You write that "it would be a very dysfunctional world if everything were entirely subjective." The author's claim states that bullying is not a subjective thing defined by the perceptions of the bully.
See? If you just put in half an ounce of effort to minimize conflict, you're agreeing with each other! Try it sometime!
https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
Please note this guideline too: "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith." I don't think there's a plausible interpretation of the GP comment as being "all in his face"—it was responding to a general question raised by the specific drama, which seems within the intended use of this site. Maybe it's a bad point, I don't know—certainly if you think it is, you're welcome to say why—just not by being snarky or by accusing another user unfairly, which I think you've done in both this comment and https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26780092.
Also, re that last one, please note the site guideline about not using allcaps for emphasis. It's not the most important point but it makes a significant difference to the threads.
I understand that you have many of the same issues to deal with, in terms of thankless moderation. You don't need people harassing you about your decisions on a day to day basis either! But this is important to me, and I think it is important that you are informed that you are being a bully supporting bullies.
As for myself, I'd much, much rather have you ban me from this site forever, rather than apologize in the slightest for any word choice that I have used here today; all of my words are in earnest and snarkless. Please consider this, likewise, an earnest invitation for you to use your discretion in the matter, if you believe it will improve the site. It's only 9538 karma, not that much in the scheme of things.
I would add that if you really want really consistent applications of style-guide things like all caps — and not, say, some tool where you can use style deviations a tool to throw at people when they annoy you — please consider writing a linter for comments offering suggestions to this effect before they are posted.
The main point, though, is that you gave another user's comment an unfair interpretation and then went after them repeatedly (and frankly aggressively) for it. That's not "word choice", let alone spelling. That's about how we treat each other in the community. I'm sorry for having distracted from that by bringing up the allcaps rule, but to my eye (ear?) it did add to the aggressive quality of https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26780092.
Even if your claim is true, it generally works better to lay out a weak moderation case rather than to make the strongest one.
Also, the stronger the case you mount, the higher the odds that you've misinterpreted someone.
Those are two separate issues, btw. The first is about effectiveness, the second is about risk. Taking on higher risk for lower effectiveness is a bad trade, so I try not to do that.
Intention is notoriously difficult to assess, especially online. If you make claims about someone's intention, they will usually say "that wasn't my intention". That just distracts from what was concretely wrong about a comment. Moreover, the community—which is the jury—is less likely to support claims about intention than specific things one can point to in a post. So again, it makes moderation less effective while putting it in a riskier position—another bad trade!
Huh? How am I "in his face"? This is Hacker News. We discuss posts. Sometimes people disagree. After having read the article, I am discussing a direct quote from it. Or do you think we should only discuss things upon which we agree?
>The author's claim states that bullying is not a subjective thing defined by the perceptions of the bully.
Where, in the article, do you see the author make this claim? To my reading, the implication by the author is that bullying is subjectively defined by the victim of bullying. The author does not point to any kind of code of conduct or standard (or lack thereof) by which the alleged bullying can be judged.
Because this poor guy's telling us, "I can't take this anymore," that his volunteering experience was so damn combative and miserable that he quit, and he just wants peace..
And now here you are saying "yeah? well what STANDARDS does he propose by which we can evaluate the VALIDITY OF THE BULLYING?!?" and ... like, come on. It's combative, it's insensitive, and it's an altogether inappropriate demand — you don't get to expect a treatise in the "bullying was too bad, so I quit" letter, even by way of hyperlink.
In short, by embodying the problem that made him quit and applying that problem to his quitting.