text:
Should we allow/encourage short answers?
The review queue has already picked up a few answers as low quality, simply, I think, due to their brevity. It seems such answers go against the SE model, but at the same time they are an accepted pedagogical methodology in many types of Buddhist dissemination; should we allow them here or should they be discouraged?
Here's an example of the issue:
Question:

Every Buddhist believes in Eternity or Samsara. So, how can I imagine of Samsara?. What is the starting of it ? Any suggestions would be really appreciated.

Answer:

Samsara begins when subject and object separate from each other.

https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/a/85/18
Edit: Another example:
Question:

I have seen Zen monks in meditation, usually with one monk supervising. The monk supervising usually carries a wand of some sort. Every once in a while he would rest the wand on the shoulder of one of the monks and then respectfully hit his shoulder. It did not seem very forceful yet I found this confusing because to me it seemed as if it may be a method of harm or violence. I would like clarification on this practie.
Why does the supervising monk do this to the meditating monks?

Answer:

It's a remedy for sleepiness. Nothing special. It's a little pat on the back to keep you awake.

https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/a/96/18

I suggest you answer your own question with some sort of "yes, it's an accepted pedagogical methodology in many types of Buddhist dissemination". It'll help voters who would agree, and you're probably one of the best voicers of this position.

Actually, I'm on the no side.

Ah, well, I misunderstood, sorry about that. My comment still stands, though (:p), even if you have less incentive.

Summary

The accepted answer ("no") was written before the question was edited on June 20th: and refers to pithy, enigmatic or koan-like answers.
Ditto this answer from Andrei (in which he justifies sometimes giving cryptic answers of his own)
Ditto the answers from Crab Bucket and Wideshanks (these too were posted before the question was edited on June 20, and refer to Zen-like answers)

On June 20 the question was edited to reference a second example of a short answer (a second type of short answer).
Then the four other answers posted after June 20 say "yes" to even very short answers, provided that:

They answer the question
They're clear (not enigmatic)

Furthermore this topic When my answer is short, shall I post it as a comment instead? suggests that if there isn't much to say in an answer, even then we would prefer to see it as an answer than as a comment.
Aside from that they can be judged on a case-by-case basis (i.e. up- or down-voted depending on how well and how fully they answer the question, i.e. depending on how "useful" they are).

I would say that we discourage them in traditional SE fashion: While such answers may be good in a teaching setting, they aren't really appropriate for a Q&A site without further explanation.

Agreed. A koan or other enigmatic thing can serve as part of an answer, but it should be accompanied by further explanation or interpretation, either from the answerer him/herself or from primary/secondary sources the answerer would like to draw from.

I think that we could use the koan as a stepping stone for a bigger discussion. It seems to me we want to keep the spirit of koans, but we don't want to push people away because they don't "get it". Perhaps asking someone to think about the koan in a certain light or perspective, or even sharing their (the answerer's) perspective with the understanding that you're trying to open the door, not shove them through it.

Explaining koans is like explaining jokes or puzzles.

@senshin I don't think this topics was asking about koans. Although a "koan" may short, a "koan" and a "short answer" aren't necessarily the same thing at all.

@Hrafn when you say "we discourage them in traditional SE fashion", do you just mean "post a comment asking for more, and/or downvote it, if you don't think it's useful as it is?"

@ChrisW I think a clearer phrasing of what I meant would be "in the tradition of other SE sites, we discourage short answers." I wasn't really meaning to speak to "how" but rather indicating that we should just as other sites do.

I feel strongly we should not encourage these kind of short mysterious answers. We should aim to be an open Q & A site which is as helpful and clear as possible. I think that there is a real risk of answers being willfully obscure or just slipping into jargon which doesn't help the average punter. I will be interesting to see what kind of people the site attracts but I would imagine a significant proportion will be 'just curious' so clear answers as possibel would be best.
There is obviously a role for engima and baffling statements but i think that is in the context of particular Buddhist practice in a given tradition - but not he practice of having a decent Q & A site.
Just my two-penneths

yes
length != quality and causes tl;dr

Use comments to ask for clarification or details as necessary, otherwise allow the community to upvote / downvote answers .

Well, this is a good example of a short answer that still works, because you've provided an answer and given an argument to back it up. I'm not convinced by the argument, since saying not all long answers are good doesn't actually say anything about short answers. But, I think this makes clear that a short answer can be okay if it actually contains some sort of supporting argument.

Thank you for your consideration. I understand your primary concern is with developing a quality resource here and building the community. I am confident you are off to a good start and will be sucessful.

I've taken a look around SE, and it seems the consensus is actually to allow very short questions, as long as they do actually answer the question. Here's some of the reasoning:
One-line answers
https://softwareengineering.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/3472/one-line-answers
https://codereview.meta.stackexchange.com/questions/1463/short-answers-and-code-only-answers
Should I give short answers or comments?
https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/251792/canned-comment-to-use-when-reviewing-a-short-answer
https://meta.stackoverflow.com/questions/254296/would-very-short-correct-answers-be-better-left-as-comments

I very much understand the frustration of students receiving these cryptic answers, in fact I went through the same kind of pain when receiving similar answers from my teacher. I specifically remember wondering why would anybody who have achieved a clear realization of Buddha's teaching not explain it to students in a nice and clear manner. And here I am few years later, declining to elaborate on some of my answers.
Because the reason for me giving such cryptic answers is entirely rational, let me try and summarize it here.
There is a type of questions, that come from confusion about the concept one is asking about, from what I call incorrect frame or reference. Answering these directly is not helpful. E.g. the one that started this thread seems to come from a complete absence of understanding, which makes it pretty much invalid and irrelevant. The options we have for these are:

Close the answer as "not clear".
Answer with "your question is invalid and irrelevant".
Try to give them an outline of the area the question lies in. In this case, give a definition of Samsara, introduce the Six Worlds, mention transmigration -- in effect write an introductory article on Buddhism 101.
Answer the question directly. In this case, say 'According to Buddha (here is a quote) Samsara is beginningless, so it has no "starting" as you called it'. Like I said above, such answer hardly helps the questioner get anywhere. They need to start thinking about their mind here and now, not about speculative points like "if Samsara has no beginning where do I come from?"
Or, the option I chose, is to give an answer that is ultimately valid and points the questioner in the direction they should focus their inquiry on. In this case, it is an invitation to switch one's context from the objective timeline, to phenomenology of "I" and "world" (or subject and object), to research into relationship of mind and experience, which, when followed through, and augmented with practice of meditation, altruism, and non-attachment, will eventually lead the person to Right Understanding.

Here is another consideration:
Previously (on Buddhism Q&A site on Google+ during the last year or two), I used to answer such questions elaborately: explain what the question implies, point out why this is an invalid way to think about the subject, introduce a valid frame of reference, and outline the basic structure they should follow to arrive to an insight. Then I noticed, that people who tend to ask such "confused" questions, often do not appreciate a complete answer, because they are not ready for complete answer yet! Instead, all they are trying to do is "probe" their way around Dharma, and try to identify key concepts and relationships relevant to their Spiritual Quest.
A notable example is this question, where the questioner, after having received 4 elaborate answers said: "Thank you all for the considered and learned answers. I shall study the texts in question. However, I am a simple man. Is there a simple answer to my question?"
This led me to appreciate my teacher's attitude to questions: because much of Buddhism is "skillful means" (upaya) designed to aid one's spiritual transformation, rather than give a purely conceptual understanding, long explanations are irrelevant at best. At worst, they have a potential to rob the student of motivation to actively inquire and thus receive their own insights about their psyche, their world, and how the two relate. So giving a cryptic or simplistic hint may be the least evil, pointing them in the right direction without confusing them or robbing of their own path.
All this said, while writing this reply, I did get a few ideas about the way this particular question can be addressed, and edited my answer to make it more helpful to the poster and other readers. Thank you for your inspiration guys!

As far as I understand, this site is about providing factual information about Buddhism, not about converting people. If the questioner presupposed that Samsara has a starting point, we should answer that the question is based on an incorrect assumption. The answer "you should ask completely different questions" may make sense in a teacher-student interaction, but not on the site that aims at explaining what Buddhists practice and/or believe in. I don't get the example with anatta and rebirth, either. A simple, factual answer is that the former is just a conventional truth.

You are right, which is why the way I answer questions has changed since Jun 2014 when this site started.

OK, sorry for digging up an old answer.

I'd be inclined to accept that answer above if the poster could reference an answer from the Buddha which is equally as short, or reference an answer from another reasonably popular teacher.
A poster replying with an "inspired utterance" on his or her own accord kind of resembles Wikipedia's prohibition on original research:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:No_original_research
In other words, you can answer like a Zen master, but you have to cite your sources.

I disagree. How would we determine which sources are acceptable? Are Mahayana sutras authentic, or only Hinayana? Are works by 18-19 century Tibetan authors? How about 20th century? Contemporary authors, all of them? And what about my teacher, who lives in my town, is he authentic?
Besides, restricting answers to those traceable to verifiable sources would rule out answers based on personal experience, and make this a site of theoretical Buddhology as opposed to practical Buddhism.

I was talking only about the short enigmatic replies that make it look like the author hasn't put any effort into their answer. If they can cite a teaching somewhere to back up why they wrote such a small short reply (e.g. the Buddha's short sutta on how the mind is so quick to move there's nothing that's an appropriate analogy to describe it), then it would be acceptable.

