r/cars mods were 100% bought and paid for by dealers. A whole bunch of them worked at dealers previously or currently. They would lock every anti-dealer thread within hours.
Hoping this community will be moderated to reflect the true values of the community/consumers and not be focused on lining the pockets of the mods.
I most certainly have never worked for a dealership. I wanted to make this community about the enjoyment of cars. I have no financial interest whatsoever in any car company or dealership. For what that all is worth.
Better brace yourself for getting those accusations anyway. The moment you do something they don’t like - no matter how clear and simple the rule they broke was - you’re automatically power-mad and/or paid off.
Glad to hear and hopefully this community can build to be even better than the Reddit one. Good people and good mods will be key.
What is your position on the discussion of the automotive industry in general? A community about cars will inevitably talk about the purchase of cars and the companies involved in that process.
Having been a mod over there I can tell you none of the mods were getting paid shit by anyone and I can also tell you that not a single discussion was had pro or con about dealerships. Hell, a quick search will tell you that even if someone had been getting paid by some shadowy dealership cabal they’d have lost that pretty quickly considering how many anti-dealership posts you can find open right now. Posts got locked or removed because someone else had posted it shortly before or the comments were a total shitshow of hate speech, insults, and/or politics.
I can say for certain that the people that screamed the loudest about mods being paid by whatever group or of somehow power-tripping on their ability to delete an internet post were always the people who ignored the rules the most. Even this forum here has “Be cool / don’t be an ass” as rule number 1. I can guarantee you that when it gets big enough that most of the “you’re power-hungry / paid off” comments about the mods will be from people who got their hate speech or just plain douchebag comments deleted. Everyone wants the rules applied to people they don’t agree with and exceptions made for everything they like. And no, not everything you personally agree with is “the true values of the community/consumers”.
I think the consistent shutting down of anti-dealer threads was proof enough. Hoping we can move past that mentality and maintain an open conversation, even if it reflects poorly on dealers.
You can remove/time out or take other actions against a poster not obeying the rules. Look at other communities where every thread is heavily moderated (science for instance) where entire exchanges are nuked. The problem is that every legitimate thread that was anti-dealer became locked within hours for ‘off topic’ or ‘rule breaking’. It 100% stifled the conversation, intended or not.
Also it was no coincidence several of the mods were in those same threads attempting to refute or sow discourse against the dealer hate.
Edit: Several of the mods were also mods/posters in askcarsales. So yes, they were getting paid by dealers…or else they were wildly misrepresenting themselves.
Mods showing up and doing something in a thread you’re freely saying was about hate? You don’t say! You and I both know those kinds of threads never contain the hate to just that topic, it gets evenly spread around to anyone on the “wrong” side of the argument. If some of them are employees of dealerships you know that you’re talking about posts that directly target them personally right? You’re not discussing hate about some faceless corporate machine; you’re blithely talking about how they, their friends, their family are horrible people. I can see how they might take that a bit more personally. Imaging someone whining about not getting to constantly post about how everyone doing your job is a piece of crap. Even if we take for granted that some of them are dealership employees, do you really think they went to their boss and asked to get paid to kind of sort of defend the industry on Reddit?
Dealership arguments also inevitably bring in Tesla which is a flame-bait topic and things get heated really quickly. Mods - despite your theories - don’t get paid by anyone to do what they do. They show up to browse just like everyone else and while they’re there they take a few minutes to clean things up. When somebody posts a topic that inspires hate and argument and it starts drawing in hordes of people it turns into a whole lot of work. Work that again, nobody is getting paid for. So yeah, when threads turn into high-volume spewing of “you suck and this is why”, it’s gonna get shut down because screw that. If people want to be children and ignore rules as simple as “be civil”, and “no politics”, it’s gonna get closed. Yes, even if you think people need the valuable public service announcement of “dealerships bad” yet again.
And how exactly were the mods representing themselves so that you consider them to be “misrepresented”? Nobody there or here is telling anyone about where they work, or what investments they might have so I don’t see how they’re represented in any way at all.
Ignoring the mocking and unfamiliarity with colloquialisms.
You’re literally describing a conflict of interest. Yes, it affects them and therefore they are unfit to moderate a conversation on such a topic because of their bias.
The fact that you don’t know or understand that, and yet were still a mod is sickening.
Edit: you need an English lesson to learn that ‘hating on someone’ is very different from ‘hate speech’.
I’m really not interested in being told I need English lessons from someone who uses “sowing discourse” when they mean “sowing discord” and who implies that refuting something in a debate is a bad thing when it’s literally the entire point. To be fair I suspect you used the wrong word there again. You might want to look up what a malapropism is and work on avoiding them if you’re going to try and claim the high ground on language…
I’m not sure how you expect to get unpaid volunteers on an enthusiast forum that don’t have any connection to said industry but in the real world that’s just not going to happen. More importantly you’re still ignoring the main point that insulting any group - especially insisting on doing it repeatedly - is a rules violation, whether a mod is a member of said group or not. I’m not in the slightest bit surprised you’re sickened by a mod who applies rules evenly and doesn’t make exceptions for you. I do appreciate your revulsion though; it tells me I was doing things right more than anything else could.
I’d suggest you take some time to ponder how the rules here even are a general “be cool / don’t be an ass” and do not make any exclusions for groups you don’t like. If the rules are ever updated to “don’t be an ass except to people who work at a dealership or who don’t hate them” you’ll be good to go! I’m sure you’ll have all sorts of arguments about how you should be allowed to be an ass anyway though. If you’re going to insist on it, try to make it an original thought at least instead of reposting something so commonplace again and again.
Autocorrect sucks doesn’t it? At least I don’t write paragraphs about it. Seriously, you jump to so many conclusions without a shred of proof. Moreover you come across as so holier-than-thou and then tell others to don’t be an ass. MY recommendation is to take a long walk and really consider just how much you care about this.
Seriously my guy, I wrote a pretty simple ask for transparent moderation and you come out swinging for the fences and super defensive.
You talk of not excluding and yet admit to openly bias moderating and then continue to shout down others when called out on it, talk about being a hypocrite.
Lol, I never noticed any dealer annoyances and I agree that people writing loooong posts about how the rules are oppressing them are often the troublesome ones.
Nothing I drive has a dealer anyway, having been out of business for decades.
Cars cost money, but to me fun to be had from cars has little to do with what they cost and as I get older, my cars get cheaper, and I have more fun from them, and worry not one fkn bit about what other people think of my cars.
Of my last four cars (bought over 10 years), one was from a dealer, and all were brand new. At this point, I’m very dealer adverse, and may never use one again.
Wait if they were all brand new, how’d you only have to use a dealership the one time?
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