Why is it one person's right to defend sexism/racism/flat earthism but it's not my right to ignore them? Are they _really_ going to give me a new perspective? Are they _really_ going to find an argument that I haven't read? I don't believe in censorship by third parties, but I believe what I put into my eyes and ears should be my choice. People can be rude, or offensive, or even abusive.As a dedicated advocate of free speech, I was initially rather put off by the right to mute. I think that if someone wants to argue anything – even that the world is flat – it does us more harm to shut them up than it does to go through the minor tedium of refuting them.
I see no ethical justification for ignoring people – but I understand that this is my standard and not necessarily everyone else’s.
You have a right to, you just pay a price for exercising that right. You don't know that there isn't at least something valuable in their argument, and you also don't know there isn't something valuable they have to say on an unrelated topic.
There's a difference between "mute" and "ignore". If I muted you, you wouldn't be able to reply to anything I've posted (including entire link posts). If I ignored you, I simply wouldn't see your posts. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong, I haven't actually used either one of these functions yet.) I think that ignore is a very useful tool to have, while mute is rather harsh and unnecessary.
I don't have a problem with either of these, why should an abusive person be able to reply to my posts? Why should one person be only given the power to ignore, while another person still has the power to follow someone around and reply? If this is between me and another party, what is the harm? Nobody is deciding for me, and I can make decisions based on my own experiences on what I want to see, sounds like a win-win.There's a difference between "mute" and "ignore". If I muted you, you wouldn't be able to reply to anything I've posted (including entire link posts). If I ignored you, I simply wouldn't see your posts. (Someone correct me if I'm wrong, I haven't actually used either one of these functions yet.)
While I agree with your argument, I think "mute" has too much of an opportunity to be abused. You are effectively censoring a viewpoint from everyone else when you mute. Let's say I post something controversial, and simply mute everyone who disagrees with me. Now, the conversation looks completely one-sided. Clearly if it's an abusive individual who just follows you around Hubski and calls you dumb whenever you post, it's a useful tool. I still think it would be better if you just ignored that person rather than muted them in this case, too, however.
Is the mute global or is it just limited to that one person? Say you muted me, does that mean someone like swedishbadgergirl wouldn't be able to see my posts anywhere on-site?