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Should I leave it as it is, or leave a comment to this, or flag for moderator attention and explain my mistake?

I do not want to draw attention to the specific question this is why I do not link it here.

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There is no way at all to undo a flag. In most cases I would suggest to just do nothing and accept that your flag is going to be declined.

Moderators generally examine the case before acting, so a wrong flag tends to only waste a bit of moderator time, but in most cases does not lead to wrong results.

Personally I'd just keep an eye on the post, and if you notice that your flag lead to a wrong decision, just reflag and explain. This is something I could imagine happening in situations where a quick read leads to a too quick conclusion, but on looking closely the post is not problematic at all. This is pretty rare, in most cases I'd expect nothing to happen due to one mistaken flag.

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Flagging for moderators is might not an option. [E.g., one cannot flag as spam and then for moderators (at least not close in time/before the flag is handled); this is different for other flags though, see comments.]

Especially if there is risk of confusion, and if you do not mind doing so, leaving a comment could make sense. I sometimes already saw a comment mentioning inadvertent flagging (mainly for comments where upvote and flag are close together).

But in most cases I think one also could just leave it. It is to be expected there is some rate of error with flags (especially for flags since they are accesible to almost everybody), so it should not be something very unusual for moderators to get an 'incorrect' flag. Also, for some of the flags even certain users see them and can endorse or also contradict them, so handling flagging errors is built in anyway.

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  • $\begingroup$ Thank you, but I have to contradict you in one point. I just succeeded in flagging for moderator attention additionally to a "close" flag to test this. (I hope the moderators don't get mad :-)) $\endgroup$
    – András Bátkai
    Jan 4, 2014 at 22:04
  • $\begingroup$ You are welcome and thanks for the info. This is interesting; this should depend on the flag one used. I recalled it from happening to me reltated to a spam flag (it was not cast error but I then wanted to inform moderators about something related to the issue and it did not work). This is still the case (for spam) as I just checked. I strongly assume it would be the same for 'offensive.' Not sure about the others. [THinking about it, it could also depend on whether the first flag is still active.] $\endgroup$
    – user9072
    Jan 4, 2014 at 22:14
  • $\begingroup$ Ok, so it depends on the particular flag. After "close" flag, it seems you can additionally flag for moderators, after "spam" not anymore... I speak of a still "active" flag. $\endgroup$
    – András Bátkai
    Jan 4, 2014 at 22:15
  • $\begingroup$ You could try what happens for "not and answer" on this answer. $\endgroup$
    – user9072
    Jan 4, 2014 at 22:21
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    $\begingroup$ I flagged as "not an answer" and then flagged for moderator attention. It works. $\endgroup$
    – András Bátkai
    Jan 4, 2014 at 22:24
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    $\begingroup$ @AndrásBátkai Nope; not mad at all. Go ahead and experiment. :-) $\endgroup$
    – Todd Trimble Mod
    Jan 4, 2014 at 22:24
  • $\begingroup$ @AndrásBátkai Some info from meta.SO meta.stackexchange.com/questions/176910/… and meta.stackexchange.com/questions/165376/… Also I just checked that now that my spamflag got declined I can again flag for moderators. $\endgroup$
    – user9072
    Jan 4, 2014 at 22:48

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