Are moderators allowed to delete questions and answers without (giving) reasons? [closed]

Question

I've been trying to ask questions on https://interpersonal.stackexchange.com/. Some are well received with answers and up votes but they kept getting closed. The close reasons were very unclear like "asking what to do".

Recently I posted a couple questions, one with answers that I had assumed I could refer back to. For no explanation my questions have been removed. First off, was this some kind of technical glitch? If not, is this even allowed by the ToS because the moderators don't own the questions and answers they didn't write.

It now says my account is suspended for "for voting irregularities" though I didn't even think I had enough rep to vote. Do moderators see what votes each user has cast? I feel like I'm being a bit "picked on" or discriminated by some moderator and would like a review.

Answer 1

is this even allowed by the ToS because the moderators don't own the questions and answers they didn't write

Yes, this is allowed. You still own the content of your posts, but that doesn’t give you the right to require that they continue to be displayed on the site. To put it another way: the terms give Stack Exchange the right to display your posts on the site, but do not require them to do so. In this case, they’ve delegated that decision to other users/moderators, who’ve decided to remove the content.

You can still access your deleted content for 60 days by going to your profile, clicking “Questions” or “Answers”, and clicking the “recently deleted questions” or “recently deleted answers” link at the bottom of that page. It will be available for longer than that if you have a link directly to the content as well.

Answer 2

The content of your posts is displayed by Stack Exchange and details of the license under which that is done can be found at https://meta.stackexchange.com/help/licensing.

Although moderators can delete any post at any time, they rarely do so without having good cause and explaining why. Often posts are deleted by an automated process (called the Roomba) which does so when they fail to meet the threshold for being displayed on the site. When posts are deleted they are only marked as deleted and not displayed. The content is still available to be restored to display by undeleting them.

Moderators cannot see the individual votes that you (or any user, except themselves) has cast.

If you believe your treatment by any moderator, or any other user is unfair and has not been resolved by your interactions in comments, chat or your per-site Meta, then your ultimate recourse is the Contact button at the bottom of every Stack Exchange page.

Before doing that my recommendation would be to take a step back, review the Tour and the Help Center, and reflect on whether your posts are currently meeting the standard of Stack Exchange sites.

Answer 3

To help understand maybe why your posts were deleted - consider that some SE sites have On/off topic rules that at first glance seem a bit weird.

IE on Bicycles, we have "sales comparisons and shopping questions are off topic" despite being blatantly obviously about bicycles.

On IPS, their [tour] clearly says

Ask about...

• Specific issues with interpersonal skills
• Real problems or questions that you’ve encountered

Don't ask about...

• Anything not directly related to interpersonal skills
• Questions that are primarily opinion-based
• Questions with too many possible answers or that would require an extremely long answer

So I'd presume that your question is only tangentially on-topic: some made-up examples of off-topic posts:

"What colour car do I buy to impress romantic partners?" Not really about interpersonal skills.

"I did X with Y and now Z won't talk to me - why?" would be opinion based

"How do I improve my relations with my siblings?" Too many possible answers.

Your other option for discussion is to try the IPS Chat site at https://chat.stackexchange.com/rooms/61165/the-awkward-silence Chat is a lot more free-form and less structured, so good for exploring when its hard to describe the problem in words.