Can category moderators be prevented from reviewing flags on their own posts?

Support
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1

I’m trying to understand the intended behaviour and available flexibility around category moderators and the review queue.

From previous Meta posts, my understanding is that category moderators can review flags in categories where they have category-moderator permissions, but they do not see flags outside their category. I also understand “appropriate for them” to mean scoped to their category permissions.

My question is about conflict-of-interest cases:

If a category moderator’s own post is flagged inside a category they moderate, will that reviewable normally be visible/actionable to them?

If so, is there any built-in setting, permission model, plugin, or recommended workflow to prevent or discourage self-review, for example:

  • hiding reviewables where the category moderator is the author of the flagged post;
  • allowing category moderators to review flags generally, but not flags on their own posts;
  • routing those cases to admins/full moderators only;
  • disabling flag review for category moderators while keeping other category moderation powers?

I realise a local policy can say “do not review flags on your own posts”, but I’m interested in whether Discourse has technical flexibility here, or whether this would need a plugin/customisation.

Thanks.

2

As a possible workaround, would using Trust Level 4 / Leader be a better fit than category moderator in this situation?

My concern is specifically about avoiding a conflict-of-interest case where a category moderator’s own post is flagged inside a category they moderate. From what I understand, category moderators can review flags in their category, whereas TL4 users have some elevated community powers but cannot handle flags.

So perhaps TL4 would let a trusted user help with topic organisation/community tidying without giving them access to review/action flags involving their own posts.

Is that the intended distinction between TL4 and category moderator, or are there any caveats I should be aware of?

3

I don’t think there is currently a plugin preventing (category) mods from handling flags on their posts.

I wonder why you don’t trust the people you chose as moderators not to handle flags on their posts if that’s part of the moderation policy. In that case, why do you think they wouldn’t delete a post they disagree with or even delete the author?

A theme component hiding flags in the review queue has also been discussed here: