I just had so much trouble writing a post which used a word which contains the word ‘trans’ (the word was transmit btw). The bot would just flat out refuse to let me post, and not even the usual avenue of posting then getting automodded, then appealing would work. Implementing a bot like this is surely overzealous and not the intended outcome. I suggest that the implementation of the ban-bot be based on the word ‘trans’ or ‘transsexual’ or some limited dictionary of words deemed undesirable rather than a blank character matching of the string ‘trans’.

This is not about the trans topic ban itself. I understand the reasoning listed in the comments, I was getting bored of the same arguments ad infinitum myself. This is more about its interpretation and execution.

I made a top level response recently:

https://www.reddit.com/r/changemyview/comments/1c7xa15/cmv_consciousness_is_a_spectrum/l0avjwq/

Which initially incidentally mentioned gender (man > woman) and sexual orientation (the kinsey scale) in the context of being constructs which can be visualized partially as binary spectra. In no way did I intend for that to be a reference to or a jumping off point for a discussion of transness.

Nevertheless this comment was banned for being a reference to trans issues.

I'm sure a mod could look at what it initially wrote but I guarantee the closest thing to a reference to transness was a disclaimer that the gender and sexual orientation spectra I provided wasn't entirely inclusive - which isn't referencing trans people anyways because it's not even a gender and more of a meta-quality to gender identity but that's beside the point. The comment was only reinstated after I removed all references to gender period.

So what is the actual rule D/5? Is discussion of gender entirely banned now because a reference to gender can implicitly be interpreted as a reference to trans issues?

More importantly, assuming gender is at least in theory allowed, how can one discuss gender without implicitly invoking rule D/5? Can such guidance be added to the rule page?

Maybe it's just me but the way reddit lays out threads it's already hard enough to figure out who's responding to what. When people get downvoted and their comment collapses it just makes that even more complicated. Idk if theres a way to fix this but people seem to love to downvote anyone with a different view than them and it causes issues.

An Ad-Hominem argument its defined as an argument aimed to refute another by pointing out traits in the emissor's personal characteristics, rather than in his discourse. This can be any claim about the argument's emissor that speaks about its ethnics, family, education, social status, wealth, moral, ethics, etc. CMV is a sub for people who want to genuinely change their views, and the objective of the top level comments sould be in accordance with this objective. The thing is that Ad-Hominem arguments rarely serve as a CMV: all those arguments achieve is to offend the emissor, and rarely bring something useful to the actual discussion that is taking place. Additionally, these arguments tend to be highly controversial in an emotional sense, which raises heated discussions between the participants.

Noneless, I have to clarify some things in my post:

1-I'm not saying that these arguments can't be used, or that a particular personal trait in OP couldn't be influencing its view. If that's the case, this should be properly pointed out: but this should not be the whole argument of the top-level comment. 2-Arguments that contain personal judgements are not automatically fallacious: this is another fallacy, known as the Ad-Logicam. To be fallacious they need to imply that the personal judgement made is a valid counter-argument against the argumet emissor.

I've noticed for some time now there are posts where the OP responds plenty to questions and comments, but ends up avoiding certain points or questions. I understand this is already a rule B violation. What I want to highlight is that it's hard to bring something like this to moderators attention and I don't mean just reporting it.

This isn't like lack of comments rules violation. It's a numbers game or a binary for rule E. Like an OP never responding is an easy take down, just wait three hours and look for OP responses. Or for sufficient number of responses, compare number of comments made in the first three hours. For an OP "dodging" violation though, it takes reading multiple comments and responses and paying attention to their content. It also takes time and analysis to consider multiple comments/responses and come to a conclusion that OP isn't addressing a point commonly brought up and is actively avoiding it.

My first thought would be to add another option for reports, but that doesn't take away the work load of reducing the analysis needed to confirm the report.

I don't think I have an answer to this issue but I wanted to bring some attention to it.

There is a lot of CMV that is basically asking for personal advice or ranting because of personal circumstances on dating. There are currently three on /r/changemyview/new at the moment and it's tiring that many of the responses are quite similar to /r/relationship_advice or similar subs. It doesn't seem to fit the nature of CMV.

I think that's too high of a bar. Posts on CMV should be required to demonstrate an open mind, but there are scenarios in which debate around a topic can and should happen, but still not necessarily cause a change in one's views.

I'm noticing an increasing trend where many post are meet with a few styles of arguemnet

The first is just people making obvious bad faith comments or insults.

