Massive complaint about the COVID thread moderation on The New York Times PDF

The COVID thread was opened on Jan 26th.
Back then, we were all trying so hard to stay on topic—but honestly, a good chunk of us kept getting warned or banned just because we pointed out that COVID was way more serious than the flu. Nowadays, the consensus is basically that you're spreading fake news if you try to downplay how dangerous it actually is.
So, turns out some of those users who got flagged or banned back then were actually right all along...
I’m asking that all my warnings on this specific thread be rescinded.
Over the last month—especially lately—it feels like almost every single post is off-topic. We've got people arguing about historical political factions, socialism vs. capitalism, personal insults, random chat threads, even betting on daily infection numbers... it's everywhere.
Why aren't these posts being deleted or flagged?
It’s pretty absurd—back at the start, when everyone was sticking strictly to the topic, moderation was super intense (and totally uncalled for), but now? It’s a complete free-for-all.

Could someone please fix that typo in the headline? It should say "The New York Times" instead of what's there now... thanks!

Right from the jump, everything felt completely foreign to us. We were dealing with a brand-new virus, an unfamiliar illness, and a total shift in how we lived our daily lives. At that stage, the priority was making sure we didn't trigger any unnecessary panic, but we also couldn't afford to be careless about the situation, which is why we had to keep a much tighter grip on moderation. As things progressed, the impact of the virus hit everyone. Even those who managed to stay healthy were forced into isolation, often losing their income or seeing their jobs vanish overnight. People had to scramble to adapt—managing remote learning for their kids, constantly weighing whether it was safe to send them to school or keep them home... None of this stuff is considered off-topic; it’s all indirectly tied back to the virus itself. As far as moderation goes, we are still sticking strictly to the forum's established rules.

Our banned posts weren't about causing a panic. It’s been proven in the news lately that if lockdowns had been implemented earlier in North America, we would have seen far fewer deaths and infections.
The reality is just that the moderator was wrong to claim this was just like the flu—and those of us who were calling it like we saw it by presenting facts (sharing facts isn't "panic-mongering"!) got banned, even though we ended up being right.

Go ahead and pull all my cards—everything I wrote turned out to be true anyway.
And yeah, this thread is full of off-topic nonsense.
If banning people for stating specific facts was considered "too radical," then letting posts fly that have nothing to do with the topic—not to mention the tasteless guessing games about infection numbers—is just lazy.
You guys are certainly staying consistent... (in your mistakes, bad estimates, and labeling everything as panic...)

Luckily, we have you around to teach us all how it's done...

My colleague covered everything perfectly. No need for further discussion; we can lock this one away.