Change the colour of flags from red to something less confronting

Question

I get the impression that when people give out flags, they feel like they're penalising somebody or putting a mark against them. I think that works against the function of flags to bring posts to our attention, since people might feel bad giving flags, and then decide not to flag a post that needs looking at. There have also been occasions where people got angry for receiving flags.

I think a more neutral colour would help shift the perception a bit, and make it feel like less of an insult. It would help people view flags as a way to attract staff attention, not just to 'report' posts for breaking rules. (For example, you could flag a post that needs its grammar fixed, has a bad title/tags, has broken images, etc.)

Something like a light blue, violet or yellow could work.

EDIT: Maybe also change the hover text as well. I don't think any post that is flagged is necessarily 'spam or inappropriate' — it should just read 'flag this post for attention from moderators'.

Comments

Good idea. Maybe if you hover over the flag, it could say "A staff member will view this question shortly", or something like that.

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I think the colours of flags should depend upon the seriousness of the question.A person who does the mistake for first time shoukd recieve yellow flag privately.This will show that the mistake is not supposed to be repeated and also the relief that no one saw it.The orange flag should be for more serious ones.Red is a strong colour and therefore should be given at the most serious ones and should be exposed

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Precisely what I'm trying to avoid is the perception that receiving a flag means you made a mistake. I want to broaden the use of flags to simply be a system that lets you say, 'Hey, people with editing/hiding powers, look at this!' There should be no shame or guilt (unless you *know* that you're doing something nasty, I guess).
It might be a good idea to have one colour of flags for posts that you think break the rules and another for ones you don't, but we could still achieve a lot by simply changing the colour once.

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Well we can accept one thing  that people will do wrong stuff purposefully

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You could make it a faint orange or grey flag icon with the number located on the flag (and if you click it, you're taken to the rules or something).

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I also suggest adding a list of "Why did you flag this" checkbox options. If the options are innocent and specific enough (No BA post for example), people won't feel as if they're penalizing another person as intensely. Also to prevent people from clearing flags when the reason isn't easy to see at first.

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This is a good idea but, at the end of the day there's always going to be someone who gets offended. :P

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what about changing the term “flag”?

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How about "Alert"?

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I like the grey flag idea.

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flags are meant to stand out anyways. making them grey would directly counteract that. any color besides red that can still stand out would work fine. also, the term alert still has a negative connotation. i propose a new system.

it would work like this:
say a post has REALLY bad grammar. you could click the "flag" button [which i personally should be some pastel color so as to not look 'threataning' or something like that] and it would pop up a little checkbox system. it could be like
Mark the problem with this post:
[x] bad grammar
[ ] inappropriate
[ ] spam
[ ] all caps / too much caps
[ ] troll post
[ ] opinionated / not answerable
[ ] duplicate
[ ] other: ____

get it? i think that would be a lot better than just a basic FLAG system. the proposed one would show a lot more about what secifically may be the problem. obviously mods and editors [experts even? idk] would be able to see the reason for flagging, along with the OP as well [to help them fix what may be the problem]. i would also suggest a person who flags something to comment or publicly say the reason so that troll flagging would be harder [at least, discouraged] and so that other users can see what and/or how the post is doing wrong, and then they can not make that mistake themselves.

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I agree with everything Flaweon said above. I, personally, think that mint / sky blue would be the best because I'm surely not biased. I would actually go with those colors because I feel like they're seeable enough but also slightly calming and to be honest...



You can't go wrong with green or blue :P

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wondering if i should make a meta post about what i put in the comment entirely so more people can see it, but im not sure.

also a light blue would work pretty good imo as well

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I think you should tbh.


Also yeah and I love light blue lol

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okay, done.

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I agree. When I got flags today, it felt like I broke the law or something. It also felt like my answers were horrible!

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I mean, it generally happenes when a post breaks the rules (or laws I guess), but yeah.

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I got a flag on an answer. I don't know why. sumwun doesn't know either...

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Sometimes things are flagged for no apparent reason. They're usually cleared, you shouldn't worry about them.

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Alright. I think I figured out why though.

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When my post gets flagged, I feel like I broke the rules or something, also like people don't like my posts, and red is a bit harsh of a color, maybe yellow?