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Explicit modhat warnings. I agree that in the first instance you did say what you did so I suppose that counts, but the second case here definitely warranted one.
Might not be the exact term I'm looking for, but by that I mean
the previous one at least was something someone actually told youvs
I'm sure you get the point. I'll stop if you think I'm doing this in bad faith, but I believe the term fits.
I'm perfectly fine with the arguments themselves, people can and routinely do assert that [thing] is literally Hitler/Russian propaganda. My objection is not content. My objection is the mode of argument that encapsulates it, e.g. implicit association, passive aggression, selective amnesia, etc. (Well okay maybe not the argumentum ad Hitlerum part, I confess, I think that ~99% of references/comparisons to Hitler are made in bad faith solely for purposes of tarring by association - which here I believe was especially visible, posted straight with not even a token attempt at elaboration.)
I'm not saying bad arguments should be prohibited, but at the very least bad arguments (and you seem aware they're bad) should serve as a mitigating circumstance when people respond with more heat than necessary. Otherwise baitposting seems too exploitable, if you wanna do a little trolling your job is simply
pretending to be retardedusing a lot of passive voice and Darkly HintingTM to goad people into making the first ad hominem that gets them modded, exhibit A here. You can argue this is a restraint issue and Nigga Just Like Walk Away From The Screen, and you sort of do -I suppose I can't really argue with that, you can always deflect and say you expect better from posters, but that's the thing with bait, posting it takes far less effort than it takes to regard it seriously and answer in good faith. Comments in this vein (case 2) actively shit up/derail conversations and are IMO straightforwardly bad, shedding very little light (Hitler bad, who knew?) but very much inviting heat; top-level posts (case 1) are technically beneath suspicion since in that case the resulting "discussion" wasn't anything particularly bad, but they still violate the rules on speaking plainly, and the passive-aggressive mode of communication doesn't seem very conducive to light vs. heat either.
As I said I really do sympathize, but maintain that your skepticism here looks a lot like cavalier dismissal to me, which I believe is not the way - I agree the reference to affirmative action was unnecessary heat, but as I outlined above (the "more bluntly..." part) it's IMO not unfounded. I do however agree that "any expression of personal opinion by a mod is given disproportionate weight", I'll try to remember jannies are people and assign less weight to that in the future.
Thanks for the measured response, I now better understand the mod position and defer to it.
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