On Content Removal
docs.beehaw.org
On Content Removal # Harmful, bigoted, or generally distasteful content isn’t as frequent on our site as it is elsewhere, but these do still appear enough that we sometimes get questions about why certain comments are left up. This post is meant to help you understand a bit about how we moderate. As stated in our sidebar and in tons of other places on our site, Beehaw aspires to be(e) a safe, friendly, and diverse place.

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.

  • Cawifre@beehaw.org
    2·
    1 year ago

    I prefer the term “tolerant space”.

    The “paradox of intolerance” approach fits alongside the “safe space” terminology in that it assumes some natural order to things that needs to be understood and navigated.

    Recontextualizing “tolerance” (the general idea) as “Tolerance” (the specific social contract) clarifies the situation: We are under no obligations to tolerate the intolerant because they have broken the reciprocal social contract of Tolerance.

    A tolerant space is one where Tolerance is upheld and expected.

    • Link.wav [he/him]@beehaw.org
      1·
      1 year ago

      I really like this term. To be tolerant and inclusive of all people, it is necessary to exclude certain types of content. Bigotry would be the most obvious example of content that should always be removed and excluded from a space that is tolerant of all.

      As a discord mod, I ALWAYS remove comments that are harmful to other users in order to have a tolerant space. I’m trying to conceive of a time when I would leave such content up as an example, as described in the OP here, and I’m drawing a blank. I can’t think of a time when it would be helpful to ever do so. It’s especially not true here where there are open modlogs. If people are looking for examples of comments that are not allowed, they are more than welcome to browse the modlogs.

      I get that some people are just not educated or won’t always be perfect, but that’s still no excuse for leaving harmful content up in a public-facing way. Doing so actually makes your platform less tolerant and less welcoming.

      I’ve not seen anything here that is necessarily harmful by the way, but just speaking to the philosophy described by OP.

    • jay@beehaw.org
      1·
      1 year ago

      Well said, I do like the phrase tolerance here for the reasons you’ve outlined. I also agree that by looking at “safe spaces” it’s really putting the onus on the people who are offended as opposed to the offenders.

      If you roll up to a space known for its tolerance and you can’t get a long? You are probably the problem