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Really, is this question detrimental to SE? Should it be wiped out? Closing as "opinion-based" wasn't enough?

Delete vote

(I didn't ask for opinions. I asked for arguments, pros and cons. How else is anyone supposed to analyze any but the most trivial of problems?)

And yes, sure, the question wasn't deleted, but the mere existence of a delete vote is upsetting. I spent so much time researching that question, it got upvotes, a similarly well-researched answer, so it's clearly been useful to some people. But apparently someone thinks all these people, plus those unseen, plus future ones, should be deprived of that discussion.

Why?

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  • Playing devil's advocate, let's say we allow all such questions, including tabs vs. spaces, the One True Brace Style, and all the other usual eternal programmer arguments. What do you suppose the site would eventually look like? My prediction. -- See also.
    – Robert Harvey
    Jun 1, 2020 at 20:17
  • @RobertHarvey: that's an unimpressive slippery slope. When interesting questions were allowed on SO and the site wasn't so negative, it looked like this. I'm not saying we should keep spam on the site.
    – Dan Dascalescu
    Jun 2, 2020 at 21:43
  • Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, I guess. I find none of those questions even remotely interesting. Entertaining? Yes. Interesting? Not at all.
    – Robert Harvey
    Jun 2, 2020 at 21:45
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    @RobertHarvey Might at least generate some activity. Might look how the site looked some years back when people of all sorts were enthusiastically participating even on topics like whether or not to cast the results of malloc in C. I don't see what there is to lose even if it devolves into arguments about the once true brace style, or tabs vs spaces, since that's at least generating activity. And I don't see what there is to lose for people browsing their feeds when we're already, and probably always will be, flooded with VLQs.
    – user377672
    Oct 26, 2020 at 10:56

1 Answer 1

Reset to default
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I don't understand why the existence of a single delete vote is an issue.

Votes to delete should not be taken any differently than up votes, down votes, or votes to close. They are all expressions of individuals on the value of the content to the community. Unless deleted by a moderator, it takes several votes to delete a post.

In the case of this question, I think that it's highly unlikely that it will get sufficient votes to delete in order to delete the post. If that does, though, feel free to raise it for review by flagging it or asking about it here on Meta. There's no need to be concerned over an individual expressing their opinion about a question.

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    The mechanisms by which that individual reached the conclusion that the question should be eradicated, are worrying to me. They signify that the SE guidelines are unclear enough, and it's OK to delete good content, which has long been a problem plaguing StackExchange. One vote leads to another. This question wasn't even closed for a full year before the first close vote. Now it's off-topic.
    – Dan Dascalescu
    May 30, 2020 at 22:44
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    @DanDascalescu The question is not off-topic. It's opinion-based. There's a difference. And it's normal for some questions to be missed and a vote will bump it into a queue for additional review and voting. However, this is why only moderators can take unilateral action on posts. It allows every individual to express their beliefs and raise posts for further review. Rather than raising concern about a vote, raise concerns about the final action taken - such as if that post is deleted. I highly suspect it would be undeleted - I know that if the community voted to delete it, I would undelete it.
    – Thomas Owens Mod
    May 30, 2020 at 23:58

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