The thought policing begins in earnest...

[Bubzer]

Pointing to events that have ACTUALLY happened is now considered meta?

Let us analyze this so we can figure out exactly where this went wrong.

What is meta? DU fails to provide a definition of what meta means here, so we must rely on a neutral source for definition. For this, we'll turn to Wikipedia:

Meta (from the Greek preposition and prefix meta- (???ά -) meaning "after", or "beyond&quot is a prefix used in English to indicate a concept which is an abstraction from another concept, used to complete or add to the latter.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meta

A key component to categorizing something as meta, is the pivotal notion that the subject of that thing (in this case, the proffered comment) relies on additional artifacts/components from some other thing/concept for it's fully-fledged existence.

To illustrate this, we'll consider this fictitious example: Someone is at a craps bar. They've been playing for a bit and have enough winnings to place a sizable bet. The attendant asks everyone to place their bet. Our player puts all the winnings on a snake-eyes(a double roll of 1) bet. The attendant closes the bets, then tosses the dice. The dice come up boxcars (a double roll of 6). The player then exclaims that they really meant for all those winning to be on the boxcar space. The claim that the chips were really intended to be on a winning space is a perfect example of meta.

So, we could say meta is the attempt to use previously unknown knowledge to alter an established position to gain an advantage.

Now, lets take a look at the comment claimed to be meta:

I am so sick of the loyalty oaths and now I read where a long-time DUer wants to start another purge, yes, I said PURGE, all those not swearing blind fealty to the Democratic Party.

The two things cited as being meta are "Purges and loyalty oaths."

For those two items to be considered meta, a position would need to have been staked out, and knowledge of those two items made suddenly apparent. Proving a lack of knowledge of the two issues is virtually impossible without an admission.

I've seen the subjects of past purges brought up numerous times in my time here. Loyalty oaths have been perpetually demanded by people on this board, and attacked by other people on this board...and even specifically cited... making it even more difficult to prove a lack of knowledge of the two issues.

The other leg of establishing a thing as meta, is to show an altering of an established position that changed in order to gain advantage.

I've witnessed numerous postings from Le Taz Hot, as I'm sure many here have. I'm equally sure that many here would gladly attest that the post in question is in line with Le Taz Hot's past posts, much as I do now.

So, since DU completely lacks any definition of meta, or "disruptive meta", and the ruling fails to match up with a reasonable and neutral definition of meta, one can reasonably presume that the ruling was determined in a manor that could reasonably be categorized as arbitrary.

[MgtPA]

1. I could be wrong, but I thought meta was short for metadata.

Metadata is data about other data, so in this context, meta would be DU posts about DU.

Just guessing here.

[Bubzer]

2. Metadata is a concatenation of meta and data.

Both can be, and often are, used independently of one another.

[Bubzer]

3. Just a reminder...

If you receive an unreasonable ban from DU (which it seems like they're gearing up to start doing), or you get removed from DailyKos for crap reasons (which they've declared they're getting ready to do), Jackpineradicals over at http://jackpineradicals.org is a Bernie Sanders friendly location where you can be accepted and heard, free from thought police.

[ladyVet]

4. I thought we'd be further into the year before the site started eating itself.

Ooops!

Not the first time I've been wrong, not by a long shot.