Earlier today, I found a mention of Meta police in a comment under Why aren't moderation tools given to people with a history of good moderation?

Allowing those who don't have "skin in the game" to moderate has its own problems. We already have complaints about "Meta police"...

Tried to search the term both here on MSO and on MSE, but found only old mentions of CW police. What does this term mean? Has it something to do with users moderating the site without participating in Q&A itself?

"Has it something to do with users moderating the site without participating in Q&A itself?" <-- that. Whether or not that is an actual thing though is not all that clear. It seems to be often used (in various forms) by users who are somehow dissatisfied with actions taken on their posts or on posts they like. –  Bart Aug 9 at 13:04
take a look at MSE post pointing out the phenomenon: 'Another half to this problem is Lounge<C++>. Not all of them and not all the time, but do a search of their room for the term "meta police"...' There is also funny discussion in the comments to that post –  gnat Aug 9 at 14:40
Here's another take on the term, by yours truly: meta.stackexchange.com/a/124455/33213 –  jalf Aug 10 at 12:27
Meta resistance never gives up never surrenders –  Cat Plus Plus Aug 10 at 12:28
@CatPlusPlus Guessing right that Meta resistance is the group that gave rise to the term Meta police and is concentrated around Lounge<C++> chat room? –  Palec Aug 10 at 12:51

3 Answers 3

up vote 32 down vote accepted

Well, it's a bit difficult to quantify, but I'll give it a try.

The "Meta police" is a term generally used to describe users who don't actively contribute to the site content, but who, in the minds of many, are there only to moderate and, in some cases, "destroy," other people's posts.

It's a term that's loosely used to refer to people who strictly enforce the rules and regulations that Stack Exchange puts in place (for good reason), and it has a negative connotation because it's usually used in a sense where one is in disagreement with said rules. The feelings also carry through because it is thought that these users who are more active on Meta than they are on the main site do not know what it feels like to have their question closed/deleted and therefore are more likely to do that to others.

It's also used to imply that people with moderation abilities/tendencies have too much power and that they use it incorrectly (this may be exaggerated by the "Meta effect").

If you see it, the best thing to do is disregard both its mention and the person who mentioned it because chances are, they're just mad about some action taken on one of their posts (or a post that they were involved in). If they are angry about an action that they feel is incorrect, well...they can bring it up on Meta!


I wish to note that the quoted comment (mine) was not using the term directly, but referring to exactly the usage you describe. –  Josh Caswell Aug 9 at 17:26
Worth noting that since the split, participation on MSO from active SO users is way, way up - I'm hoping this eventually leads to less of a perceived divide between the folks running the site and the folks talking about running the site. –  Shog9 Aug 9 at 17:28
AstroCB @Shog9 is probably right expecting divide perception to weaken. Its current prominence is very likely a heritage of MSE where voice of SO top users was only one of the many. Since the split, MSO looks like more and more like dominated by top tier SO users and it's getting increasingly harder to believe that this meta runs by users who "don't actively contribute to the site content". Almost half of top meta page is already occupied by users having 20K+ at SO and it's probably just the beginning of the rise –  gnat Aug 9 at 17:56
@Shog9 That's great, but frankly, I think one of the most amazing things about this model is the control that SE gives the community over the model in the first place. The "perceived divide" is very prominent for reasons I'm not entirely sure of: what other company allows you to post bug reports, feature requests, support requests, and host discussions about the site/company in the public eye and allows those postings to actually decide the direction of its development? How much more openness could you ask for? Why is there even a perceived divide at all? –  AstroCB Aug 9 at 18:00
@gnat That's good, but then they'll just find something else to complain about. –  AstroCB Aug 9 at 18:01
I see... "elitist police", damn it, are we really getting at this? :) Hopefully it's only because this meta is very young, at more mature per-site metas I've seen there's typically too much disagreement between top users to allow clamping them with single label –  gnat Aug 9 at 18:11
@Shog9 are we sure this is attributed to the split and not to the 4 constant links to meta from the main site? (I agree it's very positive by the way) –  Benjamin Gruenbaum Aug 10 at 6:29
The links that every other site had for years but we couldn't enable on SO until breaking off MSE? Yeah, those are probably a big help, @benjamin –  Shog9 Aug 10 at 6:35
@AstroCB so you're saying "If you see someone express dissatisfaction with Meta, the best thing you can do is to ignore it entirely". And you wonder why people are dissatisfied with Meta? I have to say, your clear "them vs us" attitude explains the term "meta police" much, much better than I could have hoped to do. –  jalf Aug 10 at 11:57
@Shog9 what about the divide between "the folks running or talking about running the site" and those who talk about neither and just contribute on SO? That's the divide I'm worried about. The divide between Meta and SE staff? I can't say I've ever been worried about that. –  jalf Aug 10 at 12:16
@jalf Exactly. If you want to be a part of the decision-making process, come here and voice your opinion. The community will make its decision and express its opinion via voting: you may be downvoted, insulted, or even mob-downvoted, but you will never be ignored. That's why this site exists. There is no "them vs. us" attitude: if they want to be "us," all they have to do is click the Stack Exchange™ MultiCollider SuperDropdown™ and Meta Stack Overflow. That's all there is to it. –  AstroCB Aug 10 at 13:35
@jalf The same logic applies from my comment above, but you may want to read this and possibly this. –  AstroCB Aug 10 at 13:41
When I talk about "the folks running the site", I'm talking about the folks contributing to it, @jalf. –  Shog9 Aug 10 at 15:14
@Shog9 oh, I see. :) –  jalf Aug 10 at 15:44
How is my "mob downvoting" question supposed to be related to this? For that matter, why is my "delete vote abuse" question related as well? –  Cupcake Aug 11 at 0:20

