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> it makes for boring reading I didn't find this readers interpretation of the author's behavior to be boring. I can see how she may come across as being over

> it makes for boring reading I didn't find this readers interpretation of the author's behavior to be boring. I can see how she may come across as being overly combative (though I agree with her goal). Your frequent comments about what you find to be 'boring' is boring.

miscPerson 7y ago
@dang likes Overton manipulation via pretending to address decorum — a common social control tactic. In this case, the person broke the unspoken rule of being critical of a community member @dang personally likes, so we get a grumpy mod post discussing the decorum, but really signaling that some people in the community can’t be criticized.
Cogito 7y ago
For what it's worth, I think it's ok for those comments to be boring. The root comment has been hidden, and the mod (who probably hid it) has replied to it stating why it was hidden. That we can see moderation is a good thing; that moderation is 'boring' is to be expected.
dang 7y ago
I mean the word 'boring' in the HN sense of not intellectually interesting. Something can still be exciting even if it's boring in this way. It's boring because there are only so many ways to denounce something as "the epitome of toxicity", "this person made me cringe", and so on, which means the patterns of denunciation get recycled a lot. That makes them predictable, and this site exists for things that aren't predictable. Another way of putting it is that indignation tends to melt down to a few formulations that get repeated a lot, where intellectual curiosity looks for what is new and different in a situation, and then has a new and different reaction to that. Since we want HN to be a site for intellectual curiosity, it's important not to feed indignation too much. It quickly overwhelms curiosity if allowed to (especially on the internet); therefore we need to moderate it. You're right that the moderation comments are boring; that's because they're also predictable. If it helps at all, they're even more tedious to write than they are to read.

miscPerson 7y ago

@dang likes Overton manipulation via pretending to address decorum — a common social control tactic. In this case, the person broke the unspoken rule of being critical of a community member @dang personally likes, so we get a grumpy mod post discussing the decorum, but really signaling that some people in the community can’t be criticized.

Cogito 7y ago

For what it's worth, I think it's ok for those comments to be boring. The root comment has been hidden, and the mod (who probably hid it) has replied to it stating why it was hidden. That we can see moderation is a good thing; that moderation is 'boring' is to be expected.

dang 7y ago

I mean the word 'boring' in the HN sense of not intellectually interesting. Something can still be exciting even if it's boring in this way. It's boring because there are only so many ways to denounce something as "the epitome of toxicity", "this person made me cringe", and so on, which means the patterns of denunciation get recycled a lot. That makes them predictable, and this site exists for things that aren't predictable. Another way of putting it is that indignation tends to melt down to a few formulations that get repeated a lot, where intellectual curiosity looks for what is new and different in a situation, and then has a new and different reaction to that. Since we want HN to be a site for intellectual curiosity, it's important not to feed indignation too much. It quickly overwhelms curiosity if allowed to (especially on the internet); therefore we need to moderate it. You're right that the moderation comments are boring; that's because they're also predictable. If it helps at all, they're even more tedious to write than they are to read.