I've said for years that we need a better system, or filter as you aptly say.

We not only need a place for better elevated discourse, but a place for the asstrolls to play - and for them to be connected. The free-speech fun place (TruthSeeker.Party) and a serious free-thinking truth-seeking forum (TruthSeeker.Club) would exist on two Lemmy instances that would be federated together - and users could focus on the local content only or all in the federation (hopefully other filters could be developed). Maybe a third middle-way Lemmy can be a SaidIt mirror, with some bridging code - assuming the other two instances find any kind of success.

Anyone can play in the Party, while SaidIt could be mid tier home and proving ground, and only the decent are allowed to stay in the Club with the elevated serious content (no memes) avoiding timesucks and noise. Instants' discipline is openly determined by the community under the guidance of the trusted-team with enough collective brains to realize that self-management may have more drama for a while, but will work itself out as systems are proposed, developed, refined, tweaked, etc.

Each instance would have its owner's charter outlining the purpose, goals, mission, constitution, manifesto, or whatever you want to call it, to explain what the site is all about. This spirit of the site is more important than the rules, guides, etc. that can get bogged down in trivialities. This spirit would be the fundamental foundation of the community - including all the self-regulating concepts and developments that each community comes up with. Rather than by votes, karma, or other points, people would earn their status in the community by their words and actions. Respect and trust by merit. There's no shortage of folks on SaidIt who are well known by their deeds, good, bad, and ugly. The good ones can lay the foundations as the trusted-team that collectively decides how they will adopt new trustees (or kindly and gratefully relieve some) and how they will determine their own ethical management. All this done in the open so that the regular users, new users, quieter old users, and even disruptors can have a fair say. It's up to the trusted-team to be open to input, opine on issues, and keep a watch on each other, while also encouraging regular users to do likewise. This is only one aspect of many, but is most certainly lacking on SaidIt.

In short, the goal is to be as inclusive as possible with checks, balances, and filters so that the people have a say if they want it, not just for fairness and transparency, but because people need to feel like they have a stake in their community, content, and future - rather than just a free service to use and exploit.

That's just the tip.