In a recent case I gave a user a warning (which is a thing in Mastodon, it records the strike in the mod interface and leaves a note for future mod action) but left the reported posts up, since it seemed like the harm was already done—deleting the posts didn't seem to mitigate harm, but might have lead to misunderstanding since the outside-the-rules posts couldn't been seen.
Is this a good approach, or should we err on the side of taking them down?
@sage When we block people, their posts appear as gaps in our threads. I can't imagine that deleting a post that violates server rules could be more disruptive than that.
If the rule they violated is worth having, can you really say "the harm was already done"? Isn't further harm done every time someone else sees the offending material—if not because of the material itself, then because a reader might easily conclude that offending material won't be dealt with?
@sage I'd probably err on the side of taking it down, though it probably depends on the rule that was violated. It's not always easy to assess whether a post is done doing harm, and if there's a rule to violate, it's likely there to prevent ongoing harm, right?
@sage Barring more and better moderation tools, I would err on just getting rid of the post if it broke the server rules and was worthy of moderation. And in any case, in terms of harm mitigation, you never know when new folks may encounter the offending post, and I don't think we'd want to scare them away from dice.camp or the Fediverse.
In my ideal I'd be able to post a public mod note on the posts, like "These posts are against our server rules. They cannot be replied to, but are still viewable as record.", but Mastodon doesn't have a feature like that.