We only remove questions that break our rules on asking questions. These forbid asking questions that ask for examples, the first or last thing, or ask about the 'most' or 'best' thing, because these do not lend themselves well to the detailed, comprehensive answers we seek. We also remove homework questions, as our users aren't here to do other people's homework for them. Questions asking about basic facts are also removed, but may be posted in the Short Answers to Single Questions thread. Some questions are asked not in the spirit of genuine enquiry, but to push personal historical or political theories. These are also removed.

As far as comments go, we wish to create a space where people can, and do, write in-depth responses to historical questions. This means removing a lot of comments that do not meet our requirements for quality. These require answers to be comprehensive, and to be based on up-to-date historical scholarship. Users must be able to cite academic primary or secondary sources on request but aren't required to cite them in an answer.

Removing answers helps in several ways. Often, on Reddit, the first comment will receive the vast majority of views and upvotes, while later ones are overlooked. This favours shorter, less-detailed comments. Who is going to spend hours researching and writing a full answer when someone can just post a two-line speculative answer or drop a link to Wikipedia and get the audience the more detailed comment deserves? We also remove answers that contain bigotry, to create a space where all people feel comfortable asking and answering questions. Finally, many of the removed comments, especially in the more popular threads, are not attempts at answering the question. Instead, they are jokes or complaints about how many comments are removed. Leaving these up would just clutter up threads, and would really take away from the experience of reading the subreddit.

If you're looking for answered questions, you have several options. /u/Gankom (and others) does sterling work gathering up the best answers for the Sunday Digest threads. You can also find quality answers on the Askhistorians Twitter and Facebook page. If you're looking for history subreddits with less moderation, you can take a look at /r/history or /r/AskHistory.

The questions have broken the rules in some way. Typically the answers do not meet the high standards of quality expected from this sub. This is what helps it stand out from other history subs.

I deleted my own comment once cause it wasn’t in-depth enough

What is up with the seemingly endless supply of people that will apparently break out in hives if they read the rules?

I mean come on. I know reading rules is boring, but if you get to the point where you’re going to make a post asking about the rules maybe you could just check the rules first.