Are spoilers a reason to get downvotes?

Question

I asked this question, it has spoilers about logan, don't click if you hate spoilers and you don't have to. It got downvoted simply because of "spoilers"! And the answer too! the good guy trying to help me got downvoted.

There's no spoilers tag on this site. Is asking questions containing spoiler something deserving a downvote?! Because otherwise my question is excellent, ticks all the check boxes for a perfect question, I even spent time making sure it's short and precise.

If "spoilers" are bad, firstly I'll delete it, secondly you'll never see me again on this site, a site which has ambiguous rules is not a site I want to be a member of, and thirdly, I must ask how to define spoilers?

This guy uploaded two videos on Logan, one of them was two weeks ago and no one complained, the other is right now. Mind you, I'm not the first one to ask about Logan on this site, or on the web.

• Should I title my question "Spoiler alert:title" It's not A SE title, it's a click bate!
• Should I downvote questions about the great wall simply because I wish to see it and haven't and the questions contain spoilers? Spoilers rule is ambiguous and unfair no matter how you look at it

Answer 1

No, they are not.

First of all, there is nothing wrong with asking a question that contains spoilers and it is absolutely no requirement to use spoiler blocks in the question body (in fact, they are discouraged if overused), neither is there or should there be a spoiler tag. Spoilers are a natural occurence on a site that discusses movies and their stories and trying to hide them only leads to problems, especially since the definition of what a spoiler is is highly subjective.

However, note that spoilers in question titles are highly discouraged and should be avoided. This doesn't mean you should prepend your question title with a "Spoiler Alert:" or append a "[spoiler]" or something like that. It means you should try to ask your question in a way that doesn't reveal major story elements. Neither does it mean you should just write something like "why did this character do that?" rather than being creative and asking a reasonable question. Especially with new releases of famous movies, it is recommended to not reveal too much in a question title (to avoid situations like this). However, this only applies to the question's title, feel free to spoil away in the question body. Whoever clicks on and reads a question about a movie he hasn't seen is pretty much on their own.

So no, please neither add stuff like "Spoiler Alert:" to your questions nor downvote questions for containing spoilers. If you see a question that clearly has a spoiler in its title, edit it out or flag it for moderator attention if you're unsure what to do. I'm sorry you had such an unpleasant experience. Stuff like that happens now and then with new releases that people could get a little emotional over. However, in its current form your question seems fine to me. Maybe people will work a little more on its title, but the immediate shock should be over.

Answer 2

Yes

not following community guidelines about acceptable posting is a reason to down vote and close vote. This is a long standing policy and as a supposedly reputable member of another stack you have no excuse for not knowing that the help pages are not all encompassing. You should know better, and your attitude demanding someone edit it instead of you fixing your own mistake is further reason to vote it down.

The current title for that question is even worse than before.

Now if you think that we should add this to the help page, you are welcome to start a new meta about that.