Asking specifically because of the situation over at !worldnews. I see that recently, there has been an open call for moderators - https://lemmy.ml/post/5277453 - with the following requirements:
“You have to be on the lemmy.ml instance” and “Should have a history of activity here”
Are these the only requirements really? Because I think that moderators have quite some extraordinary power within a community, to the point that they can just censor whatever is unpleasant to their personal opinion, as if it were violating the community’s rules when in fact it’s not.
(For instance, see the modlog over at !worldnews https://lemmy.ml/modlog/14788 - where everyone expressing doubts about the justification to call “genocide” the Israeli reaction to the Hamas terror attacks is banned. I just think that moderators should show some sense of the actual power they possess and be careful to exhibit it. As in the case above, despite the atrocities of war, there’s good reason not to speak of genocide - and even if that’s not the moderators’ opinion, expressing doubt about the justification to call it so does not violate the community’s rules.)
To some extent sure, mods you don’t like are unavoidable. Guess I just want to stress the importance of some awareness that active moderation comes with responsibility, and that includes at least trying to be aware of your own biases, and questioning to what extent the community’s rules legitimize your actions.
When I find a community I might be interested in, I check their rules and if I’m ok with them - go for it. Just damn frustrating to run into mods themselves violating the community’s rules.