thrown off of several other forums. But I've worked hard at trying to figure out how to respect others while expressing myself here. I've worked hard at figuring out better ways to express what I want to say so I'm actually heard and not presumed to be some man-hating feminazi with an axe to grind. For a long time, it was a hard row to hoe. So I'm very sympathetic to people who are frustrated with trying to participate here and feeling mistreated. So I occasionally try to talk to folks who are having trouble fitting in to try to say "Hey, I get it, it's frustrating and a sucky experience. But there are things you can do on your end to make this work better." And that's my reason for engaging you. But now I'm being lumped in with "those people" who are silencing you, never mind that I'm giving you ample opportunity to talk here. At this point, I'm feeling pretty darn disrespected and like I'm a fool, "as usual", and feeling like only an idiot would reach out to someone under such circumstances and it's no wonder your comments get so many downvotes and flags, because ugh this is feeling like all down side for me. So I will likely be bowing out of the discussion because I'm aggravated and it doesn't look productive to me. That's not a personal attack.