Hmm. The consensus seems to be that short answers are not good. However many of the questions seem to be phrased in ways that encourage brevity. I see many questions that ought to have yes/no answers for example.
Sometimes there is just no long answer. The one asked today, for example, on why the Buddha answered questions if asked three times. I've never come across any discussion of this in primary or secondary texts (either religious or scholarly). No one knows why. There are very many question to which the answer is "no one knows". Many cultural idioms are like linguistic idioms: there's no reason, it's just what they did. Padding out "no one knows" with speculations for the sake of a longer answer seems unproductive.

I think the consensus became confused by the question's being edited (to ask about a different type of answer) two days later.


text:
Update on Moderator Issue
So... we have now finally got word back from all three moderators; we are all in agreement to step down and allow for a process similar to the original pro tempore moderator selection.
Once/if the SE officials approve of the process, there will be nominations, voting, and eventual selection (guided by voter feedback and other criteria) by the SE officials themselves.
Here's the post from the first time around, I assume the process will be quite similar:
Who should our moderators be?
Any thoughts?

This is good news. Is it too soon to begin a nomination thread?

Oh - I'm sorry to see you and Andrei step down. I really hope you all keep contributing to the site. And thank you for all the moderating goodness you have bestowed upon us all.

Oh! I didn't mean that it's good news about everyone stepping down. Just that it's good news that there is progress on this issue. (Actually I'm sure many of us are hoping you'll accept nomination again Bhante.) :)

I'll post a new moderator thread as soon as things are squared away on the Community Team's end. Stay tuned.

source: Stack Exchange

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/

sort: votes


text:
Got 500 rep? Don't forget about the close queue!
Stack Exchange sites thrive because of the willingness of their participants to help keep the site clean. We have moderators, but ideally their job is to handle the stuff that regular community members can't. They're exception handlers. Most of the work of maintaining the quality of the site is done by dedicated community members like you.
We use review queues to help organize the bulk of the administrative tasks that need to be done. If you have enough rep to perform an action, you'll be able to see its corresponding review queue. If you have 500+ reputation, you'll be able to use the Close and Reopen queues. These queues help questions with one or two close votes get the rest of the five they need to be closed; same goes for the reopen queue - if a question is edited after it was closed, we bring it to the community's attention to see if it should be reopened.
The moderators and I can participate in these queues, but our votes are binding supervotes - so by doing so, we are removing the democratic aspect from the process. These tools exist to help the community make decisions about its own future, so please have at 'em!

Should this be left unanswered, so that it stays in the unanswered list, or placed into an FAQ or help page?

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/


text:
Moderators Pro Tempore announcement
Throughout the beta, we need members from the site whose focus is to engage the community, address issues and lead the way in site management. That's why we select a few members from each community to act as temporary, provisional Moderators. You can read about the program here: Moderators Pro Tempore.
I am pleased to announce that these community members have stepped up and generously volunteered their time to help us assure that each community's issues are properly addressed.

We want to make this site a huge success, and these members are great examples of exactly the type of people we need.
Did I overlook anyone?
Almost certainly. There are many members who are actively involved here and very deserving of recognition. My failure to account for everyone this early on is in no way a slight against them. Ideally, Moderators are elected by the community and that's why you'll have your elections after your site makes it through graduation.
Most of all, be respectful and understanding of the Moderators Pro Tem. Members of your community are volunteering their time and learning on the job. This is a learning experience for everyone.

Update, May 2015
Hrafn and Andrei have stepped down from their positions. We thank them for their excellent service. After a short poll of the community, we welcome two new pro tem moderators to take their places:

Update, October 2015
Yuttadhammo has stepped down. Please join me in thanking him for his excellent and thoughtful service as a moderator, and in welcoming Andrei Volkov back to the squad to take his place.

Update, April 2016
Crab Bucket has stepped down as a pro tem moderator. We'll be reaching out to the remaining mod squad in the next few days to figure out the best path forward. In the meantime, we on the Community Team sincerely thank Crab Bucket for his service on the mod staff here and wish him well going forward.

Do great things, mods!

Congratulations to all three of you.

Congratulations to all moderators. And thank you for volunteering to do the work. Really appreciated

Congratulations and thank you to our new moderator team of Venerable Yuttadhammo, Chris W. and Crab Bucket. It's a great thing for Buddhism.SE that three such dedicated individuals have accepted the responsibility of moderating the site. We're in good hands. :)   _/|_

Thank you for the appointment; I think I already mangled a question by converting a non-answer and all of its comments into comments on the question (any way to undo?), but I'll try to be a little more aware of the consequences of hasty moderation from now on.
Let's work together to make this site a great resource for Buddhism on the Internet!

No way to undo, but as a moderator you can delete any comments that need deleting.

There isn't ' direct "undo" per-se but you can reverse all the actions. Delete the newly created comments, un-delete the post, then un-delete any comments on the post that need to be put back in place.

@Caleb I think I did the right thing by transferring it, since it was an argument for closing the question, rather than an answer. Just made a mess of the comments section, but it does outline the arguments made by both sides of the debate to close.

Thank you for the appointment! Looking forward to this journey.

The challenge I see is staying within the format while at the same time providing an opportunity for people to see into their hangups and advance their Dharma practice. One thing I don't want this site to be is merely a tool for scratching an intellectual itch for metaphysical / quasi-philosophical speculation.
After speaking with folks at Temperance (the mods of Christianity, Islam and Judaism Q&A sites) I'm beginning to think we need to lift the bar for questions. I will start a meta thread soon.

Andrei, I think, based on recent exchanges, you and I may differ somewhat on this. So I think the meta thread you're going to start should be useful. Specifically, I'd like to understand the extent to which this style of site is appropriate to help "people to see into their hangups and advance their Dharma practice". And just in case people think I'm being rhetorical there -- I do think it can be, but with certain provisos. (To be discussed, perhaps on your thread.)


text:
Who should our (new) pro-tem moderators be?
This question will serve as a nomination thread in our search for a complete team of three active moderators, as discussed in this meta thread. If you wish to nominate a user (including yourself) for the position of pro tempore moderator, please obey the following guidelines:

Each nomination should be a separate answer containing links to the nominee's main and meta profiles.
Self-nominations are encouraged.
If nominated by someone else, the nominee should indicate their acceptance in a comment. Optionally, the nominee can write something about themselves and their desire to moderate in the comments as well.

We're looking for members of this site who:

Have a reasonably high reputation score to indicate active, consistent participation.
Have experience voting, reviewing, and doing other moderation activities.
Show an interest in their meta’s community-building activities.
Lead by example, showing patience and respect for their fellow community members in everything they write.
Exhibit those intangible traits discussed in A Theory of Moderation.

The Community Team will select your new pro tems based on the feedback and input on candidates here, but it won't be purely voting-based - so if you support a candidate, be sure to let us know why in the comments.
This thread will be open for one week.

Is there any appetite for 4 moderators this time? We have discussed it here http://meta.buddhism.stackexchange.com/q/1474/157 and I think there are good arguments for it. The Buddhism SE community was supportive and I know that the occasional beta site does have 4.

@CrabBucket We're going to stick with 3 moderators for now. Ideally this refresh will give us 3 fully active mods, and we can see how the workload goes for them for a while. Then we can assess the need for a fourth.

OK folks, I've locked this post (due to there not being an appropriate close reason for this :P) and will come back to announce the new mods in a few days.

Could I put myself forward please. I've found myself really wanting the site to be a great resource for Buddhism and also a welcoming place for new and old. I'd like to help maintain and support it and all that use it.
Main profile
Meta profile

+1 for Crab Bucket's dedication and consistency on Buddhism.SE. During the short time we were "modless", Crab Bucket really did all he could to keep things active and positive on Meta and on the main site. He's objective, open minded and well liked here.

I'm nominating myself as probably the only original moderator still kicking around. I'm somewhat ambivalent about the idea, but it seems reasonable that having at least one of the original moderators on the team could be a good thing.
I've been accused a couple of times of being a bad moderator, but I don't feel that the accusations were valid. I was also absent for a few months, so don't have the best attendance track record.
I've been the only really active mod for the past two months, so the site regulars know whether I'm suitable or not to continue. I am committed to staying active (no more long trips to Asia in the works) for at least the next year if re-elected.
On the other hand, if there are three keen and qualified candidates looking to take the reins, then I'm happy to step aside.
Main profile
Meta profile

I honestly don't see an issue with absences (though I did post on meta asking where everyone had gone). People have commitments and responsibilities. With 3 (or 4????) active moderators this wouldn't be an issue - though I think a post on meta to announce absences would be useful. (Incidentally I am grateful of the effort and time Yuttadammo has put into the site and thank you again for it)

Very happy that Ven. Yuttadhammo is "still kicking around". He brings knowledge, experience and dedication to Buddhism.SE. He's been the only moderator active for a while now and has worked through some tough issues solo and done a good job of keeping things on an even keel here.

I nominate Robin111:

People think that she's really nice when she writes to them: which is all-important
She writes rules clearly and carefully
She's sensitive to the difficulties of editing other people's questions, to make them clearer, and has a track record of having done that successfully (the OP thanks her for the edit)
Participates on meta (an essential qualification)
And on the main site, more than 40 answers with an average of nearly 4 votes per answer
Writes like someone who would be easy to work alongside, on a team of moderators

Main profile
Meta profile

Thank you for your kind words Chris. I don't feel as though I have the experience to do this well yet however. (Still pretty new and head down the wrong track quite a bit. ;-) But happy to be here and help out as a regular user.

