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>at least in this case people are paid to do this. I've done commercial moderation before and I would sooner go jobless than go back to exposing myself to the

>at least in this case people are paid to do this. I've done commercial moderation before and I would sooner go jobless than go back to exposing myself to the kinds of things people have to when doing this professionally. It's the kind of things you wish there was a brain cleaning solution for, but there isn't so it's stuck there basically forever (though I suspect the alcoholism rate is higher among people who have to handle this kind of thing than in the general population). The commercial moderation team I was on actually ended up separating out a task force for handling particularly gnarly content so that people had a way of opting out of being exposed to it (in our case we were responding to user reports rather than randomly stumbling on things, so manually filtering reports was feasible), which I think is the responsible approach since there are plenty of other moderation tasks to handle and some people are more or less sensitive to this content.

remcob 6y ago
> wish there was a brain cleaning solution 'Drug-induced amnesia' to reduce long term memory generation is a thing and is sometimes used before traumatic surgical procedures. It needs to be taken in advance and is probably not very healthy. Plus I would have serious ethical concerns with jobs that would encourage that.
- throwanem 6y ago
  I've had procedures where those drugs are used. They're benzodiazepines, and thus powerfully sedating. You are in no sense able to work while doped to the eyeballs with Versed.
- mirimir 6y ago
  I've read that ~high-dose opioids after trauma reduces PTSD.
stickfigure 6y ago
This seems like something specific to the individual. Maybe this isn't the job for you, but there's probably enough people "made of different stuff" that could handle it? I feel like there's a subtext in this discussion that "nobody can handle it" or "you have to be a monster to work this job" but that's just not true. Just out of college in the mid-90s, I worked for a few months at a small local software company in the last throws of death. As a last grasp at survival, all the programmers switched to doing cold call sales. With phones. I would stare at mutilated children all day long rather than go back to cold calling. I was miserable and I hated every moment of every day until the company (happily, for me) closed up. Yet I know people who somehow think it's perfectly normal to dial random numbers and try to pitch them something. They're made of different stuff. I've talked to people who make the same claim about computer programming. They'd rather starve. Facebook has 10,000 moderators. I'm pretty sure there are at least 10k people in the world who are psychologically fit for content policing. It's doesn't have to be for everyone.
- three_seagrass 6y ago
  It doesn't seem to be specific to an individual when there are class actions lawsuits and many people reporting to suffer from it. There exist jobs, like slaughterhouse knockers, which are linked to causing PTSD and increased criminal behavior. It's not far fetched to believe these moderator jobs do too.
  - SeymourGlass 6y ago
    Yeah, and they made an interesting point about how these problems are compounded by the lack of mental health awareness and the difficulties of defending mental health trauma in a court of law in countries like India and the United States. I didn't think of that before.
    - stickfigure 6y ago
      Before I accept this is a serious problem, I'd need to see some statistics. The article is just a bunch of anecdotes. If this job is hazardous, quantify it? It wasn't that long ago HN was abuzz about large numbers of suicides at Foxconn... until someone realized that the suicide rate was actually slightly below the community average. I simply don't trust arguments without statistics anymore.
- Spooky23 6y ago
  I get what you're saying, but you would have to look for traits and develop processes to make an environment that people could do well in. Big companies like Facebook (although they are not alone) don't do that. That costs money. They use disposable workers, like on-shore or off-shore contractors, and do industrial-style quotas/piecework methods to maximize productivity. When you hire like that, you'll have a normal distribution of people. On the left there will be pre-broken people who get pleasure from watching decapitation videos and nasty shit, on the right you'll have people who are traumatized and broken by the work, and in the middle you have people who will cope for some period of time, and burn out.
- zacharycohn 6y ago
  Have you ever had a job where you have to look at pictures of mutilated children all day long? I don't think many people are immune to PTSD, but I suppose sociopaths need jobs too. But I'm not sure you want to hire a department of sociopaths.
ErikVandeWater 6y ago
I wonder if showing a video/gif from reddit.com/r/eyebleach between viewings of disturbing content could reduce the toll it takes. It sounds too simple to work, but worth a shot.

remcob 6y ago

> wish there was a brain cleaning solution 'Drug-induced amnesia' to reduce long term memory generation is a thing and is sometimes used before traumatic surgical procedures. It needs to be taken in advance and is probably not very healthy. Plus I would have serious ethical concerns with jobs that would encourage that.

throwanem 6y ago
I've had procedures where those drugs are used. They're benzodiazepines, and thus powerfully sedating. You are in no sense able to work while doped to the eyeballs with Versed.
mirimir 6y ago
I've read that ~high-dose opioids after trauma reduces PTSD.

stickfigure 6y ago

This seems like something specific to the individual. Maybe this isn't the job for you, but there's probably enough people "made of different stuff" that could handle it? I feel like there's a subtext in this discussion that "nobody can handle it" or "you have to be a monster to work this job" but that's just not true. Just out of college in the mid-90s, I worked for a few months at a small local software company in the last throws of death. As a last grasp at survival, all the programmers switched to doing cold call sales. With phones. I would stare at mutilated children all day long rather than go back to cold calling. I was miserable and I hated every moment of every day until the company (happily, for me) closed up. Yet I know people who somehow think it's perfectly normal to dial random numbers and try to pitch them something. They're made of different stuff. I've talked to people who make the same claim about computer programming. They'd rather starve. Facebook has 10,000 moderators. I'm pretty sure there are at least 10k people in the world who are psychologically fit for content policing. It's doesn't have to be for everyone.

three_seagrass 6y ago
It doesn't seem to be specific to an individual when there are class actions lawsuits and many people reporting to suffer from it. There exist jobs, like slaughterhouse knockers, which are linked to causing PTSD and increased criminal behavior. It's not far fetched to believe these moderator jobs do too.
- SeymourGlass 6y ago
  Yeah, and they made an interesting point about how these problems are compounded by the lack of mental health awareness and the difficulties of defending mental health trauma in a court of law in countries like India and the United States. I didn't think of that before.
  - stickfigure 6y ago
    Before I accept this is a serious problem, I'd need to see some statistics. The article is just a bunch of anecdotes. If this job is hazardous, quantify it? It wasn't that long ago HN was abuzz about large numbers of suicides at Foxconn... until someone realized that the suicide rate was actually slightly below the community average. I simply don't trust arguments without statistics anymore.
Spooky23 6y ago
I get what you're saying, but you would have to look for traits and develop processes to make an environment that people could do well in. Big companies like Facebook (although they are not alone) don't do that. That costs money. They use disposable workers, like on-shore or off-shore contractors, and do industrial-style quotas/piecework methods to maximize productivity. When you hire like that, you'll have a normal distribution of people. On the left there will be pre-broken people who get pleasure from watching decapitation videos and nasty shit, on the right you'll have people who are traumatized and broken by the work, and in the middle you have people who will cope for some period of time, and burn out.
zacharycohn 6y ago
Have you ever had a job where you have to look at pictures of mutilated children all day long? I don't think many people are immune to PTSD, but I suppose sociopaths need jobs too. But I'm not sure you want to hire a department of sociopaths.

ErikVandeWater 6y ago

I wonder if showing a video/gif from reddit.com/r/eyebleach between viewings of disturbing content could reduce the toll it takes. It sounds too simple to work, but worth a shot.