We all know that being a subreddit moderator is a calling and that not everyone is built to succeed as a moderator. That goes double when the subreddit in question is related to crafting, and triple when there are several simultaneous major international crises occurring that you don't want anyone to even hint at on your subreddit. Crafting should be fun, not political, and that is a fact, not a political statement that anyone can disagree with me about.

As the longtime moderator of Fiber Arts Circlejerk, a very serious and important part of the broader crafting and fiber arts community here on Reddit, I'm here to offer my insights and advice to other crafting subreddit mods during this challenging time.

Managing Crafting Subreddits in Challenging Times: A Practical Guide

Black-and-White Thinking: There is no better way to turn down the temperature in the comments of a potentially controversial post than to engage in black-and-white thinking. If one or two people report a highly upvoted post of a knitted scarf as "hate," then the post must actually be hateful and you are obligated to take it down. If a post is not universally beloved by every single individual in your subreddit, then it's clearly a bad post that deserves removal.

Rule Application: Subreddit rules are the only thing that separates us from the savages, and a moderator's primary job is to ensure the rules are applied swiftly, consistently, and fairly. Every removal should be accompanied by an explanation that ties to the rules. As long as you use the words of the rules in your explanations for why a given post or comment was removed, then you're golden. If Rule 1 of your subreddit is "no hate speech, threats, harassment, insults, or incitation" and you see a comment that warrants removal because one or two people (who may be your alt accounts) reported it as hateful or threatening, your job is to take those reports at their word, avoid doing further investigation, and point to Rule 1 in your explanation.

ModTeam and Automod Masking: To keep your karma looking squeaky clean, make use of the "ModTeam" account to explain removals. A good mod accepts downvotes for difficult decisions, but a great mod realizes she doesn't have to let those downvotes affect her personal karma scores. Likewise, you can shield your terrible politics from criticism by blaming automod for post or comment removals, especially if you pretend like you don't know how automod works and didn't set it up to work the way it does.

Comment Locking: Effectively moderating a craft subreddit means using all tools at your disposal at the appropriate time. One important tool in the mod arsenal is comment locking, both for the full set of comments and for individual comments inside a larger comment section. My philosophy around locking comments is summed up as "Early And Often." In other words, start locking comments as soon as you feel like your personal worldview may be threatened by the existence of this commenter, and lock the comments of anyone you suspect may support said threatening commenter. The moment it seems that a majority of commenters hold views you deem hateful and/or threatening is when you should lock the entire comment section and post a stickied comment lecturing your community for making you do this. They really put you in a bad position, didn't they?

Not Their Monkeys, Not Their Circus: Although explaining why a post or comment was removed and tying moderation decisions clearly to community rules are good practices for a crafting mod, don't forget that you can also decide not to offer any explanations. This is a useful tactic when you find the constant calls for transparency and accountability to be annoying or when the notifications about modmail from the whiny snowflakes who hate you for just doing your job are interrupting your knitting time. You can just remove the offending posts and go on with your day. Not only does this practice free up some of your moderation time that you'd otherwise spend sending passive aggressive modmail to ungrateful jerks whose sole purpose in their small lives is to ruin your day, but it also helps your community become stronger as they realize you're not going to let your subreddit become another Nanny State that puts feelings over facts.

Creative Interpretation: Your crafting subreddit is the best place to nurture your creative instincts, and that's not limited to the crafts you do -- you can also indulge your creative side as a mod! One of the best ways to stretch your creative muscles is to pretend like a common slogan related to a current international conflict is obviously and intentionally hate speech on its face and anyone who utters it is a budding terrorist. This allows you to then make questionable moderation decisions on the basis of your interpretation of said slogan, which may or may not be founded on a flawed or even false premise, without any nagging worry about whether you're doing the right thing. And if you lock comments, remove posts, and banhammer all the ne'er-do-wells before they can take over your subreddit, then you don't have to hear anyone else questioning your judgment! Win-win-win!

See how easy that is? Now, go forth and spread the good word of how apolitical all of crafting is!