[–]subreddit message via /r/OutOfTheLoop[M] sent 1 day ago

You have been temporarily banned from participating in r/OutOfTheLoop. This ban will last for 7 days. You can still view and subscribe to r/OutOfTheLoop, but you won't be able to post or comment.

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    If you knew that the comment got removed, why would you keep reposting it verbatim.

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[–]to /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 1 day ago

    If you knew that the comment got removed, why would you keep reposting it verbatim.

I didn't know the comment was removed; I knew the threads were getting removed as a whole, and very selectively at that. When one thread is removed within half an hour and another one is allowed to stand for six hours, of course I'm going to resubmit, until I'm told otherwise.

You've never set out any lines on what constitutes and what doesn't constitute bias, and it seems to be throwing darts at a board as to what you allow and don't. I don't think my work is biased. No one from your side has ever told me otherwise, and posts seem to bat back and forward between being removed and re-allowed, removed and re-allowed seeming at whim. The few times I've asked for clarification, I haven't got a response.

You guys need to pick a lane, and you need to let the posters know what it is.

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[–]subreddit message via /r/OutOfTheLoop[M] sent 1 day ago

    I didn't know the comment was removed

https://www.reddit.com/r/bestof/comments/cgsua0/uportarossa_gives_a_detailed_history_of_boris/eukqbcn/

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[–]to /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 1 day ago

I was informed via the automod that the thread as a whole had been removed. I don't get any sort of notification that my comments have been removed, as well you know. And if your argument is that my post was biased -- which, I maintain, it was not -- I'm curious as to how you'd like me to answer a question about why people are worried about Boris Johnson becoming Prime Minister without focusing on, you know, the things that make him unqualified. There's no claim I make in there that isn't sourced. The evidence is what it is. To pretend otherwise would be pandering.

Look, guys. I'm there a lot. You know I care about the sub, and you know I put the work in with my responses. Would it have killed one of you to have dropped me a quick one-liner message before you removed it, so I at least know if it's an automod issue? Because it's getting really difficult not to take it personally at this point.

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[–]from vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 1 day ago

I'm just a rather inactive mod in ootl these days, but that's my opinion:

It isn't personally. I really love your comments and I fully agree with them.

Well, they're really informative and the highest quality this sub can wish for, but you're drawing the conclusions for the users, which makes them pretty biased.

I know you're too informed to not come to the right conclusion, but that's not what ootl is about, it's about stating simple and dry facts without setting the tone by your own conclusion or bias.

The last comment I recall that was removed and approved 2 times, was when you stated yourself it might appear biased, but pointed out that it isn't bias because you're right. This is problematic and makes every other user point into your direction, and ask us about your special treatment, and why your comments don't get removed while theirs didn't get removed.

And they're right. Your comment are often biased.

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[–]from N8theGr8[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 1 day ago

Your answers are great, but you have a tendency to let bias slip in because of your wordplay or colorful writing or whatever you want to call it. I know the point is to try to make the comment more interesting, but this isn't a creative writing subreddit. Sometimes we approve the comments and sometimes we remove them, but if you felt that you were being targeted, you had ample opportunity to reach out to us.

We have over a million users, we simply don't have the resources to notify someone when we remove their comments.

But telling us that you didn't know the comment was removed is a blatant lie and not helping your case at all.

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[–]to vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 1 day ago

No, I've never (to my knowledge, anyway) stated my posts aren't biased because they're right; I've stated that they're not biased because they're based on evidence -- and let's be honest, you can't say that I'm not doing my research on that one.

Bias is, per the OED, 'inclination or prejudice for or against one person or group, especially in a way considered to be unfair.' Prejudice is 'preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience', or 'an unfair and unreasonable opinion or feeling, especially when formed without enough thought or knowledge'. There's a reason why I try so damn hard to source the information I find, because I think it's important for people to realise that my posts aren't coming from a position of trying deliberately to hide information just to make one side look better or worse. If it comes from the other side of the debate and it's from a reliable source, absolutely it goes in, and I frequently go out of my way to call out claims from both sides when they don't line up with the facts -- but you can't seem surprised that a Presidential administration that's been called out for lying on almost eleven thousand separate occasions in fewer than three years dominates when it comes to being fact-checked. It's not bias to say that the Trump Administration or the new Boris Administration lies more. It's literally a fact. (I am also vaguely curious as to how I was supposed to answer a question about why people were worried about Boris becoming PM without pointing out his chequered history; they're not worried because he's just too qualified, but because he's inept.) To pretend otherwise, or to take such groups at their word, is to pander to something we all know to be untrue. Now you can see that on pretty much every post on this sub, but especially mine: there will always be someone on one side or the other crying bias, but they never -- maybe three or four times in all the times I've posted on here -- come with factual corrections. When they say bias, what they mean is 'I don't like how the evidence makes my side look'. When you say it's not personal, I believe that it's not actively malicious, but I don't think I'm wrong in saying that I'm a fairly well-known poster on here. I absolutely draw more heat than most people for my posts, and I don't think it's because of content; I think it's because you've got a very vocal minority of people who are happy to cry 'Fake News!' at anything they don't like, no matter how well-sourced it is, and I've pissed a lot of them off by regularly presenting them with facts that they would prefer to ignore.

