I upvoted this because I agree with the concept, but I don't believe such things are necessary. General rule of life: assholes will be assholes. This isn't going to make anyone more polite. Most of us are already polite, and quite content to simply downvote people who aren't.
If mean-spirited comments are down-voted, then it's not much of an issue. The problem is that I've started seeing mean-spirited comments receiving up-votes, and rising to the top of discussions. How do we solve this as a community?
everything is a sarcastic take on the parent, a comparison without any justification, or a straight out insult ie 'it makes me laugh'. The parents one of whom is me are all making polite comments about why we use nosql in our projects, and paraphrased sarcastic insults are sitting there upmodded. Who seem to agree with the sentiment but don't care about the tone, civility or lack of supporting arguments.
I would rather not single out any individuals/comments. In any event, it appears like a growing issue across the community, and is not isolated to just one or two people.
"I thought this question might come up, but I would rather not single out any individuals or comments."
So, you state a claim (and it is an interesting claim!). Other people ask for instances or examples and you decline to point them out. How are we supposed to "deal with it as a community" if we don't know what you are talking about?
I really would like to see an example of a mean spirited comment receiving plenty of upvotes and being on top of a discussion. I suggest (just suggesting, since I don't have any examples of what exactly you mean) that what you consider "mean spirited" may not appear so to others (and hence the upvotes)? Sounds like a simpler explanation (or at least an equally valid one) to me.
What I have seen is that empty/mean comments get downvoted to oblivion very fast. Comments with plenty of upvotes generally have some valid points/insights/value, even if the tone is sharp or sarcastic (neither of which is necessarily "mean").
Posting a mean comment which gets a lot of upvotes and making it to the top of a discussion on HN, without getting flagged etc, would seem to take some real skill in writing.
"you don't want to attract the attention of somebody who is already belligerent and vile."
I would rather these folks/comments are flushed out (the OP claims that someone belligerent and vile are getting a lot of upvotes, which seems strange to me - I don't doubt that mean people post on HN but if they are getting tonnes of upvotes (vs being downvoted or flagged) it would be really nice to see examples), but I appreciate that other people have different approaches to confrontation.
The problem is that then it is very hard to take a claim like "general uptick in mean spirited comments" seriously. A asking for evidence of any claim is valid in any discussion.
Heck if anyone wants to point these out but don't want to be seen doing it, just create a throw away account and use that?
I would agree that there is no reason not to single out those who are constantly belligerent and vile. When these individuals are easy to identify they are often isolate from a group and do not end up causing many problems. However that is probably not the case that causes the most problems.
The case that I have seen cause the most problems are the people who are normally ok but are belligerent and vile with a specific topic and or individual. This hypothetical individual is normally a productive part of the community and may not deserve to singled out. I would not out such a person unless I had good reason to believe that that they would be treated rationally and that the community would only see it as an opportunity to help said hypothetical individual to become more rational.
Slashdot attempts to fix this with meta moderation. Users are given the chance to judge up-votes essentially. Whether that is actually effective for them or applicable to Hacker News, I could not say.
I think I'm a pretty nice guy, but I've written some mean comments when I strongly disagreed with someone here. Imagine most of the mean comments here are coming from nice people who would rather (if they thought about it for a second) not respond in a negative way in those types of situations.
