The mods do a decent job, I commend them. Articles get flagged by users. Users have a wide spectrum and differing opinions on what is relevant to be discussed here.

In my experience, articles directly related to tech, like diversity in tech will stay open to comments for a long time before mods respond to flags and lock it, allowing a decent amount of discourse.

Articles that are science, but not directly related to tech (white supremicist shooting research) tend to be shut down faster if they are flagged. Why do users flag them? Probably because the arguments, potentially from either side make them uncomfortable and they’d rather it not be discussed here. The mods are just responding to user flags.

I have seen threads get uncivil, at which time the mods will lock them down, which I think is also fine.