I think you should consider your self for the role.

I ask Andrei to continue if he's available:

Knows Buddhism.SE since Area51

Experienced as a moderator both on and off StackExchange:

I've been moderating Google+ Zen Buddhism community for more than a year now and serving as one of the main answerers on Buddhism Q&A community on Google+. As a Google+ moderator I am known for my tolerance, ability to avoid conflicts, and straightforward head chopping action when it comes to breaking the rules. I'm a Stackoverflow user since 2009 with ~10k rep, and a Buddhist practitioner since 1995.

Main profile
Meta profile

Sadly, I have to decline. I have tremendously enjoyed being part of this community from the early days, but I have never been an effective mod. Besides, I'm now going through a phase in my own practice that requires me to spend less time online and focus more on real-world interactions. I think @ChrisW will make for a great moderator. Thanks Chris for your trust and support, and good luck!

Of course you have been an effective mod. Remember the animals in the jungle... :) Good luck in real life.

LOL thanks Chris, that will remain the highlight and pinnacle of my career! :))

I nominate Thiago:

High reputation (in the top 12) on the main site
Active with questions and answers on meta (so, interested in how this site is run)
Clearly knowledgeable about Buddhism
Patient and methodical: replies to my long questions with long answers
Also one of the top voters (most votes cast) on the main site

Main profile
Meta profile

I think you and Robin should accept this.


text:
Let's get critical: Dec 2014 Site Self-Evaluation
We all love Buddhism Stack Exchange, but there is a whole world of people out there who need answers to their questions and don't even know that this site exists. When they arrive from Google, what will their first impression be? Let's try to look at this site through the eyes of someone who's never seen it before, and see how we stack up against the rest of the 'Net.
The Site Self-Evaluation review queue is open and populated with 10 questions that were asked and answered in the last quarter.
Run a few Google searches to see how easy they are to find and compare the answers we have with the information available on other sites.
Rating the questions is only a part of the puzzle, though. Do you see a pattern of questions that should have been closed but are not? Questions or answers that could use an edit? Anything that's going really well? Post an answer below to share your thoughts and discuss these questions and the site's health with your fellow users!

Final Results

How does one become victim of one's own Karma?

Net Score: 3 (Excellent: 3, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 0)

How does a monk address parents and relatives?

Net Score: 3 (Excellent: 3, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 0)

Are Amitabha and Sakyamuni the same?

Net Score: 3 (Excellent: 3, Satisfactory: 1, Needs Improvement: 0)

Can the noble eightfold path be followed in its entirety by a lay follower?

Net Score: 2 (Excellent: 3, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 1)

Question about Dana

Net Score: 1 (Excellent: 4, Satisfactory: 0, Needs Improvement: 3)

Anapanasati Buddhist meditation

Net Score: 1 (Excellent: 4, Satisfactory: 0, Needs Improvement: 3)

If Buddha is able to predict the future of other sentient beings how can freewill be possible as its very nature is that of unpredictability?

Net Score: 1 (Excellent: 3, Satisfactory: 3, Needs Improvement: 2)

Did Buddha ever say that educated people would be a problem?

Net Score: 1 (Excellent: 3, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 2)

What was the motivation for the prohibition on eating onions and garlic?

Net Score: 0 (Excellent: 2, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 2)

Spacious versus Empty

Net Score: -1 (Excellent: 1, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 2)


text:
Let's get critical: Jun 2015 Site Self-Evaluation
We all love Buddhism Stack Exchange, but there is a whole world of people out there who need answers to their questions and don't even know that this site exists. When they arrive from Google, what will their first impression be? Let's try to look at this site through the eyes of someone who's never seen it before, and see how we stack up against the rest of the 'Net.
The Site Self-Evaluation review queue is open and populated with 10 questions that were asked and answered in the last quarter.
Run a few Google searches to see how easy they are to find and compare the answers we have with the information available on other sites.
Rating the questions is only a part of the puzzle, though. Do you see a pattern of questions that should have been closed but are not? Questions or answers that could use an edit? Anything that's going really well? Post an answer below to share your thoughts and discuss these questions and the site's health with your fellow users!

Final Results

Is the attempt to understand others a form of value judgement?

Net Score: 7 (Excellent: 7, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 0)

The word Dhammanusati.

Net Score: 7 (Excellent: 7, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 0)

Is lack of inherent existence the same as 'not real'?

Net Score: 5 (Excellent: 5, Satisfactory: 4, Needs Improvement: 0)

At which point after conception does life begin?

Net Score: 3 (Excellent: 4, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 1)

If i am the result of an aggregate, how does one refer to oneself?

Net Score: 2 (Excellent: 2, Satisfactory: 8, Needs Improvement: 0)

Does Zen have a concept similar to stream entry?

Net Score: 1 (Excellent: 4, Satisfactory: 2, Needs Improvement: 3)

How to deal with sore hips during sitting?

Net Score: 1 (Excellent: 1, Satisfactory: 8, Needs Improvement: 0)

Body scanning - right way of attention moving

Net Score: -1 (Excellent: 0, Satisfactory: 8, Needs Improvement: 1)

Moving from absorption to self-awareness

Net Score: -3 (Excellent: 1, Satisfactory: 4, Needs Improvement: 4)

Saṃvega or something else? Integrating sammuti sacca with paramattha sacca

Net Score: -5 (Excellent: 1, Satisfactory: 1, Needs Improvement: 6)

So far, we (i.e. people who use this meta-site) have tentatively decided to avoid closing questions.
We haven't had (maybe we should or shouldn't have) a similar discussion about answers (e.g. what makes an answer good, bad, or better).
IMO this site has at least two categories of question: introductory, and relatively advanced. I don't know whether the answers are helpful in both categories, or are better at one than the other. If this topic is looking for faults to improve, would it help to consider those two categories separately?
One thing that does seem to be "going really well" is that so many of the questions which are asked are answered: and therefore I think the site (and users of the site) are being helpful.

There were a couple of posts recently on the main meta-site, which not everyone here will have read:

Graduation, site closure, and a clearer outlook on the health of SE sites

As of this post, not a single site currently active in our network is at risk of being closed. Closing public beta sites is a rare occurrence; we expect it to stay that way.

Should introspection be encouraged in light of the new standards for graduation?

Our goal for going public was to draw the community's focus away from numbers they couldn't easily change and onto quality issues that they could. Hence the talk of closing and editing.

I guess the last of the above quotes is saying that we shouldn't focus on the number of users or number of questions/day which we can't do much about; but that we can or should try to improve the quality of the site, which includes trying to improve numbers or metrics like 'number of questions closed' and 'number of posts edited' which might be trying to be some numeric measure of 'quality'.
FWIW I'm not sure it's possible to measure quality numerically.
Nevertheless, a focus on quality:

Some of the earlier posts on meta here were a focus on quantity: "Can we attract more users?"
Instead perhaps we should focus on quality: "Are there any suggestions for improving quality?"


text:
2018: a year in moderation
It's New Year's Day in Stack Exchange land...
A distinguishing characteristic of these sites is how they are moderated:

We designed the Stack Exchange network engine to be mostly self-regulating, in that we amortize the overall moderation cost of the system across thousands of teeny-tiny slices of effort contributed by regular, everyday users.
-- A Theory of Moderation

While there certainly are Moderators here, a significant amount of the moderation is done by ordinary people, using the privileges
they've earned by virtue of their contributions to the site. Each of you contributes a little bit of time and effort, and together you accomplish much.
As we enter a new year, let's pause and reflect, taking a moment to appreciate the work that we do here together.
To that end, here is how the moderation done here on Buddhism breaks down by activity over the past 12 months:
                 Action                  Moderators Community¹
---------------------------------------- ---------- ----------
Users suspended²                                 12          4
Users destroyed                                   5          0
Users deleted                                     2          0
Users contacted                                  18          0
User suspensions lifted early                     1          0
Tasks reviewed³: Suggested Edit queue            99         69
Tasks reviewed³: Reopen Vote queue               11          0
Tasks reviewed³: Low Quality Posts queue         62          9
Tasks reviewed³: Late Answer queue              101         93
Tasks reviewed³: First Post queue               339        118
Tasks reviewed³: Close Votes queue               30          7
Revisions redacted                                4          0
Questions reopened                               17          0
Questions protected                              37          2
Questions migrated                                6          0
Questions merged                                  3          0
Questions flagged⁴                                5        152
Questions closed                                128          3
Question flags handled⁴                         105         52
Posts unlocked                                    2          4
Posts undeleted                                  18         54
Posts locked                                      6         26
Posts deleted⁵                                  192        308
Posts bumped                                      0        265
Comments undeleted                               78          0
Comments flagged                                  6        416
Comments deleted⁶                             1,780        960
Comment flags handled                           189        233
Answers flagged                                  12        173
Answer flags handled                            173         12
All comments on a post moved to chat             73          0

Footnotes
¹ "Community" here refers both to the membership of Buddhism without diamonds next to their names, and to the automated systems otherwise known as user #-1.
² The system will suspend users under three circumstances: when a user is recreated after being previously suspended, when a user is recreated after being destroyed for spam or abuse, and when a network-wide suspension is in effect on an account.
³ This counts every review that was submitted (not skipped) - so the 3 suggested edits reviews needed to approve an edit would count as 3, the goal being to indicate the frequency of moderation actions. This also applies to flags, etc.
⁴ Includes close flags (but not close or reopen votes).
⁵ This ignores numerous deletions that happen automatically in response to some other action.
⁶ This includes comments deleted by their own authors (which also account for some number of handled comment flags).
Wishing you all a happy new year...

