| Sure, I probably don't have a choice anyway. I'm not sure that I see the particular comment you are replying to as being very "ideological" though. Also, can I have my downvoting, flagging, and vouching privileges back? I have a feeling that they have been disabled without any kind of explicit notification or explanatoin. Just like shadow-banning domains and accounts, that's something I don't appreciate about your site. > regardless of what they're for or against That may be your intention, but it doesn't seem to be what you are doing in practice. Take a look at the following left-wing accounts, all of which have quite a lot of "ideological" submissions/comments, and none of which are banned (and ideally, I don't think should be banned): bediger4000
myshpa
cratermoon
PrimeMcFly
This last one calls most of Republican politicians "christofascists". [1] Again, I don't think they should be banned for that per se, but you seem to have banned a right-wing account for calling trans people "a blight on society" [2]. If my understanding of the situation is correct, that seems politically biased to me.On the other hand, let's look at the political ideology of the accounts from your search query [3] (R is for right-wing, L for left-wing): sfusato; R
salemh; R
hutzlibu; R
TeeMassive; R
dragonsh; R
door5; L
qd6pwu4; Not sure, apparently just pro-China
outis; R
I just took the first few ones in there as a representative sample, but I'm sure you understand why this may give an appearance of political bias.Finally, based on your previous comments, I understand that you find it amusing that both left-wingers and right-wingers think moderation is biased against them. I'd like to note that this doesn't imply that HN's moderation is free of political bias. It's like to the old relativist fallacy: just because different people have different norms and opinions doesn't mean that all norms and opinions are equally invalid. Some could be just plain wrong, and others could be right. You should look at the evidence. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37349420 [2]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=37148619 [3]: https://hn.algolia.com/?sort=byDate&dateRange=all&type=comme... |
I looked through the accounts you mentioned anyhow, out of curiosity to see how strong your case actually was. For a list intended to finger-point at the other side, it's weak sauce. Of the first 4, 3 are nowhere close to breaking the rule we're talking about. The other was posting primarily about environmental issues and I've asked them to stop, but actually they weren't being particularly ideological-battle or flamewarrish about it, so even they didn't really deserve to be mentioned in this context. You can have half a point for that one—that puts your total at 12.5%. That's not just unconvincing, it's evidence for the opposite.
As for your second list, only three of those accounts are banned and they were banned for obvious reasons. I didn't see any borderline calls there, the ideological balance was split, and 3 is a meaningless sample in any case.
So much for your 'data'. What about your arguments?
I'd never claim that HN's moderation is free of bias (how would I know)? What I claim is (1) the complaints about bias we do hear are so isomorphic that there must be a common mechanism generating them, and (2) this mechanism is independent of ideology because we get it in exactly the same way from both poles—right down to pointing fingers at other users every time we ask them to stop breaking the rules. Anyone who bothers to parse out what I just said there (not that anyone should, as this is weedy stuff) can see that's not a relativistic argument.
It's odd for you to argue systemic bias by digging up lists (let alone weak ones) of who gets moderated more. Suppose group X breaks the rules more often—obviously more Xs are going to get moderated. That's evidence of non bias as much as anything. Or to put it in terms you'll surely recognize: maybe more of them are in jail because they commit more crimes.
The truth is that you've been ideologically trolling HN, to the point of conducting some sort of vendetta, so obviously that you crossed the ban line a long time ago. We gave you way more rope than you had any reason to expect. How you turn this excess of patience on our part into bias against you is beyond me. One mark of the ideological mindset (relevant to HN because it's so predictable, and thus so off topic) is this aggrieved certitude of always being the victim—that plus its cousin, total unwillingness to take even a drop of responsibility for anything. (Btw, isn't at least one ideology supposed to be about personal responsibility?) Blame is always on others, never on self, and there's only one reason to read the rules: to bash the refs (and the other team). How about sincerely trying to follow them in the first place, one might wonder? Oh no no—it's all rigged against us so that's unthinkable.
The interesting thing is how consistent this is regardless of ideology; you all resemble your enemies far more than anybody else. As I said, it's isomorphic; and worse than wrong, it's tedious.