A reminder about the downvote button from the mods

This is a reminder from the mod team about voting culture on r/mormon.

This subreddit exists for faithful, nuanced, and critical perspectives on Mormonism to be discussed side by side. That only works if all three can actually be seen. We would like the downvote button to signal "this comment is low quality or doesn't contribute to the discussion", not "I disagree with this."

We know how the button actually gets used, here and everywhere else on Reddit. We are not naive about that, and we can't control your votes and wouldn't want to. But we'd ask you to consider what happens when disagreement alone drives voting in a sub like this one. A civil, substantive comment from a minority perspective gets pushed to the bottom and collapsed, the person who wrote it concludes that participation isn't worth it, and the sub drifts toward being an echo chamber that no longer hosts the conversations it was built for. That outcome is worse for everyone, including the majority. A discussion sub where one side has left isn't a discussion sub.

So before you downvote, one question: is this comment badly reasoned, uncivil, or off topic, or does it just reach a conclusion you don't share? If it's the latter, the better tools are the upvote button on the replies you agree with, or a reply of your own. A good comment you disagree with is exactly the kind of content this sub is for.

To our believing participants, we know it can be rough to watch civil, and even well reasoned comments sit in the negatives. Votes are not moderation and don't reflect the mod team's view of your contributions. The rules here are enforced the same regardless of perspective, and when they aren't, we want to hear about it in modmail.

In short, the mods' ask is that everyone report rule violations instead of downvoting them, and vote on quality instead of agreement.

As always, thank you all for your participation in r/mormon.

- the r/mormon mod team