And how far does this go, anyway? If there's a post about anti-vaxxers, do I have to take both sides at their word and present them without drawing a conclusion? Global warming? Holocaust denialism? (That's not even an exaggeration; a couple of days ago I apparently had a post removed for stating that no, Nazis were not socialists.) Is it biased to say, 'No, the evidence is not equally distributed between both sides of the argument' -- because why is there even the expectation that evidence should be distributed equally? It just isn't. As Asimov put it: 'There is a cult of ignorance in the United States, and there has always been. The strain of anti-intellectualism has been a constant thread winding its way through our political and cultural life, nurtured by the false notion that democracy means that my ignorance is just as good as your knowledge.' Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away. All the cries of Bias! in the world won't change that, nor should it.

(If you don't want to take my word for it, here's Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman making the same point.)

    This is problematic and makes every other user point into your direction, and ask us about your special treatment, and why your comments don't get removed while theirs didn't get removed.

I would hope that my comments don't get removed while theirs do is because my posts are sourced and theirs are not. That's why I put so much effort into it. I don't think PolitiFact is biased when they straight-up call someone a liar, as long as the evidence is there. I work very hard to ensure it is.

    it's about stating simple and dry facts without setting the tone by your own conclusion or bias.

Nowhere in the rules (that I can find) does it specify not drawing a conclusion -- nor, to my knowledge, has it ever. Like I said earlier, that's not what bias is. If that's where you want to draw the line, that's fine. We'll part ways over it, because I think it's horribly irresponsible and the equivalent of letting the lunatics run the asylum, but at least the people posting -- me included -- will have something concrete to point to. That said, there's no basis for it other than people who are using it as a cudgel to silence facts, and it's an insane feat of mental gymnastics to pretend that the vast majority of people are truly interested in striking down bias and not striking down disagreement.

I want this to be a place where people can come to get an actual answer to their question. I want it to be a place where people can be meaningfully informed -- and I work very hard (and very long) at providing that. I take a facts-first approach, and I stand by what I write as being accurate. If contradictory facts come to light, I strive to include them, or to provide a correction; it's the responsible thing to do. It's not about promoting an agenda. It's about standing against misinformation. You cannot do that if you're bound by the fact that, in the end, no matter what the evidence says, you have to present both sides as being equivalent.

At some point, you have to ask yourself the question of whether or not you want OOTL to be a place for people to come away understanding things deeply, or shallowly. Do you want them to have a contextual, well-sourced understanding of the issue, or do you want them to have a surface-level, 'very fine people on both sides' reading of events that doesn't take into account anything beyond taking people at their absolute word, or anything that happened more than half an hour earlier? This sub is a place where people can go to get answers. It's irresponsible to give a partial answer that lets blatant misrepresentation slip through unchallenged. This sub is better than that -- or at least, it should be. That is pandering to a vocal minority who you know -- and you know you know -- aren't acting in good faith.

When you say I'm 'too informed to not come to the right conclusion', what you're saying is that I should pretend. That I should lie. That I should present one side as being better than the evidence shows it to be -- and you say it like that's a virtue.

That is actually bias, and if that's the mods' standard for what the sub should aim to be, I don't want to have any part of it.

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[–]to N8theGr8[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 1 day ago

    Your answers are great, but you have a tendency to let bias slip in because of your wordplay or colorful writing or whatever you want to call it. I know the point is to try to make the comment more interesting, but this isn't a creative writing subreddit.

All writing is creative writing and you know it; the point is to make the comment more interesting, not to try to, thank you very much -- to get people to read it and to be informed -- but again, that's not what bias means. All of my posts are sourced as well as I possibly can for that reason. If anyone wants to criticise the factual basis of what I say, they absolutely can and I'm more than happy to change it if something has been represented. I will add in anything that contributes meaningfully to the topic. No one ever does. Why would they, when they can just get anything they don't agree with taken down by crying bias without any evidence to back that up?