It's an analogue to the notions of such frustrating, high-and-mighty individuals as the grammar police, the clothing police, the noise levels police, the <insert anything here> police who have placed upon themselves the responsibility and authority to judge, control and/or otherwise laud over their topic of choice.

  • This beer is delicious.
  • That beer is terrible. Why are you drinking that beer? I don't think you should drink that beer.
  • Who are you, the beer police? I can drink whatever I want.

The meta police are annoying, pedantic bastards who spend their whole life moaning on meta about someone not following the rules to the highest degree, often without really bothering to actually contribute to SO in the way that it was intended. They're spoiling for a fight, or they want to feel powerful, or they want to cause trouble, or whatever it is.

You nailed it - "without really bothering to actually contribute to SO in the way that it was intended." –  Infinite Happiness Aug 10 at 13:30
I normally try to ignore meta as much as possible but +1 to this answer 1 million times. –  Kik Aug 15 at 17:55


Yeah, pretty much. Meta has a somewhat varied history. It's a bit similar to the age old problem that the people who seek power are the last ones you want to actually give power to.

Meta is where you go to discuss how the site should function, how it should be moderated, how it should be improved on. Some people just vent their grievances there, and some try to "leave their mark" on the site by getting "their" rules or policies accepted on Meta. And some people hang on Meta much, much more than they're on SO.

Sometimes this works out well, sometimes not so much. In the past, the Meta community has been on crusades to delete and close a lot of content on SO, which sparked a lot of outrage among those who put time and effort into all that content.

The "meta police" is a negative term for someone who strives to police SO and tell people what they can and cannot do, and forcibly remove or edit others' content, rather than contributing content themselves. Much like a real-world police force, it describes people who see their primary purpose as enforcing the rules and keeping control.

The underlying issue that some people spend most of their time sharing programming knowledge on SO (paying no attention to how the site is governed via Meta), while others spend most of their time on Meta, paying very little attention to actually asking and answering questions) has previously given rise to some big fights, and can give the impression that Meta is "out of touch" sometimes, and leads to terms like "the meta police" and other unflattering terms.

It's also why I virtually never check Meta these days. It feels fundamentally alien to me as a SO user. It is full of people who want to police and control and close and delete and discourage contributions to SO, and every time I visit Meta I get into big arguments about that. So I try not to visit Meta any more. It's easier to just stay out of it, even if I disagree with the direction it's taking SO.

Probably worth noting that the "power" available to folks on meta is the power of persuasion - you don't exactly get any extra privileges on the main site for writing stuff here, and those who spend too much time here can end up lacking the privileges necessary to actually implement anything being talked about. One of the nicer side-effects of the meta split was that folks' rep here now reflects their rep on SO - so when you see someone with 1.5K talking about how stuff should be deleted, you know they're full of it... –  Shog9 Aug 10 at 17:53
Sure, that's true. I'm not sure I would agree that it is just a matter of persuasion (there are a lot of ways to influence a crowd, without resorting to plain old persuasion), but true, formally, people here have no special power. They're just able to meet and influence each others and coordinate their actions. –  jalf Aug 10 at 19:06
Which we were doing in external forums, chatrooms, and on SO itself prior to meta, @jalf - hence the reason for meta's creation, so that these discussions wouldn't be hidden away where other interested parties could not easily find them. –  Shog9 Aug 10 at 19:31
@Shog9 Yep, I know. I was around back then as well. ;) I'm not saying it was a mistake to create Meta (although sometimes I do wonder if it might have been). It's interesting though, in the early days I thought creating Meta was the best idea ever, and that creating chat was a completely idiotic move. Today, I use chat, but I find Meta to be a largely toxic place. –  jalf Aug 10 at 22:19
I feel the same way, but with the tools switched. Days when I have a productive discussion in chat are pretty few and far between - difference in styles, I suppose. –  Shog9 Aug 10 at 22:23

You must log in to answer this question.

Not the answer you're looking for? Browse other questions tagged .