To people who vote to reopen everything - *why*?

Question

I've noticed in the reopen queue history and 10k close page that there are at least some people who will cast a reopen vote on nearly anything they see.

I've gotta ask... why do you do this?

A bit ago, Rachel commented

@RobertHarvey I am showing the number of close votes/voters compared to the number of reopen votes/voters. I think the core problem here is summarized at the end of my answer: Your chances of getting something closed or reopened is tied to a random variable: how many people review the question at the same time as you. In the case of new open content, it is viewed by many people, including our group of "close happy" users. In the case of closed content, very few people view it, and we don't even have a decent sized group of active "reopen happy" users.

I'll say that is not completely accurate in that if there is sufficient change to the question to merit it reopening, it's actually rather easy to get it reopened. Sometimes it takes a bit of hunting for votes in chat (we can typically find 3 or 4 without bugging a mod)... but when it is something that should be reopened, the biggest challenge is finding the votes.

However, here's the thing... you've got one vote and one shot to get a question reopened. When you use your vote as a one off protest vote on everything that goes through the queue or when a question that you answered gets closed - it makes it that much harder to find the votes when something should be reopened (and try to use the reopen review rather than asking in chat or bugging a mod). Once that reopen vote times out, you can't cast it again - it is gone. So even when it does get fixed, you won't be able to cast a reopen vote on it.

If it is true that that reopening depends heavily on getting people to hit 'reopen' in the review queue rather than leave closed, why do you vote when there's no change? or when there's only a minimal change that doesn't fix the perceived issues that closed it?

And for that matter, if you honestly think it is something that should get reopened, but don't believe it will, edit it so that it is a good question that even the most hardened close voter will agree it is something that should be asked.

Tossing your votes as a one off protest vote makes it that much harder to reopen good questions when the question does get edited into shape. So why cast those votes without trying to edit the question to address the close reason and make better and unequivocally able to be reopened?

Answer 1

Speaking for myself, I cast reopen votes without edits because I have different standards for closing than you do, and believe the question stands on its own merits without needing to be "edited into shape." I could ask the reverse question of you, why you vote to close so many questions that I find perfectly fine as is? Why do you vote to close when it's possible the question will get edited later and your vote will have been wasted?

It's a simple difference of opinion. If I can find four other people that agree with me, great, and around 10% of the time I do. If I can't, so be it. I accept that as a consequence of a community-moderated site. My opinion doesn't always match the status quo.

As far as a vote being "wasted" if it's ever "edited into shape," I've never seen the situation where it didn't gather enough votes from other people. Also, the vast majority of closed questions are either edited before the reopen vote expires or not at all.

As far as "addressing the close reason," the close reasons are being interpreted extremely broadly nowadays. "Unclear what you're asking" is an especial favorite, which seems to mean anything from you put the (mostly irrelevant) code in a link instead of the question body to you should only ask questions about things you aren't extremely confused about. How exactly would you suggest fixing the latter?

Answer 2

Your question contains value statements you assume are universal. I'm guessing they're not.

• "some people who will cast a reopen vote on nearly anything they see" - They probably don't see it that way. I can't imagine anyone trying to do the wrong thing. I can imagine people holding a view of the right thing that's different than yours.
• "one off protest vote" - This phrase is pretty loaded. You're attributing motives that may or may not exist. Why do you assume a vote that's different than yours is in protest? This phrase also hints that some votes are more legitimate than others.

Another theme is "sufficient change" versus no/minimal change before a question is re-opened. I'm guessing the re-openers didn't see anything wrong with the question in the first place. Either that or it's a glass half empty/full thing. Some people think a question is sufficiently bad to be closed while others think it's sufficiently good to remain open.

Finally, I just don't think most people are interested in "hunting for votes in chat" or editing other people's questions so "that even the most hardened close voter will agree". This is a level of effort that sounds absolutely crazy to me. Maybe I'll click through a few items in a review queue, but I have absolutely no interest in writing people's questions for them or turning every closed question into a consensus building exercise. Yuck. I understand there are users who believe this is what's required and, from what I can tell, their reward is a greater say in how Programmers works. That's all fine. I just hope the hyper-active users don't seek to exclude more and more voices in the name of consensus building.