As for the fact that you suddenly don't like 'colourful language', the mod line has previously been up to and including me calling someone a 'shitheel', so don't give me that. Shit, less than a year ago I was asked if I'd be interested in helping to moderate the sub, which isn't really what you'd expect from someone who is -- apparently -- constantly breaking the rules. (I certainly haven't changed the tone or content or focus of my posts in the interim.) Whatever you think your explanations are, historically there's no basis for it.

I don't think it's a coincidence that it all seemed to kick off a couple of months ago, when I dared to criticise your new 'Answer:' policy and you blitzed a thread where people were pointing out how absolutely stellar your attitude was.

    We have over a million users, we simply don't have the resources to notify someone when we remove their comments.

    Sometimes we approve the comments and sometimes we remove them, but if you felt that you were being targeted, you had ample opportunity to reach out to us.

With all due respect, that's horseshit. So you can't tell me they've been removed, but I'm still supposed to reach out to you despite not knowing until someone else tells me? Quite besides which, I have reached out to you on a number of occasions to ask what's going on. I'm usually informed that it's because of an automod issue, and the post is put back up again almost immediately. Recently I've been giving you the benefit of the doubt that that's all it is, because they usually come back up -- not that that seems to make much difference. I've even asked you specifically not to repost my things in your Megathreads and got no response from you guys; you're not great at responding in any meaningful way, so I largely don't bother. I always thought I had a fairly personable relationship with the mods on here, and I've defended you on the sub in the past when people have criticised your decisions, but this is straight-up bullshit.

As for your notion that you don't have the resources to notify something when you remove their comments, it is absolutely ridiculous to a) have such a poorly-defined rule, b) apply said rule haphazardly, and c) remove posts that represent hours of work seemingly on the whim of whichever mod sees it, and d) doing so without giving a chance to edit it to fit these loose, 'I'll know it when I see it' guidelines. I get it -- a lot of shit comes through -- but you're treating four hours' of researched writing with the same brush as you'd use for someone who writes 'ANSWER: TRUMP SUCKS DONKEY DICK LOL!11!1!!!' You and /u/vxx have both said that my answers are great, and I've heard similar from others in the mod team, but do you really expect me to believe that no one in the team can justify spending thirty seconds to drop me a message saying 'Hey, like what you're doing here, but you need to pull back a little bit?' Even as a favour, one user to another, it would certainly be appreciated -- let alone between people who obviously put a lot of work into the sub, on both sides of the mod line.

    But telling us that you didn't know the comment was removed is a blatant lie and not helping your case at all.

Oh good, we're three for three. My posts get removed and put back up and removed and put back up and removed and put back up constantly, pretty much regardless of content. (That's no exaggeration; a couple of days ago I apparently had a post removed for stating that no, Nazis were not socialists. Any time I post something that even slightly touches on the fact that the right wing are misrepresenting facts, a flurry of angry little termites come out of the woodwork to shriek Bias! Bias!, never backing up their accusations with facts or sources or providing any correction to my work.) Every time I've been in contact with the mods (usually because a member of the mod team has got in touch with me privately, rather than through the modmail), I've never had an explanation as to why it's been removed; when I've been given an explanation that relates to it being something more than automod, I've made changes and it's been reapproved. I've said that I didn't know my post was removed for legitimate reasons, rather than automod brigading, and I stand by that; calling me a liar is nonsense, and don't think I'm not going to argue against that bullshit just because your username is in green.

The question is, do you value my contribution to the sub? Do you value the time and effort I put into making these posts, promoting the sub elsewhere, trying to educate people on often-obscure points after they ask the question? Because I'll happily spend four or six hours writing up a post to keep people informed on what I (and, based on the upvotes, they) consider to be important topics -- but I'm not going to waste my time if it's just going to be removed by the mods on a whim, without any explanation or opportunity to abide by the already extremely poorly-defined rules.

That's just ridiculous -- and frankly, it's disrespectful to the efforts of users who are trying to make the sub a place of value.

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[–]from vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 23 hours ago

I have noticed that you replied, but please give me a couple of days to read, understand and reply.

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[–]to vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 23 hours ago

Cool cool.

I mean, I'm pissed off -- not about the ban; to be quite honest, I've got other stuff I need to be doing, so it'll probably be good for my productivity :p -- but I'm not happy about being called a liar, and I'm tired of having my work called out as biased based on a definition that seems to be 'We know it when we see it'. It really sucks to have so much effort wasted based on what seems like you guys capitulating to people who are only trying to shut down what they disagree with.

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[–]from vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 23 hours ago

All I got right now is, that you linked a post that was neither from you nor removed

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[–]to vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 23 hours ago

Which one?

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[–]from vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 23 hours ago

No, we aren't capitulating. We just watch out that your side doesn't get discredited by speaking in an echo chamber.

