Brandon chiming in:
Having slept it, I'm in full agreement that deletion isn't the only tool in the moderation tool box and it should rarely be the first used in removing a post a member made.
That said, I do think it works in thise specific situation because:
The post was trying to incorporate a joke to make a point
The joke was inflammatory in a post about an inflammatory situation (Israel and Iran)
The post was was being flagged as offensive
There were comments in the thread saying the title was offensive
The creator of the post was staring to argue with people who objected to the joke
It was single link post, easily redone
The post had only 24 comments total (not 40 as some say) at the time of deletion, which seemed low, considering some of the comments didn't have anything to do with the subject (aka arguing about the jokey title).
So removing the post seemed like the best option in this case, in terms of resetting the thread so that people would focus on the incident and not how the post was created. If I had to do over again, I would have encouraged the creation of other post in the deletion note, while suggesting the removal of joke title and the explanation of the joke within.
Definitely keeping in mind that deletion should rarely be done.
Having slept it, I'm in full agreement that deletion isn't the only tool in the moderation tool box and it should rarely be the first used in removing a post a member made.
That said, I do think it works in thise specific situation because:
The post was trying to incorporate a joke to make a point
The joke was inflammatory in a post about an inflammatory situation (Israel and Iran)
The post was was being flagged as offensive
There were comments in the thread saying the title was offensive
The creator of the post was staring to argue with people who objected to the joke
It was single link post, easily redone
The post had only 24 comments total (not 40 as some say) at the time of deletion, which seemed low, considering some of the comments didn't have anything to do with the subject (aka arguing about the jokey title).
So removing the post seemed like the best option in this case, in terms of resetting the thread so that people would focus on the incident and not how the post was created. If I had to do over again, I would have encouraged the creation of other post in the deletion note, while suggesting the removal of joke title and the explanation of the joke within.
Definitely keeping in mind that deletion should rarely be done.