Based on feedback from this post, we’re going to trial pushing for more politically controversial posts to go in !politics instead of !newzealand.

We’re interested in seeing where users think the line is. Which of these recent posts do you think belong in !politics?

  1. Frustration mounting as high school teacher strikes roll on - 1News
  2. All Whites game abandoned after alleged racial abuse - RNZ
  3. ‘Random’ group of Kiwis caught protesters who lit Parliament fires - 1News
  4. Teacher struck off after refusing to use student’s pronouns - 1News
  5. New additional ETS scheme floated in review of carbon market - RNZ
  6. Migrant workers being exploited, Queenstown Citizens Advice Bureau says - RNZ
  7. Operation Pakari: More arrests of people linked to Mongrel Mob, 85 charges laid - RNZ
  8. Auckland surgeons must now consider ethnicity in prioritising patients for operations - NZ Herald
  9. This RNZ story is probably more complicated than first thought - Stuff
  10. Teacher struck off after refusing to use student’s pronouns - 1News

We’re not able to move posts to another community at the moment, but we’re thinking of locking posts that should be in !politics and asking the OP to cross-post them there. Do you think this is the best approach?

  • pluckytree@lemmy.nzEnglish
    3·
    1 year ago

    One simple thing would be to disallow cross-posting. If !politics finds it interesting, people can go there to read it.

    If something that seems apolitical turns into a political discussion, then perhaps it could be moved there? It’s important not to underestimate people’s desire not to read about politics, so erring on being too restrictive is fine in my mind. If it annoys people, tell them to post to !politics. I suspect a good number of people will just be subscribed to both.

    Finally, I think you can find some fine lines by reviewing the articles that are posted. Anything about party politics or elections or politicians/parties criticising each other is politics. Luxon and Chippy commenting on flooding is different than them throwing even mild barbs at each other.

    By reading only the headlines you posted it’s hard to judge. A moderator is going to need to review them.

    I do have lots of thoughts on moderation as well as a lot of outdated experience. I’d be happy to share but when I’ve shared to em on /r/nz, people are generally pretty shitty to me about it. I think a lot of people like being able to shout at others and personally attack them so any threat to that is viewed poorly.

    • Dave@lemmy.nzMEnglish
      2·
      1 year ago

      One simple thing would be to disallow cross-posting. If !politics finds it interesting, people can go there to read it.

      I’d rather not have rules like this until it becomes a problem. As it stands, there haven’t been any crossposts between different communities on lemmy.nz, only from remote communities.

      If something that seems apolitical turns into a political discussion, then perhaps it could be moved there?

      We simply don’t have this ability. Because of how federation works, we might not ever get the ability to move posts along with comments.

      Finally, I think you can find some fine lines by reviewing the articles that are posted. Anything about party politics or elections or politicians/parties criticising each other is politics. Luxon and Chippy commenting on flooding is different than them throwing even mild barbs at each other.

      Yes, I think it’s clear that posts about parties and the election go in !politics, but we sensed some desire to push more away from !newzealand into politics.

      By reading only the headlines you posted it’s hard to judge. A moderator is going to need to review them.

      Those headlines were chosen because of this. We wanted to know what the community thought in terms of posts that are not clearly for !politics.

      I do have lots of thoughts on moderation as well as a lot of outdated experience. I’d be happy to share but when I’ve shared to em on /r/nz, people are generally pretty shitty to me about it. I think a lot of people like being able to shout at others and personally attack them so any threat to that is viewed poorly.

      Come join the matrix chat, we talk about all sorts of stuff but it’s not uncommon to have chats about what kinds of things we think should be allowed or what people’s opinions are on things. If you don’t have a Matrix account you can sign up on http://mtrx.nz (there are other instances too, Matrix is decentralised a bit like Lemmy so you can sign up to any instance and still join the chat).

      • RaoulDuke@lemmy.nzOPMEnglish
        2·
        1 year ago

        I agree with all of this. Just to add a couple of things:

        Because of some people’s feelings having about politics in !newzealand, I wouldn’t be keen to see posts that are clearly about politics cross-posted from !politics into !newzealand. Those who want to see politics can join the community. But I really don’t want to disable cross-posting unless it becomes a clear problem. Sometimes it will make sense to cross-post, and I only want to introduce rules where we really need them. Cross-posting is also useful to help people other find communities they’re interested in, especially across different instances.

        The other thing I want to say is that there are very few of us moderators here, and if they’re anything like me, they’re already spending more time on it than they should. I’m really hoping we don’t need to be reviewing the contents of links and that people will generally post things where they belong. We’re going to be adding more guidance about that soon. I’m happy to trust the community at the moment. People seem pretty onto it here.