How to deal with an answer which is basically "a blog owner's opinion/interpretetion"?

Question

In recent times i found that one user is basically copy pasting posts from arbitrary/unknown blogs as answers.Many of his answers are like that with this being a typical example.

How to deal with them(such answers)?

I don't think we should allow this to continue.What do the rules say on this matter?

For Instance this is a popular mantra:

Om namo bhagavate vAsudevAya shAntAkAram bhujaga shayanam padmanAbham suresham | vishwAdhAram gagana sadRsham meghavarNam shubhAngam ||

The Devata of this Mantra is Vishnu and it is well known that this Mantra is for Vishnu.

Now, let's suppose I created a xyz blog and explained this in this way:

The Devata of this mantra is Vishnu and it is one of the name of Shiva of Shiva Sahasranama. So, this Mantra is showing Vishnutwo of Sriman Mahadeva (Lord Shiva).

Om Namo= Om represents Pranava who is Sriman Mahadeva himself and Namo here represents Lord is to be saluted. It is also seen in Namakam that Lord is to be saluted.

Bhagavate= Lord Shiva is Bhagvan as proclaimed in many scriptures, Moreover Vedas only address Sriman Mahadeva as Bhagvan for eg. See Atharvasiras, Svetasvatara etc...

Vãsudevãya= Vasudeva means who resides in everything. It is Lord Shiva who resides in everything through his AshtaMurty form. This is well described in Shatapatha and Kaushikti Brahmanas of Vedas.

Shãntãkãram= who is peaceful. This denotes the very nature of Lord SadaShiva.

Bhujagasayanam= It is Sriman Mahadeva who resides in serpent as Amsha in the form of Vishnu.

Padmanãbham= This denotes presence of Sriman Mahadeva in Padmanabha temple.

Suresham = Sriman Mahadeva is the God of God (Devadeva) it is well known.

Vishwãdharam = Sriman Mahadeva in the form of Linga is the base of this world

Gaganasadrishm= need not to be explained whose name is Digambara and Vyomakesha

Meghavarnam= It represents Nila Lohita form of Shiva. We see both blue and red coloured cloud.

Subhangam= Sriman Mahadeva has all bodily organ nice. It is also explained in Rudra Suktas of RigVeda and also in Taittariya Aranyakas Mantras like 'Namo hiranyabahave hiranyavarnaya ...'

Lakshmikantam= It is well known that MahaLakshmi is well known Shakti of Shiva denoting Rajas The other Shaktis beibg Mahakali and Mahasaraswati. One can check Varaha Purana and Shiva Purana for this.

Kamalanayanam= Sriman Mahadeva has nice eyes like that of lotus

Yogividdhyranagamyam = It is Shiva who is meditated by Yogi.

Vande Vishnum= I salute the all pervasive one

BhavaBhayaHaram: Oh Bhava (Shiva) destroy our Bhaya.

SarvaLokaikaNãtham= who is Lord of all worlds.

Thus it is proved that 'Om Namo Bhagvate Vãsudevaya ... ' mantra is for Shiva and not for Vishnu.

Now from that same blog I copied that content and pasted here and answered questions. Is this accepted in this Site?

Answer 1

Blogs which give Blog owner's interpretations shouldn't be allowed and answers which cite them as sources should be deleted.

For example, if a blog has exact Vedic Verses or Puranic verses, we can cite them in answers (without citing blog in answer) as these verses are not influenced by Blog author's intepretation. Similarly, if a blog has a particular Acharya's interpretation, we can quote them in answer without citing blog name or link. But we shouldn't allow blog owner's personal interpretations.

Coming to this answer on Sri Rudram, this answer is completely copy pasted from a blog. But Blog owner's post explains how Sri Ranga Ramanuja and Sri Parashara Bhattar are interpreting each word of the Sri Rudram. However, it would be still better ,as said above, if OP cites exact quotes of Acharyas and can explain them in his own words.

So, i think it will be better if OP edits his answer mentioning exact commentaries and explain them instead of copy pasting them completely from some blog. Other users can help OP in getting exact commentaries of Acharyas.

Answer 2

Simple Solution: Use your voting power!

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If you don't use it enough, you've only yourself to blame in the long run! And when you downvote somebody's answer, don't forget to explain your reasons in comments. Always give feedback why you didn't like it.

Also, before voting, you can leave a comment and wait for the user to clarify his or her position i.e., delay your voting.

Anonymous downvoting has to be absolutely avoided irrespective of your personal beliefs.

What do the rules say on this matter?

If you were thinking 'flag it for deletion', that's not allowed. As per current rules, anyone can write an answer citing a blog and it's valid for the site. That's why I proposed in my answer here that blogs should not be used as a reference going forward. (That brings up another interesting question, are websites like kamakoti.org and hindupedia.com blogs? Who will decide what's a 'blog' and what's an authentic 'website?')

But when the original blog owner writes the same answer here on Hinduism.SE he or she can choose to reference his blog or simply copy-paste it here. Some people might call it self-promotion, but I don't think of it like that. We should look at the content first and see if it answers the question before we jump to any conclusions. Also, take a look at this meta post: Should a famous Hindu Swamiji, Guru, Indologist, Hindu book writer etc. were to join this forum

Here's some advice from this excellent FAQ (The copy-paste issue, Hinduism version):

tl;dr Please stop posting answers that are just copied out of Wikipedia or some random blog. If you see these things and they don't cite a source, flag (either "very low quality" or "other" and specify that the post is plagiarized) and downvote. Even if they do cite a source, consider downvoting.