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I recently posted about Stanley Black & Decker shutting down operations at their new Craftsman factory, and some of the comments have been extremely abject.
Some of the comments currently published toe the line, but I’m more referring to the many dozens and even hundreds that went straight from first-time commentor moderation to the trash folder.
There’s pro- and anti-Biden comments, pro- and anti-Trump comments, rants about both democrats and republicans, racism, anti-Semitism, geopolitical rantings, anti-China rantings, anti-millennial rantings, anti-capitalism, and more along those lines.
There are also rants about Sears and Kmart, misinformation about Milwaukee Tool, and all kinds of other made-up facts.
How does someone see “Stanley Black & Decker is closing two factories” as an opportunity to talk about the potential for nuclear war?
A couple of the most unhinged comments call for the deaths for republicans, democrats, Jews, and countless anti-China rhetoric.
The hate some of the commentors express towards other people is as astonishing as it is intense.
There are rants about “Chinese fentanyl,” immigration, the last presidential election. How is any of this related to the topic?! Don’t answer that.
One person posted former Stanley Black & Decker CEO James Loree’s email address for others to direct their complaints to. Why? He retired nearly a year ago; there’s a new CEO.
There are rants about “Bush, Clinton, and NAFTA.”
Back in January, I posted about how Home Depot stopped selling Estwing hammers, and the same thing happened there. The comments there got so bad with respect to hate and commentors personally attacking each other that I simply shut it all down.
First-time commentor posts go to moderation, and so you don’t see the worst offending comments. I do.
Not to mince words, it’s very disheartening, and I won’t allow my website to be a vehicle for anyone’s hate. If someone wants a soap box for political or racist rantings, they should find someplace else to do it.
Here’s where things get complicated. For news posts like these, there are 3 types of commentors – regular readers who comment often, regular readers who rarely comment, and new readers or visitors who discover a particular post through a news feed or similar.
When a post trends via Google, news feeds, or similar, there are a lot of new voices. That’s usually a great thing.
Some of the comments have been utterly disgusting and contemptable.
A fraction of regulars comment, and it’s impossible to tell if a new voice is a regular who is chiming in about something important to them, or a new visitor.
This puts me in a terrible position. Do I deprive everyone of the opportunity to comment and chime in, or do I remove obscene comments during moderation?
In the Estwing post, I drew the line when commentors started telling each other to harm themselves.
Some individuals’ abhorrent and hate-filled rantings shouldn’t ruin everyone’s ability to voice their opinions about tools, news, or related industry developments.
But this was not a one-time occurrence; hateful comments and incivility has become a recurring pattern.
If a commentor makes a cogent point but then spews hateful rhetoric, I still cannot allow that.
What if it’s an opposing viewpoint? Am I going to be accused of suppressing dissenting opinions?
This affects regular readers – whether you comment or not – much more than one-time visitors, which is why I bring it up.
The easiest solution would be for me to simply close the discussion sections for posts that might have a strong likelihood to attract problematic comments, which apparently includes any post related to manufacturing or country of origin.
Honestly, I’m going to have to do something – sorting through hateful, bigoted, and vulgar rantings is not part of my job description.
If you find the comments sections closed on tool news posts in the future, this is why. By my estimate, it would affect less than than 1% of posts, but I still felt it necessary to bring up for discussion.
We went 14 years with mostly-civil reader comments and discussions, with only occasional off-color, inappropriate, or highly offensive submissions. I will do what’s necessary to promote a civil and welcome environment.
“But that’s censorship.” My house, my rules. Leave your politics and hate at the door.
Regulars are great about this, but it’s still something that needs to be addressed in case there are any questions.
Update – I finally had to lock the comments section for the Craftsman post. 25 of the 30 most recent comments in the automatic moderation panel were off-topic political rantings, adding to the many dozens I already had to sort through this week.
Maybe what I’ll do next time is close comments after 24 hours, giving regulars an opportunity to chime in and ask questions.
