It kind of gets arbitrary. You feel like a person is being noisy on your sub, so in a few clicks you promptly ban them.
Quietly shadow-banning people instead of taking public action is, imo, really disgraceful.
You take away the person's voice to interact with members of the community, because you feel like.
The best way to go would be I feel public actions. A list(posted weekly or monthly, I suppose) which records
| Banned User | Post for which they were banned. | Site Policy under which they were banned. | Moderator who took the action. |
|---|---|---|---|
And it would be better if the banned person is not able write posts at all, instead of their posts getting posted, but these existing for them only(and they not even getting to know that they have been banned).This last part can be really irritating to people when discovered.
EDIT:
Some evidence
| Post | As seen from my account | As seen from a neutral account |
|---|---|---|
| A | 3 | 4 |
| B | 5 | 6 |
| C | 7 | 8 |
| D | 9 | 10 |
All screenshots taken between 6 to 6:30 AM IST.
EDIT 2:
I learnt yesterday that a thing like shadowban exists. I learnt from u/Georgy_K_Zhukov today that it is carried out by the site admins and not sub moderators.
r/AskHistorians is the only sub I check back for post replies or comment replies. It led me to think that I was banned here by the moderators.
I checked my other posts, and they don't appear either. I should have done my research. Found r/ShadowBan today.
P.S.: To u/BikeDoctor137 , I think you won't call people cowardly with the same ease if you were interacting with them in person.
Ah yes, that noted advocate of transparency /u/throwaway95432160. You could start this crusade, perhaps, by letting us know which banned account you are, perhaps?
Anyways, I'll boil this down to the basics. This subreddit is a dictatorship. We, the moderators, work very hard to create a space which we welcome people to come and enjoy. It is, however, a privilege, not a right, and we reserve the right to revoke it at any time if deemed necessary.
All the rules of the subreddit are available to be read. There is the abbreviated version on the sidebar, and the longer version on the Wiki page. We operate on the assumption that anyone posting here, like a responsible user, familiarizes themselves with those rules, and as such, there is no guarantee that you will be notified of a removal.
Far from operating entirely quietly though, we do issue public warnings when deemed appropriate, and when we "take away the person's voice to interact with members of the community" by banning them, it is not done "because we feel like it", but because they have explicitly violated the rules, and in most cases, done so repeatedly and after explicit warnings.
All banned users receive a notification of their ban, and have the right to appeal, although our bans are, for the most part, permanent, with successful appeals being limited to cases where a moderator made a mistake, or there was an honest-to-god misunderstanding, as opposed to "but I don't do it again!".
I'm not an historian or a moderator.
I'm a regular reader of this sub, and I consider the heavy moderator hand its biggest advantage. I can always rely on learning something from the replies, and rarely have to worry about them being sub-par. The rules are crystal clear. I don't think it's much feeling involved, but that's just a guess.
To be honest, it sounds like your normal account has banned here?
Seems like you get banned a lot. Have you considered the possibility of modifying your behaviour to avoid this? Here's a suggestion. Try following the rules instead.