user-1: Moderating is a very common and popular word coming from making things moderate, humble. Yet moderating in action is mostly the opposite and often does not dear to act very unwholesome. If we look at it its not a little different to censure and control.
Having maybe sees such, how should, could one act so that simply never fall into this trap. What kinds of purposes should be avoided? Would simply stick to precepts help?
What are the unwholesome purposes of moderating? Which aspirations should be avoided when doing such a task in what ever surrounding one acts?
Are there some hints found in what is called mediation which is a alternative to judge? 
What is required for a person to be able to moderate? Opinionlessness? Would such be a solution and foundation?

user254: 
Moderating is a very common and popular word coming from making things moderate, humble.

I prefer to think of it as, not making things moderate but as keeping things moderate.
Also it isn't keeping other things moderate, it's a form of self-moderation.
This site was (the people on this site were) moderate to begin with, before I came along. I don't make them (I don't cause them to be) moderate. Because most users are already moderate, this site is moderate by default: moderation is its natural state.
Having experience of this site, I've formed an impression of how moderate people's posts usually are.
If, then, someone posts something that's beyond those norms, i.e. norms of:

Politeness
Being on-topic
Answering the question
Being a straight-forward answer, not a discussion or an argument

... then I inspect it closely to see whether I should intervene to correct it.
I'm grateful to moderators who intervene, and who don't intervene, who show restraint, who help to prevent or avoid useless argument on this site.
I'm especially grateful to the users who post helpful content. Keeping the site available for them is why I want the site to exist. A theory of what moderators do is described here.
I assume that the purpose of this site is approximately as stated in this post, i.e. ...

I haven't the time for or interest in debating Buddhism on the Internet - forums abound where one may do so elsewhere
What I was looking for here was a place where I could answer specific questions about topics on which I was somewhat of an expert, under the assumption that I (or anyone) could provide the single right answer to the question as a resource for Buddhists searching for answers online, without having to deal with (much) controversy or opinion.

... although with modifications (e.g. that most types of question with a few exceptions are acceptable, and anyone can answer). The Q&A format of the site helps to minimize controversy (i.e. people write their own answers without trying to criticize each other or each other's answers).

Yet moderating in action is mostly the opposite and often does not dear to act very unwholesome.

The moderators moderate every day.
By far the most frequent moderator action is ... nothing, nothing at all: read a new post and do nothing to intervene because (in their opinion, according to their judgement) it's already moderate.
Actions of a typical moderator include:

Do nothing
Upvote or downvote
Comment or edit
Edit the tags
Welcome a first-time poster

Other forms of moderator intervention ...

Closing a question
Deleting comments
Migrating a question
Deleting an answer
Banning a user

... are rare, even very rare. That's because almost all users already understand that they can and should post questions and answers which are on-topic, inoffensive, and answerable; and that this site is meant to be used as a Q&A site, and not as a forum for discussion.
The review tools, if you're interested, show how much (or how little) intervention there has been, in the last 30 days:

Posts (questions and answers) deleted
Posts (questions) closed or migrated
And you can see the "posts migrated" there.

The only 'moderated' content which users can't see are deleted comments (but comments aren't supposed to matter anyway, it's the Questions and Answers which are supposed to matter).

What are the unwholesome purposes of moderating?

Really?

Are there some hints found in what is called mediation which is a alternative to judge?

I think we all have both (mediation and judgement in moderation):

Mediation includes editing for clarity, posting comments, discussing in chat, using Meta to discuss and vote on general policies and any specific questions and answers
Judgement mostly includes showing good judgement, being moderate, and so on -- all users are expected to (and do) show good judgement


What is required for a person to be able to moderate? Opinionlessness?

I assume you mean, "to be a moderator" or "to moderate this site".
In my opinion some of the desirable characteristics are:

Is willing to do it (some people are asked but decline)
Long experience of the site, including what's been posted on Meta (knows what's expected)
A prolific user (visits the site frequently, knows the subject matter's essentials and/or in detail)
Tolerant (allow other users to ask about various forms of Buddhism, and give their own answers)
Cooperative and/or flexible (it may be better to avoid someone whose views are so fixed, so adamant, that they can't reach agreement with other moderators and users, i.e. the community)
Some history of posting on Meta (demonstrates an interest in the governance of the site)

Also, as Gottfried mentioned, I suppose "trust" comes into it somehow. I'm not trying to say that only moderators are trusted (that would be untrue) but I suspect that if you didn't trust a user then you wouldn't ask them whether they're willing to be one of the (temporary) moderators.

