I think it’s a weird way to look at moderation as if it was democratic. Voting bad mods out is one thing, but I don’t think you can just vote new good mods in. Moderation is a lot of unpaid work. Even if a large part of a community is unhappy with a mod decision, removing the mods doesn’t mean there will be people with that much time on their hands to step up, and even if there are, it’s not easy to choose the good ones among them by a simple popular vote…
Some of the subs I was on had some elaborate setups with mod tools and bots and the mods were still quite busy. Replacing them with randoms who then also don’t have access to the tools would be entirely pointless.
On the other hand, it’s a terrible system to have mods as unassailable tyrants.
As an example, I was banned from a popular sub for corrective someone about a minor detail of a shooting. I correctly cited the appropriate state law in question, and I was banned for being a right-wing extremist. I am a leftist, and linked numerous comments I had made in the past that reflected as such. The mods made a vague excuse about how my comment would just cause unnecessary confusion and muted me. People like that should not be allowed authority over anything, let alone a forum for public discourse.
I think it’s a weird way to look at moderation as if it was democratic. Voting bad mods out is one thing, but I don’t think you can just vote new good mods in. Moderation is a lot of unpaid work. Even if a large part of a community is unhappy with a mod decision, removing the mods doesn’t mean there will be people with that much time on their hands to step up, and even if there are, it’s not easy to choose the good ones among them by a simple popular vote…
Some of the subs I was on had some elaborate setups with mod tools and bots and the mods were still quite busy. Replacing them with randoms who then also don’t have access to the tools would be entirely pointless.
On the other hand, it’s a terrible system to have mods as unassailable tyrants.
As an example, I was banned from a popular sub for corrective someone about a minor detail of a shooting. I correctly cited the appropriate state law in question, and I was banned for being a right-wing extremist. I am a leftist, and linked numerous comments I had made in the past that reflected as such. The mods made a vague excuse about how my comment would just cause unnecessary confusion and muted me. People like that should not be allowed authority over anything, let alone a forum for public discourse.