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
Number of Votes Shown
I was looking for the number of votes I have been casting on the site recently. I though voted couple of times today but my name is not show. Then thinking I might have forgotten to vote I checked some of the recent Q&A to see that I have indeed voted. I voted a few more times and came to the page but still my votes are not shown.

You don't show up on that page because you only voted 4 time this week, for a user to show up on the week page, he/she has to have voted > 10 times in a week.  If a user has voted > 10 times, and hasn't shown up on the page, then this could be a cache issue.
If you go to your personal profile you can scroll to the bottom and look at "Votes Cast" and can accurately tell you how many votes you have given.

Is this rolling stats or calender stats?

@SumindaSirinathSalpitikorala I think they're stats for this calendar week, where "week" is defined as starting on a Sunday and probably using UTC timezone.


text:
2019: a year in moderation
It's New Year's Day in Stack Exchange land...
A distinguishing characteristic of these sites is how they are moderated:

We designed the Stack Exchange network engine to be mostly self-regulating, in that we amortize the overall moderation cost of the system across thousands of teeny-tiny slices of effort contributed by regular, everyday users.
  -- A Theory of Moderation

While there certainly are Moderators here, a significant amount of the moderation is done by ordinary people, using the privileges
they've earned by virtue of their contributions to the site. Each of you contributes a little bit of time and effort, and together you accomplish much.
As we enter a new year, let's pause and reflect, taking a moment to appreciate the work that we do here together.
And what could be more festive than a big pile of numbers?
So here is a breakdown of moderation actions performed on Buddhism over the past 12 months:
                  Action                  Moderators Community¹
----------------------------------------- ---------- ----------
Users suspended²                                  17          7
Users destroyed³                                   5          0
Users contacted                                   27          0
Tasks reviewed⁴: Suggested Edit queue            121         59
Tasks reviewed⁴: Reopen Vote queue                16          1
Tasks reviewed⁴: Low Quality Posts queue          32         25
Tasks reviewed⁴: Late Answer queue                73         38
Tasks reviewed⁴: First Post queue                415        102
Tasks reviewed⁴: Close Votes queue                21          6
Questions reopened                                15          0
Questions protected                               70          2
Questions migrated                                 5          0
Questions flagged⁵                                 2        147
Questions closed                                 109          0
Question flags handled⁵                          113         36
Posts unlocked                                     1          2
Posts undeleted                                   20         67
Posts locked                                       7         18
Posts deleted⁶                                   243        330
Posts bumped                                       0        224
Escalations to the Community Manager team          1          0
Comments undeleted                                57          0
Comments flagged                                   1        311
Comments deleted⁷                              1,602        994
Comment flags handled                            118        197
Answers flagged                                    9        253
Answer flags handled                             222         42
All comments on a post moved to chat              82          0

Footnotes
¹ "Community" here refers both to the membership of Buddhism without diamonds next to their names, and to the automated systems otherwise known as user #-1.
² The system will suspend users under three circumstances: when a user is recreated after being previously suspended, when a user is recreated after being destroyed for spam or abuse, and when a network-wide suspension is in effect on an account.
³ A "destroyed" user is deleted along with all that they had posted: questions, answers, comments. Generally used as an expedient way of getting rid of spam.
⁴ This counts every review that was submitted (not skipped) - so the 2 suggested edits reviews needed to approve an edit would count as 2, the goal being to indicate the frequency of moderation actions. This also applies to flags, etc.
⁵ Includes close flags (but not close or reopen votes).
⁶ This ignores numerous deletions that happen automatically in response to some other action.
⁷ This includes comments deleted by their own authors (which also account for some number of handled comment flags).
Further reading:

Wanna see how these numbers have changed over time? I posted a similar report here last year: 2018: a year in moderation...
You can also check out this report on other sites
Or peruse detailed information on the number of questions closed and reopened across all sites

Wishing you all a happy new year...

all_licenses: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/


text:
How should we go about promoting this site?
Once we enter into public beta, we'll have to try to ensure that the site meets the minimum criteria for acceptance here:
http://area51.stackexchange.com/proposals/45110?phase=beta
Not just so that we pass the SE quotas, but so that the site actually becomes a lasting resource. Obviously, this means we'll have to promote the site to the best of our abilities.
I'm sure we all have leads for spreading the word about this site personally, but we should probably discuss ways of coordinating our efforts over the long-term if we are to cultivate a lasting community here.
What are some methods we all should be thinking about in terms of increasing awareness about this resource?
Here is a link with a few ideas to get us started:
http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2010/08/a-recipe-to-promote-your-site/

It's probably a good idea to learn from the other religion related Q&As we have. Are there interesting questions you could ask to attract the attention of Google visitors? What kind of advertisement/promotion did those other sites put up?
We are going to have Hinduism into public beta soon as well, I think the two can coexist and help each other greatly.

Basically, the key to a successful site is the quality of its content. Ask, answer, vote, discuss (in chat). Keep the site alive and vibrant. Edit questions to eliminate typos, grammar errors and raise the quality bar higher. Once you do, you'll get visitors naturally coming from Google and users will be happy to stay.

Hinduism is a cesspool at the moment. I would not suggest counting on any good coming of collaborating with them for the time being.

I'm sure you mean the quality of the questions & the rigor that people are following the SE way of doing things.

I have posted a link to Google+ Buddhism and Meditation community with ~38k followers.
That said, I don't think we should rush with promoting the site, until we figure out our format as to appropriate questions and answers. Otherwise we can get an influx of fun but disorganized content.

One important idea in the above link is to break up this question into smaller questions, so maybe people will come up with ideas and open questions on how to make those ideas a reality. I'll try to post some ideas as questions myself.


text:
Questions about finding local instructors/communities
I want to ask the community, roughly, if anyone knows of Theravadan Buddhist teachers in the Fort Collins, Colorado area, if they know of lists of communities that I could reference to find this information, or if they know the best place to ask.
Is that an appropriate question?

It's very very localized to a specific place and time (where: Ft. Collins, when: now), so I'd view it as not a great fit for a SE site. Basically the questions that make great fits are those that are likely to help future visitors in some way, shape, or form.
That said, it's a great question to ask in chat.

I had success with http://www.buddhanet.info/wbd/ when looking for local communities. In fact, this is how I found my Zen Master.
Oh but your question is, whether that's an appropriate question. I would say if you phrase it "Is there an online directory of local Buddhist communities?" instead of specifically for Fort Collins, then yes, it is a good question. Go ahead and ask it ;)

I suppose the downvote means my answer is not useful? :)

Voting is different on meta. :)

Oh it means someone disagreed that such answers are appropriate. Now I get it.

Yup! You're in the clear.


text:
Commenting with minimal argument
So how can we comment, and should we even comment, and how much shall we comment -- to question or to clarify something in an answer?
The Help topic includes a section titled When should I comment? which says ...

You should submit a comment if you want to:

Request clarification from the author;
Leave constructive criticism that guides the author in improving the post;
Add relevant but minor or transient information to a post (e.g. a link to a related question, or an alert to the author that the question has been updated).

... plus another titled When shouldn't I comment?
But beyond that:

Are there any site-specific conventions on this site about commenting?
Are there ways to post a comment without that seeming like an argument?
What can I do if I see a comment which seems out of place?

what instance generates this post?

@Ooker I don't understand the question? But comments have been discussed before (see the list of related meta-topics at the end of the answer).

I mean this topic perhaps has been discussed million times before. So if there is a need to create a whole new one, I wonder what the reason to "reinvent the wheel"?

@Ooker I'd hope that moderators might be more aware of conflict (in the past) than others users are, because a purpose of a moderator is to moderate and delete conflict, preferably before other regular users notice it too much. This topic was written to address a recurring conflict -- yet a rare conflict, which didn't arise often, i.e. this topic isn't addressed to most users, who comment or who don't comment without conflict. The conflict was that ...

... different users sometimes seemed to hold different opposite extreme views about commenting on this site. One is that someone might think, "if someone's answer is wrong then I should certainly say so" -- however, as a moderator, I want that kind of comment to be "with minimal argument" so that I don't have to be involved. At the opposite extreme, someone might think, "people shouldn't ever comment critically on other people's answers at all" -- but I think there is a form (and quantity) of commenting which is permissible (permitted), and maybe beneficial, and with minimal argument.

Why even comment?
A benefit of posting and reading answers on a public site, is that several users read or review each answer. Users can "vote" an answer, but a comment can be more specific or detailed, informative.
If you do read something which seems misleading or which you don't understand, in an answer, then you can post a comment. Commenting is optional (not required). If you post a comment under the answer:

The author can correct or clarify the answer, and/or reply with a comment of their own
Anyone else who reads the answer can see the comment[s] too

How to comment, and how often, how much?
Comments:

Should be polite, occasional, and relatively rare
Must be about the answer, and specific or constructive or prescriptive, for example:

"I didn't understand what you meant when you wrote X?"
"Why did you write X? Would you add a reference to what that's based on?"
"When you wrote X isn't that contradicted by scripture Y?"