user106: Although I think in fact the question concerns some specific case... but because the title sounds as a general question I'll try to give a general answer 
Nothing is constant (that's the main relation to the Buddha-dharma in focus here in Buddhism.SE); and you can be guaranteed that if you have only one (or more) constant rules, then someone some time must fall into that trap.
But I think, this is --more or less-- common sense with all people who have to do with creating rules and checking their observance.
The Buddha made his vinaya rules on concrete occasions and not as an ivory-tower, eternal, abstract system of paragraphs; and it is reported that shortly before his parinirvana he said, that "the minor rules" might be adapted if needed.
The uncertainty about, which rules were meant to be "minor" --according to the same transmission of reports--, caused the first council to decide to conserve the current state of rules ... but after one or two generations it was obvious this could/would no more be accepted or be put into practice for the greater(?) part of the sangha.                
So from this so old and ancient example we can remember that trying to absolutely prevent misbehaviour by a constant rule will be futile. And this leads then to very interesting problems which we should solve for ourselves. One among of them is the problem of giving trust to someone: trusting that he/she does not intentionally behave badly even when I feel that something happened which "broke the rules" and disadvantaged me. This trust/trusting is of course easier in a sangha of small size, where each one knows each other, than in an international SE-community where anonymity is one overwhelming basic property (and only few members seem to achieve a sort of near-personal relations).
In short, to answer the generally formulated question: it is not possible to prevent that someone falls into that trap.     
 
And to say something more than only such a specific answer: I think it is useful/helpful/wholesome to try and train to analyze oneself: to see whether one is (possibly) just cultivating the paradigm of mistrust - for example, formulating the title of the questions in a way as if it were somehow normal or commonplace or expectable, that distracting behaviour of the moderator (or of the poster, or whatever) occurs. Once you're already at this point, that you assume such a thing and state it as given, then --whether you know it or not-- you're introducing a basis of/for distrust into the community. And the source of such anonymous, under-surface emotion/paradigm of distrust shall later be very difficult to recover and to heal.

There was a story where even the Buddha could not resolve a conflict between two prominent members of his sangha (a holder of the suttas and a holder of the vinaya) and after a serious warning - which lead simply to nothing - he left the scene for some time in solitude in the forest: to let those bhikkus learn and experience the reaction of the laypeople and the alm-givers, to such self-representation of the sangha and its inability or even unwillingness to remove/resolve dissent and conflicts.           
(I'm a bit in a hurry and must stop my answer here, possibly I can come back to this later/in the evening or tomorrow, sorry)

user157: I am just going to put something in here about moderation on the site and my view of it. All the moderators here do so on a voluntary basis and do not get paid or get any particular advantage from doing so. I think it's fair to say that everyone who has moderated the site at any point (that's 6 users past and present) has done so because they want the site to a good positive place for Buddhism Q and A.
That said - no one is perfect and we are all human beings. We have and will make mistakes and will continue to do so. But I really believe that everyone that moderates does it with the best of intentions. If anyone is hurt or offended by the action of a moderator then meta is the place for a discussion. If anyone wants to discuss the principles of moderation on the site (or I'll be honest generally I think) then again meta is the place.
Realistically, I don't think anyone is going to be falling over with gratitude for the moderators. But can I just say that I am grateful to the other moderators for keeping things positive. I have been by far the least active moderator over the last few months so I am really grateful to the others for keeping things going and going in a good direction.
This might be an off topic answer but this is the stuff that this post brings up for me so I wanted to write it in.
Be well everyone.

-1: <p>Moderating is a very common and popular word coming from making things moderate, humble. Yet moderating in action is mostly the opposite and often does not dear to act very unwholesome. If we look at it its not a little different to censure and control.</p>

<p>Having maybe sees such, how should, could one act so that simply never fall into this trap. What kinds of purposes should be avoided? Would simply stick to precepts help?</p>

<p>What are the unwholesome purposes of moderating? Which aspirations should be avoided when doing such a task in what ever surrounding one acts?</p>

<p>Are there some hints found in what is called <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mediation" rel="nofollow">mediation</a> which is a alternative to judge? </p>

