Why are people downvoting the MediaBiasFactChecker bot?

otp@sh.itjust.works to No Stupid Questions@lemmy.world – 347 points –

I know MediaBiasFactCheck is not a be-all-end-all to truth/bias in media, but I find it to be a useful resource.

It makes sense to downvote it in posts that have great discussion -- let the content rise up so people can have discussions with humans, sure.

But sometimes I see it getting downvoted when it's the only comment there. Which does nothing, unless a reader has rules that automatically hide downvoted comments (but a reader would be able to expand the comment anyways...so really no difference).

What's the point of downvoting? My only guess is that there's people who are salty about something it said about some source they like. Yet I don't see anyone providing an alternative to MediaBiasFactCheck...

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In America "Left / Left leaning" is to the right of "Democratic Socialists/ Social democrats" which is to the right of "Socialists/Communists". In countries where those are options, it can be confusing calling something that is on the right side of the above spectrum "left". The bot should have either a numerical score (Nazi =1, Right = 3, Left = 5, Dem Socialist = 7, Communist = 9) or it should have a "Socialist leaning" category so that people get that they aren't saying Al Jazzera is supportive of Marx

That scale breaks down at first sight, I can have 50% communist views, 30% Dem Soc views, 19% Left views, and 1% Nazi views (i.e. I want to do a Holocaust on Putin and his cronies).

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