Must not attack the author ("focus on the content, not the person"), so not for example:

"You are wrong"

I recommend:

When you comment, try to be clear and say everything you need to say in that first comment.
If the author replies to your comment with another comment, then think twice before replying to that -- instead try to let the answer's author have the last word, don't turn it into an argument.
If the author doesn't accept your comment, you already had your say (by posting that first comment), and other readers can see your comment -- maybe that's enough
If you want it to be a different answer, then maybe write a different answer yourself
Generally (perhaps almost always) phrase a comment as a question (examples above)
Try to clarify the answer -- i.e. what it's saying, and why and how -- more than contradicting it.

Some users only want to post their own answers, and not get into commenting. You may comment if you feel you should, but try to not disturb other users.
Are these suggestions necessary?
Maybe not!

In practice the majority of people's comments don't seem out of place -- and don't need moderating -- "polite, occasional, and on-topic" is enough of a guideline.
Off-topic comments might be distracting for readers, so do avoid those.
A little conversation sometimes is probably fine, if it seems friendly and topical --
so comments beyond what's suggested may be OK (or maybe moved to chat).

These conventions were meant to identify what form of comment is almost definitely OK -- and hopefully considered "cooperative" or "valuable" rather than "argumentative".
What if I see an unwelcome comment?
Sometimes you may see a comment which seems out of place.
Stack Exchange's strict "Question and Answer" format -- "no chat"! -- does tend to keep users from interacting or arguing. So comments, can become a cause or almost the only vehicle for arguments, and troublesome.

You can flag any comments or answers for moderator attention -- as described here (also here).
Only moderators can see flags -- flagging is confidential, your identity isn't published -- ideally you or any user can flag a comment, without creating any added hostility.
Try setting a moderator flag for any "hostile" posts, or for anything "off-topic".
But don't flag an answer for being "wrong" -- which is for the reader to assess, not a moderator -- then instead of "flagging" you can comment, and/or downvote, and/or post an answer of your own.

Guidelines for the moderators
The site's moderation policy for comments is more-or-less as described here.

The author of an answer (or any other user) may flag a comment as "no longer needed" -- but a moderator may decline the flag, and keep the comment if they think it is still helpful
The author of an answer must not delete-and-repost their answer in order to delete the comments under the first answer -- edit the answer but let moderators decide which comments should be deleted
A moderator may and/or should delete a comment they consider rude or hostile or "ad hominem" (i.e. which criticises the author not the answer)
A moderator may move comments to chat especially if there are several of them -- and should prefer to move harmless (e.g. friendly but off-topic) comments to chat instead of deleting them

Moderators are users too (or some users are also moderators). If a moderator posts a question as comment to an answer, they are probably acting as a user, commenting like any other user might.
More details
There are other 'faq' topics about comments --
on meta.stackexchange.com --
with details including how SE intended comments to be used, when to use @Username in a comment, etc.
Other discussions about comments on this site
The following meta-topics are related -- I think this (above) is a summary of the actual current ("de facto") policy and compatible with all these previous meta-topics on the subject.

Should we upvote answers more often, and/or comment more?
Some thoughts on the direction of Buddhism.SE
Posting comments to answers
What comments to take into account?
Post comments to help improve answers?
Are these comments inappropriate debate or reasonable questions?
What are comments underneath answers for?
Can you keep "you" out of hostile comments?
Unnecessary arguing

This is a reasonable summary of the comment-related standards,  approaches and moderation strategies we have developed over years here at Buddhism Q&A. Nothing major seems missing or contradicting my experience.


text:
Who keeps deleting my answer?
First answer

I saw Little Buddha. Who is going to become a pet again?

Second answer

Did you watch Little Buddha? I did when I was young.

Third answer

Maybe there’s a chance the directors will bear the same fate.
This sutra sounds like an inside job if you know what I mean. :)

Fourth answer:

Again? Who keeps deleting my answer? Please take a screenshot folks.
At some point of time, the movie Little Buddha   became a video tape. Is there a sutra for them?

Two of these were deleted by Andrei, two by me.
This site (sometimes reluctantly) allows "Zen-type" answers -- see  for example Should this 'zen type' answer be deleted?
But I for one failed to understand this as an answer to the OP's question.
The OP asked,

Why does the Buddha have such a dim view of actors? I can imagine all kinds of professions that would be less ethical than acting. Was acting a very different sort of profession in Indian 2500 years ago? Would the same kind of fate be shared with actors today? Are actors frowned upon in modern day Buddhist countries?

Is there a reason why you think that these are answers to the question therefore shouldn't be deleted?
Please also note that "answering a question with a question" isn't really the purpose of this site, though it's one of several conversational strategies in real life -- Are the kinds of question, and what kinds of answers are good, considered on Buddhism.SE?
Also from the Tour:

This site is all about getting answers. It's not a discussion forum. There's no chit-chat.
Just questions...
...and answers

And of course it is:

... for people practicing or interested in Buddhist philosophy, teaching, and practice.

Answers which recommend that people not practice Buddhism are likely to be deleted. And Ditto -- based on FAQ index (summary of site policies) -- answers which disparage specific schools or traditions of Buddhism.
And Answers vs Advice

The best answers deal directly and solely with the question(s) specifically asked in the first place.


text:
Are we ethically bound to call out other people's statements as wrong?
In a comment or further question under this answer,

[...] One part that I still don't understand, is why there should be no distinction between types of "wrong"? No doubt a persons belief system should not be declared wrong. Even an inconsequential opinion, I clearly see it as counter productive to declare someone wrong. But objective facts are different. If someone denies the Holocaust, how are we not ethically bound to call this out as wrong?
That's extreme of course, this is not Nuremberg. However I have noticed one real example that is ethically troubling. Feminists are offended by Buddhism. With no qualification, this is not opinion, it's objectively false. When declared as a blanket statement, it can actually harm others. A young girl maybe chooses a different life path. A person on edge is nudged toward bad behavior. In other words, calling something wrong cannot all be the same. Kindness and acceptance should not conflict with moral imperative.

"Ethically bound" sounds like a rule. Acts of compassion are defined by compassion rather than by rules.
So we can strive to remain compassionate (unlimited) rather than to be bound by rules (limited).
Helping to correct wrong ideas is natural. Seeing a false statement about Dharma, I would likely say: "Is this so? What are the reasons to say so? Can you provide quotations or explanations for that view?"

I believe ethically bound does not imply a rule.  Example: "Brafman said he was ethically bound to discuss a plea deal with prosecutors but Shkreli refused to consider it".  Source: https://vocabulary.com/dictionary/ethically.  An alternative would be a moral imperative.  Example: "Tackling the issue of poverty is a moral imperative." which is also not meant to be a rule. Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_imperative.

Whatever the wording, I definitely agree with your statement:"Helping to correct wrong ideas is natural".  I would still think it should be an objective fact.  For example, is a statement about buddhism stated in the canons?  could be objective, while the meaning of a phrase in the cannon, or even a proper english translation of the canons would be difficult to claim as an objective fact.

@Lee, wisdom is openness. In that openness we have rules, principles, vows - about our discipline etc. They can be helpful to highlight important points in situations. You know, not having a rule of truthful speech, we can have made no decision to be truthful - and then we might not notice something about our speech. So having rules etc can be helpful, because they help to notice certain things, not overlook them. Thich Nhat Hanh calls Five Precepts "Five Mindfulness Trainings" :). So what I mean: it seems that a strict rule or imperative like "always say wrong" isn't flexible enough.

@Lee, discussing meanings of statements goes into field of opinions. Often I know when I'm right and "they" are wrong, but I can only explain my position and explain why I think their position is wrong. Suppose we have, in the simplest case, two answers which "argue" with each other like that. Then what's the problem?

We must be allowed to challenge statements here that are objectively or morally wrong, and most importantly statements that are both things at once.  It's not merely a theoretical or academic discussion, these decisions can affect lives negatively.
It's surprising after ~6 years on SE the first question has arisen that could change my decision to participate in a community.
There is no reason to believe the strength of my belief in compassion, openness, are not shared or exceeded by most here.  Somehow our principles are shared, yet still allow disagreement on these fundamental points.
These are extreme examples, but taken from real life and even from Buddhism SE. If these ideas are promoted here, will we enforce the current rule against calling out them as wrong?

Advocating persecution. Would we silence Thích Quảng Đức for speaking out here?
Falsely accusing an entire class of people as offended by, or fundamentally incompatible with, Buddhism. Shall we moderate all feminists that demand not to be unjustly stereotyped?

Perhaps most of us agree here in general. The question seems to be more about skillful means to deliver message without provoking defensive reactions etc. Then rules which seem to limit us might be helpful, like stairs railing. We can jump over but they help to remain on course. We can say "I disagree". When we say "Wrong", it's the same message: we show people we disagree. ;) Cheers. And thanks for thoughtful comments to my hasty answer!

I posted an answer too now.

@chang thanks for your answer, I didn't notice haste :) Moreover your comment is important.  I agree skillful delivery and avoiding provocation are paramount.  I guess a difference could be believing provocation should absolutely minimized, without forgoing action required by moral responsibility.

I disagree but I'm not sure that I can do that tactfully (nor briefly); so, my apologies in advance.

Exaggeration
I think the example is a bit extreme: it goes from zero to Godwin in a single post.
I read the implied/emotive premise as being that, if I don't "call out as (objectively) wrong" the statement that "Feminists are offended by Buddhism", then,

I am complicit in (and perhaps approving of) the Shoah.
One or little girls may choose a non-Buddhist life path (and so end up in hell)
The situation is somehow analogous to when Thích Quảng Đức self-immolated

If that is your premise, if it's how you feel, then I guess that helps to explain why you feel compelled; and I'm sorry that you feel so distressed about it.
But I think it is an exaggeration of the situation. If you don't see the situation clearly, if you don't communicate the situation clearly, then I expect you'll be unable to resolve the problem with the other person.