<p>What is required for a person to be able to moderate? Opinionlessness? Would such be a solution and foundation?</p>
 254: <blockquote>
<p><strong>Moderating is a very common and popular word coming from making things moderate, humble.</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>I prefer to think of it as, not <em>making</em> things moderate but as <em>keeping</em> things moderate.</p>
<p>Also it isn't keeping <em>other</em> things moderate, it's a form of <em>self</em>-moderation.</p>
<p>This site was (the people on this site were) moderate to begin with, before I came along. I don't make them (I don't cause them to be) moderate. Because most users are already moderate, this site is moderate by default: moderation is its natural state.</p>
<p>Having experience of this site, I've formed an impression of how moderate people's posts usually are.</p>
<p>If, then, someone posts something that's beyond those norms, i.e. norms of:</p>
<ul>
<li>Politeness</li>
<li>Being on-topic</li>
<li>Answering the question</li>
<li>Being a straight-forward answer, not a discussion or an argument</li>
</ul>
<p>... then I inspect it closely to see whether I should intervene to correct it.</p>
<p>I'm grateful to moderators who intervene, and who don't intervene, who show restraint, who help to prevent or avoid useless argument on this site.</p>
<p>I'm especially grateful to the users who post helpful content. Keeping the site available for them is why I want the site to exist. A theory of what moderators do is <a href="http://blog.stackoverflow.com/2009/05/a-theory-of-moderation/">described here</a>.</p>
<p>I assume that the purpose of this site is approximately as stated <a href="https://buddhism.meta.stackexchange.com/q/1711/254">in this post</a>, i.e. ...</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I haven't the time for or interest in debating Buddhism on the Internet - forums abound where one may do so elsewhere</p>
<p>What I was looking for here was a place where I could answer specific questions about topics on which I was somewhat of an expert, under the assumption that I (or anyone) could provide the single right answer to the question as a resource for Buddhists searching for answers online, without having to deal with (much) controversy or opinion.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>... although with modifications (e.g. that most types of question with a few exceptions are acceptable, and anyone can answer). The Q&amp;A format of the site helps to minimize controversy (i.e. people write their own answers without trying to criticize each other or each other's answers).</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>Yet moderating in action is mostly the opposite and often does not dear to act very unwholesome.</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>The moderators moderate every day.</p>
<p>By far the most frequent moderator action is ... nothing, nothing at all: read a new post and do nothing to intervene because (in their opinion, according to their judgement) it's already moderate.</p>
<p>Actions of a typical moderator include:</p>
<ul>
<li>Do nothing</li>
<li>Upvote or downvote</li>
<li>Comment or edit</li>
<li>Edit the tags</li>
<li>Welcome a first-time poster</li>
</ul>
<p>Other forms of moderator intervention ...</p>
<ul>
<li>Closing a question</li>
<li>Deleting comments</li>
<li>Migrating a question</li>
<li>Deleting an answer</li>
<li>Banning a user</li>
</ul>
<p>... are rare, even very rare. That's because almost all users already understand that they can and should post questions and answers which are on-topic, inoffensive, and answerable; and that this site is meant to be used as a Q&amp;A site, and not as a forum for discussion.</p>
<p>The review tools, if you're interested, show how much (or how little) intervention there has been, in the last 30 days:</p>
<ul>
<li><a href="https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/tools?tab=Delete&amp;daterange=last30days">Posts (questions and answers) deleted</a></li>
<li><a href="https://buddhism.stackexchange.com/tools?tab=close&amp;daterange=last30days">Posts (questions) closed or migrated</a></li>
<li>And you can see the &quot;posts migrated&quot; there.</li>
</ul>
<p>The only 'moderated' content which users can't see are deleted comments (but comments aren't supposed to matter anyway, it's the Questions and Answers which are supposed to matter).</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>What are the unwholesome purposes of moderating?</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>Really?</p>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>Are there some hints found in what is called mediation which is a alternative to judge?</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>I think we all have both (mediation and judgement in moderation):</p>
<ul>
<li>Mediation includes editing for clarity, posting comments, discussing in chat, using Meta to discuss and vote on general policies and any specific questions and answers</li>
<li>Judgement mostly includes showing good judgement, being moderate, and so on -- all users are expected to (and do) show good judgement</li>
</ul>
<blockquote>
<p><strong>What is required for a person to be able to moderate? Opinionlessness?</strong></p>
</blockquote>
<p>I assume you mean, &quot;to be a moderator&quot; or &quot;to moderate this site&quot;.</p>
<p>In my opinion some of the desirable characteristics are:</p>
<ul>
<li>Is willing to do it (some people are asked but decline)</li>
<li>Long experience of the site, including what's been posted on Meta (knows what's expected)</li>
<li>A prolific user (visits the site frequently, knows the subject matter's essentials and/or in detail)</li>
<li>Tolerant (allow other users to ask about various forms of Buddhism, and give their own answers)</li>
<li>Cooperative and/or flexible (it may be better to avoid someone whose views are so fixed, so adamant, that they can't reach agreement with other moderators and users, i.e. the community)</li>
<li>Some history of posting on Meta (demonstrates an interest in the governance of the site)</li>
</ul>
<p>Also, as Gottfried mentioned, I suppose &quot;trust&quot; comes into it somehow. I'm not trying to say that only moderators are trusted (that would be untrue) but I suspect that if you didn't trust a user then you wouldn't ask them whether they're willing to be one of the (temporary) moderators.</p>
 106: <p><em>Although I think in fact the question concerns some specific case... but because the title <strong>sounds</strong> as a general question I'll try to give a general answer</em>         </p>