The second is not challenging the view but challenging the view doesn't go far enough. For example, I can have the view, elementary school should be free and someone will 'challenge' the view by saying "All school should be free". I think the reason behind this is because lately there have been a bunch of soapbox post about Trump and abortion and whoever indirectly agrees with the Op while disagreeing gets the award

Third is the 'trust me bro' people who will allude to stats, studies and facts but then when asked to provide them make some excuse as to why they can't/won't or just ghost.

The fourth is people who just make the same argument that 3 other people have made without reading and I know I don't want to have the same conversation over and over.

I think it's unfair because if I just give a random delta and can't explain why it's delta abuse. But if i don't give a delta to bad arguments it's soapboxing. The poster ends up getting penalized for this when it's the low quality of comments that are the actual issue.

If I want to change my views, why should I post them here? Based on experience, whenever I want to genuinely learn about something, a lot of research goes into it, and then if there are "sides" to it, I would have to end up asking questions from those sides to get their perspective on things. In short, unless I am willing to have a looser "grasp" on my views, I likely wouldn't change them, and even the research done would have simply contributed further to more confirmation biases.

But if I were to post them here, it almost feels like I "don't want" to change my view/mind, and the whole thing appears more like a "looking for a fight" instead. This is because every time I wanted to post something here (but not done), it always had to do with a rather strong belief I have about something, the usual, psychological backfire effect plays its role perfectly, instead of being willing to change views, the psychological backfire effect ensures that I "defend my identity" even more.

Then the only correct question remains: "Do you ACTUALLY want to change your views, or not"? I admit, I don't actually even know the answer with 100% confidence to that question.

To summarise, if this specific thread can do nothing to literally remove the psychological backfire effect, why would it be effective to even ask people to challenge your views here? I am beginning to think that those who give out the deltas to signify they have changed their minds a little are just doing "something polite", they're just being courteous that you have participated.

This post prompted the thought. One comment in particular shares my thought on the idea

You’re doing a lot of predicting the future, in an unprecedented time, and I think it’s pretty obvious that no one can know with any certainty exactly what is gonna happen when.

Since "no one can know with any certainty exactly what is going to happen when" it seems pointless to debate. When a view is stated as a certainty about future hypotheticals, changing that view seems opposed to the purpose and function of this sub.

Obviously there are over 180 comments on that post (at this time) and the OP did award 1 delta, but the idea of changing a view on a hypothetical future possibility seems prima facia pointless.

every day there is some half assed post just about israel, ukraine and election or some low effort ragebait about some group and the comments are the same arguments repeated in perpetuity

there are some topics where pretty much every person has their minds made up and OP barely ever changes their mind on any of these topics.

On Android mobile app I don't see the complete right panel and the wiki does not explain how to award Delta.

Rule 4Award a delta when acknowledging a change in your view, and not for any other reason

...no explanation how to actually do that

It is important that you award deltas

...still no explanation how to actually do that

When awarding a delta

...still no explanation how to actually do that

When to award deltas

...still no explanation how to actually do that

Any user, whether they're the OP or not, should award a delta if their view is changed

...still no explanation how to actually do that

Example of awarding a delta:

OMG an image of some text in a comment field? Pretty please explain in your wiki how to award delta.

Has this ever been given any thought? In the same way deltas can be awarded, maybe commenters could also leave some sort of award to OPs who put up a well-written post. A certain number of those and the user gets a flair maybe?

We know a well-written CMV when we see it. And we know that commenters work hard for Deltas. Why not introduce another flair/metric/tally that acknowledges the other side of the conversational handshake that this sub is seeking to cultivate?

https://subredditstats.com/r/changemyview

This forum has seen significant decline in recent years, being at a 5 year low. The main thing I am seeing is overmoderation

Just like how long mods wait for OP not replying, mods should wait for at least 3 hours before judging if a post warrants a removal under unwillingness to change one's mind.

We got one obvious Troll who has been trolling for the last hour, and yet another run-of-the-mill ‘I’m a lonely incel boy post’.

They always go the exact same way. Idk if I’m just missing the ones where a Manosphere guy comes in good faith and changes his mind about something, but I feel like they all go the same way every time.

https://imgur.com/gallery/HCtKelt

Perhaps this is just implied as it likely violates Reddit's rules, but as I understand our rules currently, there is no rule against calling for say, all women to experience SA or Blacks to be enslaved or anything of that sort. Am I misunderstanding the rules, is that an omission on grounds that Reddit bans it, or is that really a kind of view we think it is useful to discuss here.

