Why Was This Thread Removed?

As staff, we see that question a lot. Generally along with baseless accusations of a cover up, political bias or other nonsense. The following are the main reasons threads are removed:

• Something about the thread (or the majority of posts within it) violated one or several of the Terms & Conditions Of Use and greater clarification of ATS policies can almost always be found in the Index of Important ATS Threads
  
• The thread was a repeat of recent thread, there is a specific ongoing thread for the topic like Q-Anon or that subject is exhaustively covered already.
  
• The thread was really a Complaint that needed to be moved to the Staff Only forum to be handled there. Which means not all threads are trashed.
  
• The number two reason is slinging political mud outside the Political Mudpit forum.
  
• And the number one reason was that it was a minimal thread. A line of text and link is not a good opening to a thread of discussion.
  

There really isn’t a good reason why minimal posting is so common. There is even a warning every time you try to start a thread:

NOTICE: AboveTopSecret.com management is now enforcing new standards for the opening posts of threads.

Opening posts that contain minimal content, links with little or no explanation, YouTube videos with no commentary, images with little or no commentary, and similar nominal content may be removed without warning or explanation. If your topic is important to you, make sure you explain why, with links and supporting material so that our members may offer more relevant contributions, and ultimately, better threads. In fact, if you have less to say than this simple notice, then you probably do not have enough to start a new thread. Thank you for your assistance in helping to create great threads on ATS.

When you click this form-field, this message will disappear.

You may notice that there are seventeen different threads on Civility and Decorum in the Index of Important ATS Threads in the “Courtesy...and Trolls“ section and several more in the “Editorials and PSA’s” area. Why is civility so important? Because no one really wants to read a thread full of bickering back and forth. No one wants to read a thread with one third to one half of the posts removed...only thing left is to trash it.

As to why we don’t discuss actions against other members including thread removals is due to simple decent courtesy. You wouldn’t want anyone knowing your business, why do you need to know other people’s business. People like to think that the staff are all cloak wearing practitioners of esoteric arts that protect arcane magics and secrets, but the reality is that the T&C's and common sense explain all our actions. And pretty much every reason is outlined above.