I understand the question should answer itself, as in no, we can not. I just got thinking talking with a racist g*mer, that there are two rightly removed comments where after I give them crap. The problem is for the lurkers, that they maybe can not see the whole dialogue. Maybe removing problematic content fully is the right choice, but maybe seeing context can be useful, too? Sorry for the rambling, but, can, and should, we view removed posts?
That doesn't always work. I wanted to see a deleted comment once, but the comment wasn't removed. The modlog only showed the user being banned.
on hexbear, a deleted comment/post is usually always visible, but a purged user is not. other instances probably have things configured differently.
The only other thing I could think of is to ensure you're accessing the log from the splash at the bottom (top?) of the page, rather than any given comms' sidebar (which only shows comm-specific actions)