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I've noticed that a moderator of this Stack Exchange site continues to incorrectly reject flags. This has, unfortunately, been ongoing for many months. This is likely due to a misunderstanding of how the review process works at Stack Exchange. Please note that I have been a moderator on another Stack Exchange site for many years, so I have gathered years of experience with these tools. Just like everyone, I make mistakes too.

Kindly note, despite the moderator's erroneous comments and rejection of flags, all flags are definitely not just to bring something to a moderator's attention.

When established community members review first answers, our only choices are:

  • Looks OK: We click this when there are no issues with the answer. The answer remains visible for all to see.
  • Edit: We click this, and then perform an edit, when we can fix the answer with an edit that does not significantly change what the answer provider was trying to convey. The answer remains visible for all to see.
  • Share feedback: We click this when we want to personally interact with the person posting the answer to provide them with feedback. The answer remains visible for all to see.
  • Flag, followed by Other action: We click this combination when an answer is not an answer, or when an answer is very low quality. The answer will also be reviewed by others, and if they agree, it will be removed.

I took a long break from helping on this Stack Exchange site because I grew weary of receiving repeated erroneous messages from a moderator claiming that "flags should only be used to make moderators aware of content that requires their intervention" (that's a verbatim cut and paste of their response) and having my flags erroneously rejected. It takes a lot of my time and energy to review community questions and answers, and I grew tired of my efforts being repeatedly rejected by someone who seemingly doesn't understand some parts of the Stack Exchange system.

As a moderator myself, I certainly understand that moderating is very time consuming and is also lot of work. I also understand that the tools we are given aren't perfect.

If you haven't already, please consider reviewing questions and answers on an additional Stack Exchange site so you can better understand the review process from a community member's perspective. I'm a top reviewer on several Stack Exchange sites (including high and low traffic sites), and this is the only Stack Exchange site with this problem.

Please, please, if you're a moderator, and if you have questions about how Stack Exchange works, please ask a Stack Exchange Community Manager for help. They are here to help us all and are eager to answer questions!

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Is there something specific you're referring to? Did you flag something as spam or abusive and have that flag rejected, for example?

Not knowing which other StackExchange sites you're comparing this one to, I can't comment on differences specifically. We did decide as a community years ago, though, that this site needed to be different than, for example, StackOverflow. On SO, there seems to be a reflex for some commenters to tell new people to Read The Fine Manual. In fairness, for a lot of coding questions, there is often a manual.

For the problems that come here, though, there often isn't a solution that someone can just do a quick Google for. In fact, that's often how they end up with us. Many of the people asking questions are first time users asking sincere questions about a problem that they don't have the vocabulary to explain. Part of the challenge for people trying to help here is that we often have to lead them based on initially vague descriptions. As the back and forth proceeds, the problem and possible solutions sometimes seem to coalesce out of the fog.

However, there often isn't a "yep, X is the one single problem that you have, Y is the solution and it'll only cost you Z". We have to be content with sending someone off to a repair shop with a short list of possible issues and some of the vocabulary that they can use to discuss them with a mechanic.

In short, this site can be a lot of work, it's often not cut and dried but we're all doing our best to help the people that come here even if it doesn't always work.

Is any of the above something that you're being prevented from doing?

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  • Hi Bob. Thanks for your thoughtful reply. I agree with everything you wrote. It's just that there is a moderator (I don't know which one) who erroneously believes that all flags are solely to bring a post to a moderator's attention. They then reject the flag. This prevents reviewers from properly reviewing posts (for example, identifying answers that are actually questions or identifying answers that are so low quality that they are unlikely to help any of our community members). That moderator simply needs further training to understand how Stack Exchange flags are to be interpreted.
    – End Antisemitic Hate
    Commented Jun 13 at 4:31

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