Delta and thread for context .

I don't see them frequently but often enough that they bother me. I hate seeing "I disagree, but delta" kind of comments. I accept that the explanation could not be apart of the delta comment, and it's not abuse because it's not a delta given for a clear non-idea related responses, but doesn't this lack explanation?

I fear that comments like this are being used as way for folks to soapbox and hide from mod scrutiny because there's a delta. Doesn't even have to be for soapboxing, it could be just to avoid moderation in general.

Pretty much the title. I didn't even know it was added (Have not been on reddit in a couple years and was previously a lurker but read them) until I saw this post. I tabbed it up and later attempted to post a clarifying question when I found it was locked w/ a post why.

The rules list these reasons for it's specific lock and removal:

Transgender topics haven't worked for a number of reasons. We find they cause the most amount of rule-breaking, particularly with OP's not coming with an open-mind. It is the number 1 cause of burnout for our users. It is also becoming increasingly difficult to host these conversations on a platform where the admins are not allowing discussion on it. This is the one topic we have had to make an exception for and outright ban.

I find a ton of rule breaking in Incel related posts. Especially with OP not coming with an open mind. These posts are nearly daily, and from what I found the other day, are also used to poach people to try to recruit them. There are hate groups using this sub to recruit and I find this bonkers that's occurring.

I know, there's likely a few people who genuinely have their view changed. But I would argue there are subs dedicated towards helping people out of that incel mindeset (like /r/IncelExit for example).

I would love to hear what others think of this.

EDIT: I would say this post is related too.

Why isn’t the no soapboxing rule enforced?

Edit: If my replies come slow it's because I'm working right now, but I'll attempt to engage with everyone as I can. Thank you for helping me, those who have commented so far.

Edit 2: Done here for today. I appreciate all the responses! I do think I mis-titled this, though. If I posted this again, I would be more specific to the types of comments like "Does anyone actually think X,Y,Z?" I can understand that clarifying questions are extremely important, and that some views have been tested by the subreddit enough not to warrant full breakdowns.

Original post:

I am so tired of top-level comments that don't try to change OP's view but still remain up. Comments like "Who's actually saying/doing/thinking [insert proposition from OP]?"

Listen, I know that some CMVs beg that question. I'm not arguing that the point is invalid. What I'm arguing is that entire comments can be framed around this meta-discussion about whether OP should have arrived at this view to begin with.

Bottom line, if all you have to say is the above, report the damn post. You shouldn't be allowed to comment with a technical dissertation. If the goal is to change a view, we should logically attack that view of its own merits.

I'm not saying there's no merit in asking how somebody gets to a view to begin with. But it should be a small part of an expansive rebuttal.

I saw a comment yesterday that essentially denied the reality under which OP came to a view, and then almost all the child comments thoroughly rebuking the top commenter's nitpicking. They gave the top commenter numerous examples of people saying the thing that OP was referring to. The top commenter's edits were all framed around minimizing the real-world examples being provided.

And at that point, we're having a completely different discussion and we've lost sight of the ball. The top commenter never engaged with the view, and their comment was never deleted.

I'm just getting tired of it. I go to CMV to be surprised by eloquent and articulate rebuttals to ideas that I both agree and disagree with. I don't come for nitpicking the source of the view. I want to read ideas, not "Well technically, I don't personally see where you're coming from."

Because then, when we allow this, many of the top comments get away with it. Then people complain that OP isn't willing to change their view (which I think is generally a mob mentality moment and there's room for another post on that account). As though OP needs to gratify views that don't resonate with them just to keep mods happy.

This was originally a CMV, but I was told to post here--a subreddit with less than 1k people.

I want to read posts that were removed from r/changemyview, so a separate subreddit for removed posts would be useful.

So this guy came up today, and the other week there was someone who had a post that was literally just ‘I don’t like black people’.

The racist one was removed eventually, but only because the OP was so belligerent in the thread. Mr. 6’2” and a Six Pack has a 200 comment thread doing some sort of MLM marketing and no hint of an actual CMV.

Maybe I’m the only one annoyed by this sort of rage bait? Curious to hear others thoughts.

Title explains it all. Why isn’t free discourse allowed (obviously not tolerating hate speech/recommending violence & being respectful etc.)

But why is this topic SPECIFICALLY banned on CMV? Isn’t this meant to be a medium for open & honest dialogue, not an artificial echo chamber of one side because the other side has been banned into silence?