<p>Nothing is constant (that's the main relation to the Buddha-dharma in focus here in Buddhism.SE); and you can be guaranteed that if you have only one (or more) constant rules, then someone some time <strong><em>must</em></strong> fall into that trap.
But I think, this is --more or less-- common sense with all people who have to do with creating rules and checking their observance.
The Buddha made his <em>vinaya</em> rules on concrete occasions and not as an ivory-tower, eternal, abstract system of paragraphs; and it is reported that shortly before his <em>parinirvana</em> he said, that "the minor rules" might be adapted if needed.</p>

<p>The uncertainty about, which rules were meant to be "minor" --according to the same transmission of reports--, caused the first council to decide to <em>conserve</em> the current state of rules ... but after one or two generations it was obvious this could/would no more be accepted or be put into practice for the greater(?) part of the sangha.                </p>

<p>So from this so old and ancient example we can remember that trying to <em>absolutely prevent</em> misbehaviour by a <em>constant rule</em> will be futile. And this leads then to very interesting problems which we should solve for ourselves. One among of them is the problem of giving trust to someone: trusting that he/she does not intentionally behave badly even when I feel that something happened which "broke the rules" and disadvantaged me. This <strong><em>trust/trusting</em></strong> is of course easier in a sangha of small size, where each one knows each other, than in an international SE-community where anonymity is one overwhelming basic property (and only few members seem to achieve a sort of near-personal relations).</p>

<p>In short, to answer the generally formulated question: it is not possible to prevent that someone falls into that trap.     </p>

<p><hr> 
And to say something more than only such a specific answer: I think it is useful/helpful/wholesome to try and train to analyze oneself: to see whether one is (possibly) just cultivating the <em>paradigm of mistrust</em> - for example, formulating the title of the questions in a way as if it were somehow normal or commonplace or expectable, that distracting behaviour of the moderator (or of the poster, or whatever) occurs. Once you're already at this point, that you assume such a thing and state it as given, then --whether you know it or not-- you're introducing a <strong><em>basis</em></strong> of/for <strong>distrust</strong> into the community. And the source of such anonymous, under-surface emotion/paradigm of distrust shall later be very difficult to recover and to heal.</p>

<p>There was a story where even the Buddha could not resolve a conflict between two prominent members of his sangha (a holder of the suttas and a holder of the vinaya) and after a serious warning - which lead simply to nothing - he left the scene for some time in solitude in the forest: to let those bhikkus learn and experience the reaction of the laypeople and the alm-givers, to such self-representation of the sangha and its inability or even unwillingness to remove/resolve dissent and conflicts.           </p>

<p><em>(I'm a bit in a hurry and must stop my answer here, possibly I can come back to this later/in the evening or tomorrow, sorry)</em></p>
 157: <p>I am just going to put something in here about moderation on the site and my view of it. All the moderators here do so on a voluntary basis and do not get paid or get any particular advantage from doing so. I think it's fair to say that everyone who has moderated the site at any point (that's 6 users past and present) has done so because they want the site to a good positive place for Buddhism Q and A.</p>

<p>That said - no one is perfect and we are all human beings. We have and will make mistakes and will continue to do so. But I really believe that everyone that moderates does it with the best of intentions. If anyone is hurt or offended by the action of a moderator then meta is the place for a discussion. If anyone wants to discuss the principles of moderation on the site (or I'll be honest generally I think) then again meta is the place.</p>

<p>Realistically, I don't think anyone is going to be falling over with gratitude for the moderators. But can I just say that I am grateful to the other moderators for keeping things positive. I have been by far the least active moderator over the last few months so I am really grateful to the others for keeping things going and going in a good direction.</p>

<p>This might be an off topic answer but this is the stuff that this post brings up for me so I wanted to write it in.</p>

<p>Be well everyone.</p>