Strawman
The statement in question i.e. "Feminists are offended by Buddhism" is, I guess, a misquote of the following statement:

I have not noticed anything you have posted that could be offensive.
While as a dhamma practitioner i never get offended, thank you for thinking of everyone here.
Getting offended what feminists claim happens to them.

As I read it, the statement isn't saying that "feminists are offended by Buddhism" ... it's saying that feminists claim they get offended, e.g. that "feminists" are inclined to say something like, "I am offended by X", or "X is offensive" (where 'X' isn't necessarily Buddhism), and in particular perhaps, "you are offensive" or "your statements are offensive, offend me."
If you won't read the statement in question then, if you oppose it, it's likely to be a typical straw man argument -- which I consider worthless and counterproductive behaviour.

Big picture
It's good to keep in mind the larger picture, the context of a statement. I read the quoted answer above as saying:

I don't think you did post anything offensive (but if you did, you're excused ... I'm overlooking it, too slight to notice)
As a Buddhist I tend not to take offense, but thank you for being considerate of everyone here
When I think of "people getting offended" I tend to think of "feminists"

If you consider yourself feminist and want to disagree with the last statement, the best way to disagree might be by not claiming you got offended by the statement (otherwise you're just proving the point).

Straw man -- I'm worried about (I doubt) your ability to see the big picture. When you objected to the answer discussed in this meta-topic I got the impression that you focused on "no metta" rather than on "primarily equanimity".
Arguing -- Part of the "Big picture" on this site is that I don't want people arguing. I met a pacifist once when I was young, who said, "I'll discuss anything with anyone. But as soon as it turns into an argument, I walk away." I think that arguing is worse than not arguing. At the risk of posting a ridiculous/extreme (straw man) example of my own, imagine I posted some stupid answer, like, "Men are goats." If that were posted as an answer, I'd rather that readers of the site would see that answer with a simple "minus 1" vote next to it and no comments underneath -- I'd prefer that to a ton of comments arguing about whether men really are goats!
Always an excuse -- People always seem to find some excuse to go to war: "it's his fault, I'm in the right, we have to protect someone else, it's a moral obligation, think of the women and children, etc." All the reasons you give for arguing (e.g. "to prevent other people being misled") could also be given for any sectarian or religious argument (e.g. for arguing against Theravada doctrine, or against Mahayana, or etc.). But I just finished saying that I don't want sectarian arguments ... that I expect you to more-or-less, and at least, tolerate other people's views.

Ineffective
Assuming that this is the answer that you're talking about, there are 10 comments by 6 people under that answer ... the answer hasn't changed.
IOW people did try to object to the answer, and their objection was ineffective. People hardly even bothered to downvote the answer.
You might want to argue that the comments are worthwhile for posterity: someone who reads the answer can read the comments and see there were dissenting opinions ... that's not ideal from SE's point of view, where the useful information is meant to be in the answer and not buried in a ton of comments under the answer.

Equanimity
Let's get back to your alleged reason for arguing, i.e.:

When declared as a blanket statement, it can actually harm others. A young girl maybe chooses a different life path. A person on edge is nudged toward bad behavior.

Isn't that the old "Think of the children" argument (which some people associate with moral panic)?
Anyway, people are supposed to be adult (aged 13+) when they read this site. They ought to be able to make up their own mind about things they read.
Part of "equanimity" is the thought that each person is heir to their own actions. If someone does go to hell, it's not because you failed to "call out" some statement on the internet.

Feminism
I'm not sure it's on-topic but FYI you can see here to read some of Dhammadattu's statements about feminism and how that might relate to Buddhism.
Though there are some statements that I wasn't predisposed to agree with, they mostly make sense. They may not be my personal opinion, not the answer I would have given, but I think it doesn't make sense to expect everyone to have identical opinions.
There was one answer which I did disagree with -- see the comments which I moved to chat at the end of this answer. In that case it was because he was linking to a site which I thought was so non-Buddhist as to be objectionable. In that case I eventually persuaded him to remove the link; I don't know whether that was because of how I said it, or whether it's because I'm a moderator.
My guess is that part of the reason for my "success" there is that I was very specific/narrow about what I wanted changed, i.e. I wanted the link to that web site removed. I think I did it by persuading him that the link didn't support his argument, didn't say what he thought it did -- I wasn't trying to persuade him that his whole answer was wrong or that he should write something else.

Politics is off-topic
One of the things I learned during that chat is that I'm willing to quote splcenter.org whereas he is willing to quote conservapedia.com -- I take it, therefore, that there are some political or cultural differences in our backgrounds. That makes me disinclined to argue further, because political arguments are off-topic on this site: I couldn't go around claiming that this site is inclusive if I tried to forbid "conservative" views.
I could wish that he didn't seem to have thing about feminism (by "having a thing" I mean that the latest comment seemed to me gratuitous, unnecessary), but I suppose he knows that and it isn't my job (or yours) to criticize or censor every statement.

Summary
I don't think you should call out people's statements.
As you wrote earlier, "I'm new here, and hoping to better understand the cultural and participation norms".
I think the norm is that questioning a statement, asking for clarification, is OK, e.g., "I didn't understand X" or "I didn't understand Y".
It's also OK to suggest a specific improvement (i.e. "constructive criticism"), either as a comment ("This answer would be clearer if you mentioned X" or "I don't see why you mentioned Y, it doesn't seem relevant and detracts from the rest of the answer); or possibly be editing the answer yourself (but only if you're sure that such an edit would be welcome by the author ... I tend to only edit for grammar).
If you disagree with something then downvote it or post a better answer (but your answer should address the question, without directly referencing the answer you disagree with).
You can also post on Meta (to get input from other users), and/or flag it for moderator attention; I suppose the moderators aren't so new and do have some experience with the "norms".
Please note incidentally that the norms of this site are unlike those of many other SE sites -- see the FAQ index (summary of site policies). Note too that the goal of many of those policies is to "minimize controversy" -- you can help with that by "taking exception" to as little as possible.

I will apologize up front also for extended comments below.  Understanding someone's position and agreeing with it are very different.  I will not try to further convince anyone to agree, but clarification of intent is important.  Three points were described as exaggerations, which would be fine but possibly my intent was not clear.  On the three exaggerations:

Ex1:  Little girls going to hell?  Not at all. People discouraged from BSE, when new to Buddhism, could conflate the two and not practice when it might have greatly benefited their lives. Not uncommon for people to change directions after a first bad taste.  Ex2:  Letting a comment denying the holocaust stand means someone approves of it?  Not close actually, more like evil succeeds when good men do nothing.

Ex3:  Thích Quảng Đức - Its analogous because it an example of how Buddhists can speak and act against the speech and actions of others without violating principles. I chose him to illustrate the point because he's a hero of mine, not to diminish him to the level of this site.

It's suggested one possibility for my post is "worthless and counterproductive behaviour". I'm not sure how to respond to that, but let me just say it's not a straw man argument.  I won't go into why because I sense even if you came to believe that, it would not change your opinion on the larger issue.  If a feminist says he's offended, then it proves the point that feminists are easily offended?  Clearly not, it could be that person is rarely offended.  It would only show fallacious reasoning.

"Think of the children" does not apply unless potential for harm is not real, or that the remedy is worse i.e. trying to prevent child abuse by abandoning the bill of rights.  I'm sorry you believe it does apply here, I simply do not share that belief.

[the goal of many of BSE policies is to "minimize controversy"]. A fine goal it is.  But maybe that's the crux of it.  I'd like to think here we just differ on what's important enough to call out as wrong.  I sincerely hope minimizing controversy is not a factor when deciding to act, even against things that are believed to be dangerously wrong.

I've benefited from the wisdom and diverse perspectives here.  Thank you for having allowed me to participate.


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Should there be an explicit policy against "Magical thinking" questions?
Do we need a stricter formal policy against magical-thinking types of questions?
Someone posted the following -- in reply to the question, Can the energy generated through meditation neutralize the covid 19 corona virus?

There needs to be a stricter formal policy against magical-thinking types of questions; they tend to get voted down into oblivion, on a know-one-when-I-see-one basis, but that doesn't really explain to people why their questions were banned.
All the health-wealth-sex-love-fame-and-success questions seem to be designed to attract only crank answers; and would have only crank answers, if they weren't promptly closed. Questions about where-can-I-find-a-truly-enlightened-guru-who-can-fix-everything seem to fall into the same category (and seem to attract unfortunate answers from messianic claimants) as well as the questions about how-can-I-physically-levitate-and-read-minds.
Questions of this sort (and the answers they receive) seem to harm the credibility of a site designed for serious academic study of historical Buddhist thought.  And more significantly have the potential to mislead vulnerable people.  People who are inclined to earnestly ask questions like that on a site like this are obviously vulnerable.  Ideally there'd be a bot that would automatically reply to mystical truth-seekers that the Buddhist Sangha doesn't and didn't exist for these purposes, citing scriptural justification from authentic suttas.
While somebody might believe that meditation "should" prevent COVID-19 infection, might feel that one karmically "deserves" to be uninfected, and might attempt to construe certain suttas to support that view... it remains that there is not one known case of meditation preventing COVID-19 infection.  It would be irresponsible in the extreme to suggest that meditation can prevent COVID-19 infection.

