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My own attitude has been to be relaxed about comments if there is a real mathematical (and collegial, cordial) conversation going on, but to move chat threads when they become contentious or go off the topic rails. I tend to agree with the idea that MO is somewhat sui generis among SE sites, and not all the "usual SE rules" need be followed to the letter.
No, among community-based reasons, it's just this, or "This question does not appear to be about research level mathematics within the scope defined in the help center", or a custom-built reason (user-specified). The other reasons to close are duplicate, needs clarity or focus, needs more details, and opinion-based. That's it. Might you be thinking of a different site?
I have responded here: chat.stackexchange.com/transcript/message/56897449#56897449 I understand why the situation seems confusing, but it was not deleted by mistake, and there was nothing sinister going on. The other moderators can see what happened as well.
Harry, could you please not kick up even more dust by painting moderators as taking unreasonable actions in other cases and anticipating things getting "even worse"? This is not something to be discussed in these damned comment boxes, and it's really off-topic (relative to the current thread). The whole MS saga is not to be rehashed and relitigated here.
Harry, I think it painted a very misleading picture. While I am not privy to any of the discussions Ravi has had with various people over the years, I think it's jumping to conclusions that there were groups approaching him and seeking to set policy. My guess it was more private individuals occasionally relaying concerns, or something. Maybe you could ask him. What I can say is that there have been no such groups contacting the moderators. Or at least I'm not aware of any such (and I think I'd know).
