[JimmieMcnulty]

> Users here are extremely quick to push back if we do something they find objectionable.

This is simply not true; you act like you're the only person who's been around here for 15 years. There is simply no mechanism to organize any kind of meaningful pushback. Additionally, by virtue of the fact that you already dismiss the people (like me, with your declarative statements about the nature of my comments) who give you this pushback, it's not clear you'd even notice. Just looking at your history I can see a number of folks who fundamentally disagree with how you give feedback, but I guess to you that's not "valid" pushback?

I only feel safe to give you this pushback in the first place because I know your moderation efforts are ineffective to how I prefer to use HN. Otherwise I'd be afraid of getting actioned against, as you aren't a rational actor when it comes to taking actions against users on HN.

Further, you have this habit of making declarative refutory statements such as these without justification or elaboration. That's pretty much the exact definition of "shallow dismissal".

For example, a "serial abuser" might actually just be someone you disagree with who you then take action against as part of that disagreement, but the way you operate is clearly without that possibility in mind.

Edit: What[0] would[1] you[2] call[3] these[4] comments[5], if[6] not[7] pushback[8][9]? Or do these not count because you dislike these users? I'm quite sure, in your mind, you've dismissed these complaints as invalid, and I think that's an error.

Also no, none of these are me. Also also not for nothing but 'tptacek seems to spend an inordinate amount of time defending your work in the form of replies to complaints, and I personally think that's a massive waste of his time, but c'est la vie...

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32857054

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32831746

[2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32801256

[3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32782368

[4] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32777165

[5] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32777628

[6] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32780934

[7] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32773572

[8] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32776460

[9] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32772466

[dang]

I'm talking about the kind of pushback that happens when we get something seriously wrong and a significant subset of the community gets riled up about it. In the links you've listed, the one example that comes close to that is the pushback against how I moderated the QE thread. In that case I realized I'd made a mistake, and made a bunch of changes. Backing down, acknowledging the mistake, and changing direction is the only thing that works in response to a genuine wave of community dissatisfaction.

I'm not talking about resentful responses from individual users—those are inevitable, if only because misunderstandings are inevitable on the internet, and they don't (necessarily) indicate community discontent. On the contrary, by and large the community downvotes and flags those comments. It's the admins who usually come along and unkill them later.

I'm sure it must be very annoying to be around here for 15 years only to see some random asshole get anointed the big boss of the place and start banning people left and right. But I'm a bit more interested in what people (including you) think I'm doing wrong than you seem to assume.

[JimmieMcnulty]

What annoys me is your continued refusal to acknowledge the unfair lack of recourse available for someone who disagrees with a decision you’ve made, and your flippant attitude around making those decisions when it comes to people you don’t seem to respect.

You’re hiding your behavior behind the mob mentality that punishes dissent, claiming that a shallow dismissal response is valid because the HN mob has attacked with downvotes, so violating your own policies is acceptable.

The fact that I was able to find so many examples in just the past week should concern you. It won’t, because it’s clear you don’t “count” those issues as legitimate, but it should and you should.

“I’m interested in what people think I’m doing wrong.” doesn’t mean you’re interested in improving, however. There are easy, concrete steps you could take; simple rewordings, a policy change or two, that would vastly improve how you interact with the “fringe” of HN.

[cutierust]

The very fact that a forum moderator is celebrated like a hero (who never says out loud that there is actually a team in existence), and a guy who called Microsoft dead as a genius next only to gos should tell you all you want to know about the average level of discourse here and quite frankly going against the flow is something I'll have to fault you with at this point since this place is pretty much conformation central.