I'm not saying that it's not expected; the recent turmoil between Israel and Palestine has brought a pretty heavy influx of people wanting to post about the topic or stuff adjacent. The subreddit is getting a lot of posts that don't meet the requirements of the sub, but skirt it just long enough that it takes a few hours for it to become apparent and get removed.

I describe them as 'janky' in my title because they tend to have too many issues describe succinctly in a title.

Poor grammar, composition, a collage of ideas that don't always fit together, lack of explanations, and a very short body in general. OPs in those don't tend to reply to any comments and when they do reply, it's often a blend of incoherent, illogical, and/or vitriolic.

There's also a tendency for the tone, vocabulary, and statements made to border on being hateful or offensive, but that's a little too subjective and not the meat of my complaint.

As an example. There are more out there like this in the past week or so, but it is not easy to search and collect removed posts.

I'm used to low quality when sorting by 'new', there's no guarantee of quality. But does anyone else feel like because of recent events that people are using the subreddit as a rant outlet?

I understand soap boxing is against the rules already. I also see that the mods are doing the hard work of shutting posts down once there's a clear rules violation. Most times its lack of participation. But I'm see stuff like this daily. Is there anything to be done about this? I mean piratically. Because reporting and moving on doesn't feel like it's having an effect as a user.

I hate to put more work on the mods and I'm not interested in fixes that just aren't feasible for the subreddit given current resources. Can mods temporary ban the subject or something? Very broad action I know, but it feels like with tensions running high right now that the severity and volume of posts on the subject are just going to increase.

I welcome a more effective or constructive way to address this issue. I'm just putting it out there that to me this seems like a very noticeable increase in these kind of posts and it is hurting the subreddit.

We all know the sort of post. Sometimes it’s legit Blackpilled misogyny, along the lines of “women are dumb and make the wrong choices in dating so woe is me”, or it’s more whiney “I’m ugly and being ugly is hard because women won’t date me so woe is me”.

Or some variation on that general theme.

The threads always end up being relationship advice, where well-intentioned posters try to convince a mopey boy that it isn’t so bad.

It’s exhausting, I’m so over the genre. I don’t have a specific solution necessarily, I suppose I’m just wondering if anyone else has noticed an increase in these.

Many posts on this sub contain an opinion opposing a supposed view by a portion of some population (citizens of a country, people who vote for a certain political party, humans in general, fandom groups, Reddit users, etc). Unless the poster can show that the view they are opposing is held by a non-insignificant portion of the population set the post should be deleted the mods.

Examples - "People from America don't care about their kids safety compared to Europe" or "French people should stop being rude to tourists"

What's the problem with these posts?

1. It can be a manipulation technique - For example, instead of a post on another form saying "Are Democrats running over babies?" in which people argue if that's true or not a post of sub would be "Democrats should stop placing babies in the middle of the road and running over them".

It allows the poster to start a discussion with the assumption that the view they oppose is true and it manipulates others who may see a post like the one above and believe the view it's countering occurs.

2. The poster may have an opinion based on false facts - Similar to above except without malicious intent. Posts like this waste time and could spread false information because, as above, the user "is just asking questions"

By allowing these posts the user's own view is reinforced

Ok but at least a few people or even one person might hold the view, what about that?

If one or two people in the state of New York think that gorillas should run daycare centers arguing against that by posting "People in NY shouldn't let gorillas run daycare centers" is misleading. Using the term "people" when it's 1 or 2 out of millions is manipulative.

What should be required?

I think that as long as the post provides some basic evidence that the view is held by a portion of the population that would be sufficient. The language the post uses is important. This is just a subjective example of how I think of a portion of a population when I hear the following:

"All" - At least 95% of a population, "The vast majority" - At least 80%, "Most" - At least 60% ,"The majority" - At least 50% ,"Some" - At least 10%

What kind of evidence?

So the purpose here is not to provide irrefutable evidence but to at least show you made an effort before making your post.

- Recent polls by a respectable polling company

- The views held by politicians (as they act as representatives for their voters)

- The views held by political pundits (as they have viewers that often are mostly from one population)

- Protests in which decent amount of people show up, can be easily identified as belonging to the population in question, and are conveying the view the post is opposing.

​

I really think this would make the sub a better place.

Which rule should I report them under? Do we get a new rule or use the custom option?

Thought to myself: hey, I have some time, lets see if someone can maybe help me see some things from a different perspective, but I guess not since who knows when it will be approved. There's been like 15 posts total over 24 hours, doesn't seem like this would be necessary or that the automod is even useful in this situation.