I guess my meta-questions here are:

Do we ever get this kind of question (as described in the 2nd paragraph above) on the site?
If so then should they be closed? Or should we allow "bad" or "crank" questions, but be stricter about answers?
If they should be closed, do we need a formal/predefined reason?
If we need a predefined reason then how should that be worded?

The predefined reasons for closing a question on this site are defined in Moderation policies for Questions -- is the following text adequate (or could it be edited to be better) as a new close reason to be added to that topic?

"Magical thinking": health-wealth-sex-love-fame-and-success questions seem to attract only crank answers; and would have only crank answers, if they weren't promptly closed. Questions about where-can-I-find-a-truly-enlightened-guru-who-can-fix-everything seem to fall into the same category (and seem to attract unfortunate answers from messianic claimants) as well as the questions about how-can-I-physically-levitate-and-read-minds.
Questions of this sort (and the answers they receive) seem to harm the credibility of a site designed for serious academic study of historical Buddhist thought. And more significantly have the potential to mislead vulnerable people. People who are inclined to earnestly ask questions like that on a site like this are obviously vulnerable. Ideally there'd be a bot that would automatically reply to mystical truth-seekers that the Buddhist Sangha doesn't and didn't exist for these purposes, citing scriptural justification from authentic suttas.

My arguments against that as worded:

We have many questions about sex (morality) and success (in lay life), which are presumably on-topic
We generally allow (and want to allow) low-quality or confused questions
This site isn't only for "serious academic study of historical Buddhist thought" but also for "practical" questions (about personal practice and personal life)
It isn't only about the the Buddhist Sangha but also laypeople and lay society
What are "the scriptural justification from authentic suttas"?

An alternative would be to create a "FAQ" topic on the main site, which provides a definitive/curated answer to "this sort of question" -- if such a thing can be defined. That would allow further instances of the same question to be closed as a duplicate.


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What's the purpose and policy of this site?
Do we need, can we have, a topic which describes or summarizes the purpose and policies of this site?
Most people (including new users) don't seem to need one, i.e. they contribute questions and/or answers and there's no problem.
Occasionally there's a user who I, as a moderator, find slightly more problematic -- sometimes I feel like I have to keep telling them, well there's "this" rule, and there's "that" rule, and there's also the "other" rule ... and all the various rules aren't clear and in one place.

There are rules in the Help about "Be nice" and about "comments" (how much to comment or not to comment), etc.; but there are many dozens of Help topics.
And there were policies expounded in Meta, about what kinds of answers we do or don't want to see on this site, about how or even whether to express your disagreement with other answers (and/or with other schools), etc.; but there are nearly 300 Meta-topics.

We already have at least two proposed-faq meta-topics:

Welcome to Buddhism.SE! is mostly positive and mostly about asking questions.
Moderation policies for Questions is again mostly positive and entirely about questions.

Whereas this topic might be more negative or prohibitive
It may be that what I'm asking for in this topic is a larger number of negative prohibitions than of positive permissions.
For example like there many prohitive 'rules' in a public swimming pool:

What you can do: swim! and not swim.
What you cannot do: spit, run, jump, fight, shoes, glass, etc.

I feel like I've written so much Meta-stuff already. Do I have to write more?
Can you say whether we need this topic, and if so what it should contain?
IMO some of the topic might be,

Not too many comments ... see e.g. Robin's summary,

And not having this back and forth "forum style" interaction is what makes this site special and different than other forums for some users. We seem to appreciate the neatness of simply providing an answer and leaving it at that as compared to being drawn into arguments via endless comments.

Answers may not need references but should have some foundation in Buddhism

Be nice

Answers (not 'advice' instead of an answer)

Use Meta not the main site, when you want to discuss the site

Avoid being rude about 'other' schools of Buddhism

I thinks we need a FAQ like: http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/7931/faq-for-stack-exchange-sites with site specific issues. Perhaps we can add a prominent link to this in our welcome message.

Also this would be interesting to go through: http://meta.stackexchange.com/questions/223674/the-real-essential-questions-of-every-beta

Obviously this site is only for questions. For example, one cannot post an article one writes. Is that correct? Thanks. Also, is there a way to contact the moderators? Thanks

@Dhammadhatu For example, one cannot post an article one writes. Is that correct? Yes that's correct (see e.g. this topic). The site is primarily intended for questions-and-answers. Also, is there a way to contact the moderators? Yes, you can 'flag' anything (any question, andwer, or comment) that bothers you; and/or you can post a new question/topic on Meta, if you want to discuss something privately; and/or post a comment if you want a a moderator to create a private chat with you.


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Post comments to help improve answers?
We have liberal policies about accepting questions (of any quality) ... but what about answers?
I noticed that Hugh was posting comments in this topic -- and I was wondering whether I can recommend posting that kind of comments, as a way to improve the quality of answers?

I think they're good comments: and, I commend the desire or attempt to improve the quality of answers; and I wouldn't mind seeing more participation (from Hugh or others) like that.

Beware that sometimes comments can be done badly, for example:

"You're wrong!"
"Your whole school of Buddhism is wrong!"

Two of the things I like about these specific comments of Hugh's:

They're specific (about what's wrong) and prescriptive (about how to improve it)
They're posted to benefit the OP, to try to ensure that answers fully address the OP's question.

Apart from benefiting the OP, it's also proper to post a comment if you don't understand the answer:

"I didn't understand this bit of your answer, could you clarify that?"
"Could you post a reference, where I might read more about what you wrote?"

If you think that an answer should be better, it's also proper to try to a post a better answer.

The one slight criticism that I have of Hugh's comments is that they impute a motive, e.g.:

you care more about making sure that Buddhism is compatible with science instead of answering OP's doubts

I don't mind writing "you" conventionally, but I avoid writing "you" when I'm writing criticism.


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How to ask questions about different traditions of Buddhism?
What questions can and/or shouldn't we ask about other or different traditions of Buddhism?
For example, what about the question, From the perspective of Theravada is SGI considered a cult?

SGI is an organization, not a school...

@yuttadhammo I'm confused about which word to use generally: school, tradition, lineage, sect, branch, doctrine, teaching, group, vehicle. I called it a "school" because it maybe it's teaching something. Should I use a term "organization" for SGI even if that's not a generally appropriate word (i.e. would I use "organization" for Theravada)? Is "tradition" a word I could always use?

Eh, maybe you're right... I'm thinking of the corporation that spreads the religion. I guess they use them interchangeably.

fwiw their 'About Us' says, "lay Buddhist movement" and "network".

The question From the perspective of Theravada is SGI considered a cult? is 'primarily opinion-based', and not a good question (not a question which encourages helpful answers)
It's opinion-based for two reasons:

By asking for, it justifies opinion-based answers: the "Theravada perspective" is expert about the Theravada tradition, and less likely to be knowledgeable on the practices of SGI.
It explicitly excludes more expert answers: because an expert answer about SGI, from an SGI perspective and by an SGI practitioner, would be off-topic.

Ask about their perspective
If you wanted to know more about SGI then you could ask, instead, "what is the SGI perspective"? Conversely if you have already decided, that you already know enough about SGI to make up your mind, then don't ask: you needn't disguise a statement as a question!
Assuming you're biased towards (or more knowledgeable about) any particular tradition to begin with, even so if you ask about another tradition you might prefer to phrase that question as if you were a student of (i.e. trying to learn more about or clear your misunderstandings of) that other tradition.
There are maybe, for example several other questions which could have been asked instead:

Ask what 'a true Buddha' means: in the Lotus Sutra; from the perspective of Nichiren's own writings; from the perspective of Nichiren's disciples; and from the perspective of SGI.
Ask for an explanation of any specific, genuine direct quote that interests you; for example the following sentence appears in the SGI dictionary:

Nichiren is regarded as the teacher of the true cause, and Shakyamuni as the teacher of the true effect

Questions could include:
What's meant by 'true cause' instead of 'true effect'?
What's the doctrinal/literary basis for saying this? Do we understand why its original author wrote this?
Does that affect the reasons for which and/or the ways in which Buddhism is practised?
Asking about a direct quote is better than asking about a misquote, a misunderstanding, or asking about some angry paraphrase of whatever they have and/or haven't taught you.
Ask about a practice: what explanation does SGI give for chanting? What effect is it meant to have? Is asking about an "effect" even the right question to ask?
Ask about a similar practice from the perspective of another tradition: does Theravada practice chanting? For what reason / intention / effect?

C vs Pascal type discussions are banned
I recommend what Andrei said in reply to another question, Which type of Buddhism is for me?

I'm afraid this will be like comparative-religion questions, answers coming from limited perspectives of mostly being familiar with "my" school and assuming it to be better ("truer") than others. If we assume that what type of Buddhism is better for you depends on you, then we could ask this as [etc.]

Also,

But you know that C vs Pascal type discussions are banned on all forums since 90s? :) The fact that question can be answered well, does not mean it will be answered well. A good question has an incline, so its answers naturally turn out good. A bad question is inclined toward flamewars, and takes extra effort and wisdom to answer well. Like that question about faith in B vs. C which I had to save.

In summary we should beware of asking questions which ask for direct comparisons of different traditions. We should especially beware of questions which ask for one tradition's "perspective" on another.
Part of what may have caused this question was the OP's reacting to some alleged claim by SGI that SGI's tradition is better than other traditions. I think that claim too is difficult to ask about well: and if you want to ask about you could ask for example, "What is good about SGI's doctrine?" or at least something more tactful than "Why is SGI's doctrine better than others?"

