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The opposite of this question, I would be interested in allowing all users to see deleted posts that were flagged as poor questions. Obviously rude & abusive answers should be hidden away, but the flag for non-answer is often low quality and incorrect answers.

I think it could be beneficial for newer users to be able to see these and why they were deleted, to help them make better answers in the future.

If the answer is 'ashfoaofhiuoeifnoen', then it's flagged as abuse (of the community's resources), deleted and no need for under 10k to see it. But if it's just a low quality answer, it would help us learn what is considered low quality. e.g. - I see a lot of link-only answers deleted that new users might have learned were not okay had they seen them deleted in another question they were browsing - many don't read into all the rules right away. Also low quality answers in general.

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    Or people who don't understand the site fully yet would just see a bunch of crappy answers not caring about the different background and assume that the site is something that it's not. A lot of these deleted answers are worthless "thanks" and follow-up questions which, if seen, might make the site appear to be a discussion forum.
    – animuson StaffMod
    Mar 14, 2017 at 2:49

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I disagree with this proposition, and for one simple reason.

If we were to want to allow everybody to see these deleted answers, why are we deleting them in the first place?

While it may highlight bad practice for lower-reputation users, it also does something else: it brings down the general quality of the answers presented to these users.

We already have quite a few resources to highlight bad practice. The help centre, the tour, comments, and meta, to name a few off the top of my head.

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    In addition, when you find a low quality answer you can leave a comment on it about why it's low quality, and provide links to the relevant Help Center article(s) about that. Even it deleted, the poster should still be able to see it in their history, and read the comment you provide. This helps them see that low quality answers are not kept, but they are still welcome to provide good answers, and advises them on how to do that.
    – user351780
    Mar 14, 2017 at 3:00
  • Hmm... maybe they should be able to deleted:yes and thus see only their own deleted answers? Often, the comments below them explain why they were deleted.
    – Mikey
    Mar 14, 2017 at 3:19
  • @Mikey, except you can see deleted questions, if they are yours.
    – Gnemlock
    Mar 14, 2017 at 8:07

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