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I was reading a question, and in a comment line in the code I came across and offensive (profane) word. I decided to remove the word in an edit, instead of flagging the post. Two reviewers approved my edit, but then a moderator rejected it. Is there a reason it was rejected by a moderator? I am really confused as to why it was rejected. Here's the edit:https://stackoverflow.com/review/suggested-edits/3110951

Does anyone know why? Was it rejected because the word is hard to find? Thanks for your help.

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  • You shouldn't be suggesting edits on bad posts in the first place.
    – Cole Tobin
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:16
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    What do you mean? Should I have flagged the post? Most of the post was fine, so I thought I should just edit the word out.
    – davidsbro
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:17
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    I couldn't find the profanity even when I was looking for it in that @#!*#$ wall of code (just a pointless observation).
    – Tim M.
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:30
  • @TimMedora, it's at the bottom right of the second code block...sorry it's kind of obscure. I thought that if I put where it was in the reason for editing, the reviewers would see it, but I guess they didn't or didn't look, or had another reason.
    – davidsbro
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:32
  • @davidsbro - My comment was slightly tongue-in-cheek. I did eventually find it after I noticed your note on the edit. In seriousness, I don't think it's a great question because it's essentially saying, "here's all my code...where do I add ABC?" That doesn't mean I disagree with your edit, but I would probably have tried to clean the question up more.
    – Tim M.
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:36
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    @TimMedora If you click the "markdown" button on suggested edit stackoverflow.com/review/suggested-edits/3110951, you'll only see the changed lines. It makes it very easy to find the differences.
    – Joshua Taylor
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:48

1 Answer 1

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Let's look at the reject reason:

This edit is too minor; suggested edits should be substantive improvements addressing multiple issues in the post.

I'll emphasize some key words:

This edit is too minor; suggested edits should be substantive improvements addressing multiple issues in the post.

The edit didn't address other issues with the post. The code needs some formatting help. See the stray bracket outside the block? There is a "Thanks" line that should have been removed. You could have even gone further and turned that link to YouTube from a dumped link into an inline link.

Now, regarding your reason to edit: Stack Overflow is an adult-oriented site and the general policy is to not do anything if it's not being used in a rude way. Now, I don't like profanity, but unless someone is directing it at me, I will tend to ignore it until it gets out of hand.

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  • So should I go back and edit those things along with the word? But I also thought users were supposed to remove profanity if they could, and flag if it got bad.
    – davidsbro
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:20
  • Where did you read that?
    – Cole Tobin
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:28
  • Here's one example meta.stackexchange.com/questions/177629/…
    – davidsbro
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:34
  • Correct, however, it isn't harming anyone by leaving it. If you want to remove the profanity, feel free to try again. Just be sure to fix other issues.
    – Cole Tobin
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:37
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    @davidsbro Part of the responsibility of editing other people's posts is to fix it properly - if you can't or won't then don't bother. You had to really look to find it (it was scrolled out of view), and it wasn't intended to be offensive (obviously a copy paste from actual code base) so it's not a huge deal.
    – slugster
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:42
  • @slugster, thanks for editing the post. I know one's supposed to fix the post as much as possible, and I think I didn't because I just wanted to remove the word. You're right though, I should've fixed the formatting and everything else I saw. But I am still a little confused as to why a moderator wouldn't remove the word...there's no point in leaving it in.
    – davidsbro
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 1:58
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    @davidsbro It will get removed - whenever someone makes a substantial edit. The moderator wasn't voting against removing the word; the moderator was voting against a minor edit. The same moderator would probably be fine with removing the word if it's in a more substantial improvement to the post.
    – doppelgreener
    Commented Oct 11, 2013 at 2:14

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