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Ask HN: What does the past link have to do with my submission?

3 points by sigmaprimus ↗ HN
I posted an ASK HN question recently that was flagged, I thought I was conforming with the HN rules but was concerned with the controversy regarding the subject of my question.

To my surprise the question was flagged and there appeared a "past" link beneath the question. This link lead me to what I would consider a vulgar commentary full of prolific language.

my question is how exactly is a question supposed to be phrased to avoid being "Flagged" and subsequently censored by what I can only imagine is an individual with an agenda contrary to the subject of my inquiry?

5 comments

[ 4.4 ms ] story [ 25.2 ms ] thread
ggm
It could be its pre-emptive to risk. I can't but think a conversation to JP is going to descend into name-calling. All it needs is a crosslink to Rogan and it's sure to fire off.

And I say that, as somebody who is very likely to be contributing to the mess because I am unsure I can restrain myself from polemic. Dislike of these individuals shouldn't colour honest debate, but I struggle with this. I don't believe in some (false) moral euivalency here, and I know that has direct impact on the quality of discourse.

nathanaldensr
You're asking for exactness as if the interpretation of a submission is a mathematical formula. It isn't. Readers with flagging power are going to look at your submission and make subjective, biased, inductive calls about whether to flag, upvote, downvote, comment, and/or ignore.

In other words, don't take it personally.

DrScump
Given that 54 of your last 60 submits (90%!) were Ask HNs, perhaps you are overusing this feature.
mtmail
I don’t think the phrasing would’ve make a big difference. The person the question was about is a political commentator and somebody must have expected the comment section will be about Canada politics as well.

The “past” link is dumb and automated. It just links to a title search. Usually used to find duplicate stories. For example if somebody submits a story about a breaking-news topic that has been submitted 10 times from other sources in short amount of time. It’s not meant to link to a specific story, what you saw is likely a random result.