I guess what I'd really like to know is what people besides men think when they see jokes like these on a site like MO.
From what I've gathered, most men think either "that's funny, there's nothing wrong with it" or "that's not very funny, but there's nothing wrong with it."
@TannerSwett it is a deep cultural problem, that gets amplified as soon as it materializes on a website that doesn't have as primary goal being a collection of bad jokes.
Yeah, but now there's a meta post on MO with lots of upvotes saying that MO is "catering to professional appearance a bit much" with lots of people arguing that the sexually suggestive jokes should be brought back.
:/ That is kinda hard... It probably helps to remember that communities start small, and there will always be a bit of 'us knows us' that makes humour easier than when the community has started growing. You can see it in some of the answers/comments from the earliest posts on MSE too, there was a lot of joking around. Most comments would be deleted were they posted today, and probably some answers too...
People will miss what they were used to, so they'll try to get it back. Is there any sign the mods might cave into it?
Then I don't think there's much to worry about. Votes don't always lead to actions, especially not if they're advocating a 'wrong' thing. If votes really influenced actions, we'd probably not have had the HNQ improvements either ;)
Still, there's a post with a score of 29 saying that the deletion of the sexually suggestive jokes was wrong, and based on vague and merely theoretical concerns.
@TannerSwett Yeah well... some posts are like that. Can't be helped. Just downvote it yourself and move on. Contact SE if mods really do decide to undelete the jokes based on that meta post.
The CMs have been doing analysis for a long time regarding which questions that should be automatically deleted. The hang-up is always that notion that stuff might be ok... But that's counter-productive. Without evidence of utility, we must assume that even a small cost is eventually damning, if for no other reason than that it accumulates. Removal should be the default, forestalled only when there exists some evidence of usefulness for a relevant purpose.
@Shog9 How would you handle complaints from MO users who complain that they're losing parts of the autonomy they were granted when they became part of the SE 2.0 network?
A joke thread is by definition primarily useful for an irrelevant purpose. Perhaps there is a temporary benefit in terms of community building, but this evaporates quickly; at the point where a significant number of people are concerned that it detracts from that already tangential goal... You need a compelling argument to save the thread.
@SonictheAnonymousHedgehog so far as I'm aware this is entirely an internal matter.
(To be clear here, I do agree that the post should be deleted; I just don't want to trigger a crisis. Likewise, after having looked at the evidence in Wikipedia's Fram case, I agree he should be banned, but you're probably aware of the crisis triggered there.)
I wasn't even aware that MO had a joke thread until folks on MO started discussing its problems.
I'd rather trust the MO community to moderate their own content here than worry that they might somehow trigger some crisis by doing so. They stand to lose more than I do either way.
Also, I've never known the MO mods to be shy about deleting stuff.
I tried World of Warcraft once. I remember thinking: "If I play this, I'll probably get addicted. But I'm unemployed right now, so if I'm ever going to get addicted, now's the best time."
With games like that, I always get kinda semi-addicted (I want to play it a lot) and complete all the tasks/quests and get all the things you can collect... until I have like 10 things left to do, then I'm out :P
eh, i never really look at it that way, as far as getting "addicted" to it. it's more of a, i have n hours a day where i need something to do, what can i find to fill that timeslot that's enjoyable
and not crazy expensive
i play a bit of wow, minecraft, poe, ksp, and a bunch of other stuff, varies month by month, sometimes even week by week. i just want to avoid watching TV mostly
classic wow will likely keep my interest for a month or more, it's a whole lot of a content that can't be quickly consumed
Well they do have an ongoing election, with only one candidate so far, CS 3/40 (with 0/8 in moderation category)
@TannerSwett Why I’m not on MathOverflow has become a kind of standard reference for the subject, although 6.5 years later it's definitely not the same site.
What's it like being a moderator on Graphic Design Stack Exchange? Whats the day to day around here, what are the perks, the drawbacks, etc?
