Moderation systems fail when they don't accept that toxicity is a human norm, pretending instead that human toxicity is an enemy to be defeated.
Why is it so wrong to criticize a bad idea? To do so bluntly?
The "effect that it had" was an honest conversation. Ultimately I find HN's policies an embarrassment and a symptom of dishonesty. Way I see it, you were brought on to make moderation more transparent, and you're doing well, but you weren't actually given powers to attack HN's main problem, which I'd define as a discomfort with disagreement.
And maybe that's a human problem. But we live in a very negative time. Outright hatred is a part of life, and tools of hatred (downvoting, shadowbanning) are hypocritically applied to shut hatred down.
But it doesn't shut it down, and it shouldn't. To say "You shouldn't feel this way" is fair game when applied as an argument between people. What you say when you banish shit is "You shouldn't exist," and that's an unsustainable mindset.
You can see the logs. You can probably see that I'm a serial offender when it comes to pissing people off here. I've got yet another account on your bad list because you think you can control discomfort.
But you don't have a modicum of transparency or honesty in your line of work, dang: there's nothing you can point to that explains why my downvoted comments are both at -4 as some minimum, but the css makes them different shades of grey.
That's really trivial shit to care about, but that's my point: you're not taking care of trivial explanation of policy. You're an improvement, but that doesn't mean you're done.