A bad question is inclined toward flamewars
I accept that this is a slightly artificial limitation. Even if Nichiren himself compared his doctrines with other earlier doctrines, for the sake of the "community" on Stack Exchange a question about comparisons should be asked carefully if at all.
FYI here are some highly-upvoted quotes from the corresponding policy of the Skeptics.SE site:

If someone wants to mock creationists, flat-earthers or vaccine-denialists he/she should just get a blog. This site should be objective and polite, as Robert explained in his excellent answer.
"Hostile or mocking responses to untenable claims" equals a failed site. It's really as simple as that.

Be nice.
Treat others with the same respect you’d want them to treat you. We’re all here to learn together. Be tolerant of others who may not know everything you know.
    It's not optional or reserved for people you agree with; it is a basic tenet of the site. Any hostile behavior or ad hominem attacks should not be tolerated.

The community should reject and down-vote disproportionate, mocking behavior towards any opposing ideas or people in the guise of making a VALID argument.
[...] Otherwise, this site will fail.
Trust me on this one: Users will leave this site in droves if its primary purpose is for members to pat each other on the back and tell each other how smart they are. That type of clique-ish behavior starts when "the best quip" or "best put-down" curries favor and popularity from the community. Don't encourage those activities with your support. The best way to respond is with a polite "We don't do that here."
Let's keep the questions (and answers) canonical and authoritative. If you can resist the urge to browbeat those who hold opposing ideas (whether they're on this site or not), this site will thrive.
Well said. It's never reasonable to be hostile.

Summary
I suggest that all this is a reason why some questions could be closed:

"primarily opinion-based" is already a valid close reason
Questions can also be flagged as inappropriate for respectful discourse.

Perhaps some questions should be closed until they're made more neutral (unbiased) in tone.
A possibility is:

Put the question on hold (five closed-votes by community, or flag it for a moderator to close)
Optionally create a topic here on meta to discuss how to improve that question
Optionally if (after) it has been edited/improved, then it can be reopened (five reopen votes by community, or reopened by moderator)

"Ask about their perspective" is right. I was lazy in creating the question but I can definitely break up my conclusive, loaded question about SGI into several questions or one long, thorough one referencing their source materials...

Thank you. I don't know whether there are any SGI practioners reading the site; but there may be in the future.

I've closed the question as "off-topic", rather than opinion based. It doesn't exactly seem opinion based, since I think there could ostensibly be a set of criteria by which a specific religious movement could be reasonably labelled a cult. I don't think such labelling has anything to do with Theravada Buddhism, or any Buddhism.
A part of me is concerned with censorship - obviously censorship of hate-based content is perfectly fine, but I'd like us to keep open the potential for asking tough questions like the one asking how godless Theravadins replace god. Suppose the question in question was worded "How does SGI defend their seemingly non-Buddhist doctrines like holding Nichiren to be the true Buddha and expiating karma through chanting a specific mantra?" Would it be a reasonable question then, and thus the offense here was to try and pit two schools of Buddhism against each other? Or do we want to avoid such pointed questions all together?

Well, "How does SGI defend" implies that it's being attacked,  and "their seemingly non-Buddhist doctrines" implies that their doctrines seem non-Buddhist. Removing those and any similar words from the question, and just asking about "a true Buddha", "Nichiren", "karma", "mantra", would make the question more neutral. Also "pitting two schools" doesn't seem right: the "godless Theravadins" question is addressed to Theravadins, not asking for "theists' perspective on Theravadins". And "cult" is just a vague word as well as being vaguely rude, so it's unclear what it's asking.

So I think that particular question was "unclear", and "primarily opinion-based", and "inappropriate for respectful discourse".

I guess you're right... the word cult itself is too problematic.  But how do we approach the issue of what is and what is not Buddhist?

If someone answers referencing a teacher who claims to be Hindu, I point that out in a comment (or flag it); but if a question is about a Yoga teacher who says they included Buddhist influences into their meditation curriculum, I don't complain. How about allowing questions about any tradition (or culture, or literature) which self-identifies as "Buddhist": would that cause problems? If Christians share a site, I'd like to think that Buddhists can as well (SGI are mentioned on Wikipedia's Buddhism page).

The list on Wikipedia for Schools (and Movements) of Buddhism is huge. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schools_of_Buddhism. What is and isn't Buddhism is likely going to vary by whose answering that question. I think the acid test for a question for this site is if the person is actually seeking information or looking to push their own viewpoints.

@ChrisW no, I suppose not.

There's an old Robustness Principle for computer protocols: "be conservative in what you do, be liberal in what you accept from others". So permit a wide range of questions (including other schools), but try to be careful to stay on-topic when answering them (i.e. answer within the context of the question).

An example of a question from a person looking for information: "Does the belief (or practice) of the School of X reconcile with early Buddhist teachings? Or is this a point of contention between the schools?" An example of a person pushing their own viewpoint. "Is School of X wrong because they believe Y?" Or "Is School of X a cult because they believe Y?" Skillful editing can probably turn a problematic question into one that facilitates respectful exchange.

Any question can be asked as long as it's asked respectfully and objectively and fits standard SE criteria for questions. The problem with the question we're discussing is that is was framed neither respectfully nor objectively.
People with little or no knowledge of Buddhism may come to this site for information. The tone set on a site called Buddhism.SE can shape opinions of newcomers to Buddhism. Are we practicing Right Speech? (Granted it's a site about Buddhism, not a Buddhist site; but the majority of active participants in the site indicate in one way or another that they are practicing Buddhists and as such our behavior reflects on how Buddhism is practiced in daily life.)
We have not declared some traditions of Buddhism to be valid and others invalid. That was one of the first issues discussed on this site; whether to have separate sites for separate sects and the idea was immediately discarded as impractical. Theravada and Mahayana
I did not vote to close the referenced question. My reason for this is that the OP has formed a pattern of divisive input to this site and it's something we should address and determine how we will deal with a situation where a contributor has an ax to grind and uses the site to do this. Simply closing the question without addressing the underlying "agenda" issue would only result in more questions, answers, comments in the same vein. Following are some of his contributions to the site:
From: What is meant by Namu Amida Butsu and also Nam-myoho-renge-kyo?

...not someone who is practicing to achieve one's own salvation. To practice anything after the salvation-event is to not understand that event." I don't like this. It smells of the same Christian "we are already saved, you don't have to do anything but come to church and donate" nonsense. There are so many practical Right Speech and Right Livelihood elements to the orthodox Buddhist path that are eliminated in these newer "Buddhism"s. Also, this is not a good example of Pure Land Buddhism. For a good representation I reccommend the book "The Secrets of Chinese Buddhist Meditation." –  Ahmed Jan 11 at 7:08
@Methexis How can a sect say say that the Buddhadharma is not necessary with ____? Maybe it can say that with the inclusion that one already studied and practice the other things but to have a special sect devoted to this practice... I hope the people being introduced to this practice already came from a background of heavy emphasis of Buddhist studies (cosmological, dharma, etc.) and sila and are not your typical old people scared of death and just making prayers and vows to squeeze their way into heaven... Although that still has some minor merit. –  Ahmed Jan 13 at 21:04

From: Why can't a Buddha's power just save us already? Like Jesus

@Robin111 The religion the we all practice, Shakyamuni's Buddhism has as its basic tenet self-experiment and the Four Noble Truths. Any sect, which goes against those foundational rules saying they are not necessary, is no longer defineable as Buddhism. Similarly, there are extremist sects within Islam and Christianity, which have veered far off the basic agenda that the founders established. Thus, the original religion gets blamed for the sect's idiosyncrosies, ignorance, and even pathological actions (e.g. terrorist actions). Do you see the principle? Do you see the parallel? –  Ahmed Jan 12 at 17:57
@GottfriedHelms I am over this argument. You guys are not going to get it and in the end it comes down to my "rude" style of writing doesn't it? Which by the way is perfectly precise. "Scam" is denotatively the exact word to describe these Latter-day-Religious-Sects which use the Buddhadharma's name yet being cheat you entirely of it by saying studying the rest of the Buddhadharma is not necessary, pandering to old/weak people who do not wish to study Buddhism like the science that it is. –  Ahmed Jan 14 at 16:29

I'm not trying to be Pollyanna here. But it's a slippery slope to start rudely criticizing the traditions that other people hold dear; both Buddhist traditions and religions outside of Buddhism. It's also jarring to read his comments that imply that certain schools of Buddhism are for the old, the weak, and the less intelligent.
Perhaps this should be a different thread. But this issue in it's entirety is something that should be reviewed to determine how we move forward.

If you flag these sort of comments, we can (and probably should) delete them.

Will do. Thanks. :)


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Should samatha and meditation-samatha be synonyms?
We currently have tags samatha and meditation-samatha.
They each have one or two dozen topics. Assuming we don't want to merge them (because it is a type of meditation and a word which people will search for), should they at least be defined as synonyms?
What about jhana (three dozen topics) which is described as a type of samatha meditation: should that be a synonym too?
What about samadhi too (see also What is the difference between samadhi and samatha?), should that be a synonym of samatha?
And there's also mindfulness (seven dozen questions)?

A separate topic, what about meditation-metta and metta-bhavana and loving-kindness, should these be synonyms of each other?

Anyway we need a tag cleanup.

I'm hoping people will make, agree with, or improve specific suggestions of which tags to clean and how.

Easiest is multiple tags due to spelling mistakes or spelling variations .