We can't approve your comments when we remove hundreds of comments in the same thread for bias from the other side.

Stay to the facts, keep your opinion out. That should be enough to convince everyone that isn't lost for good. If that isn't enough for you, you need to find a different subreddit.

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[–]from vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 23 hours ago

Your last link. It's neither a post of you, nor was it removed. I found a comment of you that wasn't removed either.

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[–]to vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 21 hours ago

If it's the Nazi post, it was removed for at least twelve hours.

    We can't approve your comments when we remove hundreds of comments in the same thread for bias from the other side.

Look, let's be real: the comments I put out are not the same as the vast majority of comments you're deleting, especially from the other side. Anyone can go on Removeddit and see the comments that you delete (especially those trying to 'correct the record', mostly from the right), and they're just not equivalent. They're not based on facts. They're not based on evidence. They don't provide any documentation for what they're saying. The difference is that they've realised they can just complain and get the factual posts taken down. The fact that you're doing so from people acting in bad faith is the very definition of capitulation, but it's nothing new: people have been pulling this shit for fifty years -- and yes, it happens far more often on the right than it does on the left. That's not bias either.

Take this, for example:

    Answer: REEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEtards from subs like r/AgainstHateSubreddits make sock accounts and post stuff in the subs they get triggered by to get the subs banned. They do it because they can't stand people saying things they don't agree with, because they're pathetic little dopes.

    Instead of just ignoring the subs they don't like, like an adult, they need to be the fascists they pretend to hate, and stop other people speaking freely. Then some SJW shitrag "journalists" write hit-piece articles, and because reddit is a regressive-left hugbox, the subs get banned.

    Meanwhile, leftist subs like r/Chapotraphouse talk about killing police, or executing rich people, and nothing happens to them.

(Consider also, by the way, that that post is still up, and yet someone removed child comments from it saying 'Fuck off, crybaby'. It certainly seems that someone was watching that thread.)

Now I get it -- mistakes happen; things are overlooked; obviously that would have been removed if one of you had seen it -- but I find it pretty damn offensive that my stuff is getting lumped in with that. This is not a 'both sides are equal' situation -- or at least, I hope it isn't. That you would expect me to put the same 'Bias:' tag on my posts as they would on that is nonsensical. That you'll give in to complaints from people who never respond even to exactly how my posts are biased, just that they know they are, is even worse.

    We just watch out that your side doesn't get discredited by speaking in an echo chamber.

Come on... don't pretend that you're doing this to protect 'my side'. I don't have a side, as far as my posts are concerned; I take offence at the idea that you seem to think I wouldn't apply the same standard to any scandal from the 'other side'. I'll say it again: I reject entirely the idea that my work is biased. I don't build my pieces based around getting one over on one side or the other, and I won't have the effort I put into my posts disparaged by the idea that they're about scoring points. I go into each post with the goal of helping people understand what's going on: nothing more or less. I don't tell people how to think, but I sure as shit don't pretend that both sides are equal when the facts say otherwise.

It's about providing context. Facts do not exist in a vacuum, and to pretend they do -- to present unequal evidence as though it is equal, without comment -- is straight-up misinformation. You're advocating for bothsidesism, which by definition means giving some facts more weight than they're due. That is bias, so please don't claim it's about 'making sure one side doesn't get discredited'.

You won't even give people a straight answer when or why things are removed, and based how often my posts are taken down and put up and taken down and put up, I'm not even sure you guys know what the hell your definition of bias is. It's ridiculous, and it has been for months now -- funnily enough, around the same time as your 'Answer:' policy was brought in. I don't know what happened there, but things have taken a marked turn for the worse in terms of dealing with (several of) the mods. I've had my work removed without any notice or opportunity to change it, I've been called a liar, I've been banned for breaking no rule in particular -- for posting an answer I stand by, still -- and you've basically said that despite the hours I've put into this place, I'm not longer welcome here.

I hope the sub improves again, I really do. It used to be a place where facts and research were valued, but you guys have lost your way, and it's a damn shame.

Be better.

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[–]from vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 21 hours ago

Do you want to insult me because you can't keep your opinion out of your otherwise perfect and informational comments?

That's a new low to compare me to a holocaust denier.

Sincerely, fuck off.

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[–]from vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 21 hours ago

Someone else has to sort it out.

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[–]to vxx[M] via /r/OutOfTheLoop sent 21 hours ago

If you think that, at any point, I compared you -- or anyone -- to a Holocaust denier, I don't know what to tell you except read it again. Maybe better this time.

I hope you have just a swell day. I'm done with dealing with this noise. Enjoy whatever the hell it is you guys do.

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