cross-posted from: https://feddit.nl/post/16246531

I feel like we need to talk about Lemmy’s massive tankie censorship problem. A lot of popular lemmy communities are hosted on lemmy.ml. It’s been well known for a while that the admins/mods of that instance have, let’s say, rather extremist and onesided political views. In short, they’re what’s colloquially referred to as tankies. This wouldn’t be much of an issue if they didn’t regularly abuse their admin/mod status to censor and silence people who dissent with their political beliefs and for example, post things critical of China, Russia, the USSR, socialism, …

As an example, there was a thread today about the anniversary of the Tiananmen Massacre. When I was reading it, there were mostly posts critical of China in the thread and some whataboutist/denialist replies critical of the USA and the west. In terms of votes, the posts critical of China were definitely getting the most support.

I posted a comment in this thread linking to “https://archive.ph/2020.07.12-074312/https://imgur.com/a/AIIbbPs” (WARNING: graphical content), which describes aspects of the atrocities that aren’t widely known even in the West, and supporting evidence. My comment was promptly removed for violating the “Be nice and civil” rule. When I looked back at the thread, I noticed that all posts critical of China had been removed while the whataboutist and denialist comments were left in place.

This is what the modlog of the instance looks like:

Definitely a trend there wouldn’t you say?

When I called them out on their one sided censorship, with a screenshot of the modlog above, I promptly received a community ban on all communities on lemmy.ml that I had ever participated in.

Proof:

So many of you will now probably think something like: “So what, it’s the fediverse, you can use another instance.”

The problem with this reasoning is that many of the popular communities are actually on lemmy.ml, and they’re not so easy to replace. I mean, in terms of content and engagement lemmy is already a pretty small place as it is. So it’s rather pointless sitting for example in /c/[email protected] where there’s nobody to discuss anything with.

I’m not sure if there’s a solution here, but I’d like to urge people to avoid lemmy.ml hosted communities in favor of communities on more reasonable instances.

  • muculent@lemmy.world
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    3 hours ago

    These are just my thoughts based on what I’ve read so far. Do what you will with it. This is just my general advice.

    If you like a community on an instance, make friends on it. If you network with enough individuals that feel the same way about a community that you do, fork that community onto a new instance and carry on. I see others weighing in on too much control, not enough control, defederate, remove moderator or admin control from individuals that censor, ban, on lean one direction over another. You’ll find these power dynamics are more prevalent or less prevalent depending on the instance you’re on or communities your partipate in. If you feel strongly enough about it, be the change you want to see and determine what best course of action you should take that is within your power. Whatever you choose I hope you find or potentially create a community or instance that works best for you.

  • Dasus@lemmy.world
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    7 hours ago

    One of the mods over there is a Russian who refuses to answer whether he’s pro-Russian or not, says Russian propaganda doesn’t exist, pretends to be American while intensely engaging in American threads, denies Uighur genocide, etc etc etc.

    https://lemmy.world/u/[email protected]

    https://lemmygrad.ml/u/davel

    He has some older account where there was Russian being used but I think he may have deleted it or I just can’t be arsed to look enough rn.

    Anyway, one of the clearest pro-Russian trolls I’ve seen. Lemmy.ml is full of them, I don’t know why lemmy.world federates with them.

    • davel@lemmy.ml
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      1 hour ago

      Wait, now I’m a Russian pretending to be an American? This tale gets taller every time you tell it 😂

      He has some older account where there was Russian being used but I think he may have deleted it or I just can’t be arsed to look enough rn.

    • szynaptic@lemm.ee
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      3 hours ago

      Because LW is just as bad.

      .ml is run by angry tankie assholes.

      LW is run by moral superiority assholes.

      Assholes, assholes everywhere.

        • szynaptic@lemm.ee
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          2 hours ago

          I expected this type of response from idiots who think “omg this guy insulted my instance… that means they insulted me!!!

  • Gammelfisch@lemmy.world
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    8 hours ago

    My post criticizing China’s high-speed rail network was yanked. I was surprised and immediately thought of Reddit.

    • DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social
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      7 hours ago

      I’d say it’s the love of social heirarchy but tomato tomatoes, as the red scare nonsense in this thread proves.

      You’ve got morons babbling about .ml users being “security threats to the fediverse” LMAO, shitlibs will never change, and I say that as someone that got instance banned from .ml for saying federal representative democracies are, by definition, a form of democracy.

    • OpenStars@discuss.online
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      10 hours ago

      Genuine question: HOW though?!? I’ve user-blocked the entire instance, yet I see those comments basically everywhere I go, plus they used to not be able to reply to me and have a notification sent to me, but now on 0.19.5 that seems to have been un-done. In no way is a user-block like a personal defederation.

      Also, fully 100% (not making this up) of everyone that I have told Lemmy about irl has said that this issue is why they refused to join the Fediverse. As the number of alt accounts goes up (some of them mine) yet the total number remains mostly constant, that spells doom for us eventually.

      And it is not fair to the users of lemmy.ml either, for the rest of us to see the instance they come from and immediately brace ourselves for an onslaught - thereby potentially misinterpreting what they say, just b/c their fellows are so arrogant and insensitive and we have come to expect that from them.

      The whole “just ignore the cancer and it will go away” approach leaves much to be desired, imho. Feel free to do as you please, but that’s not what I am talking about: you asked, and as a result now you know some (certainly not all) of the reasons why others may not wish to do the same.

  • P4ulin_Kbana@lemmy.eco.br
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    7 hours ago

    Man, I just wished I couldn’t have to worry about political ideologies and extremism, it surely feels like Twitter, except the extremism comes from the left. The worst thing is that Lemmy’s developers support these stuff…

  • socsa@piefed.social
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    13 hours ago

    Honestly I think the .ml folks have shown themselves to be such zealots that they should be considered a potential security threat to the broader fediverse.

    The more places defederate from them, the more opportunity and initiative there will be for alternatives to their largest communities to grow.

    • kuato@lemmy.world
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      7 hours ago

      This is the most hyperbolic take yet 😂 I can no longer sit back and allow Communist infiltration, Communist indoctrination, Communist subversion and the international Communist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious fediverse memes.

      Edit to add: oic, your alts keep getting banned

      • imaqtpie@lemmy.myserv.one
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        7 hours ago

        It also has less users than sh.itjust.works and lemm.ee. And way less compared to lemmy.world but I guess they aren’t linked on the joinlemmy site for some reason

        • WanderingVentra@lemm.ee
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          2 hours ago

          It was removed from it to avoid over centralization on the fediverse. It already has like 80% of users

        • finitebanjo@lemmy.world
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          8 hours ago

          Fully anonymous porn viewing is something very much coveted, and there is also a huge industry whose target audience is net denizens so you could also make an argument that the number of users is inflated by the industry users.

          • P4ulin_Kbana@lemmy.eco.br
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            7 hours ago

            I mean, I don’t believe it’s really that anonymous, and it’s an actual “industry”, more of people posting their photos.

  • electric_nan@lemmy.ml
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    10 hours ago

    If all you want to see are opinions and memes that fit within the political confines of the New York Times, then .ml probably isn’t for you. Lemmy.world has taken a very brave (and rare!) stance of being a champion of neoliberal politics. The mods and users here will do everything they can to make sure you aren’t exposed to any political philosophy to the left of Henry Kissinger.

    • khannie@lemmy.world
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      10 hours ago

      There are about two people on here who wouldn’t say “fuck Henry Kissinger”.

      What a massive load of shite. The fucking smell of boot polish off your breath is disgusting.

      Jog on.

      • electric_nan@lemmy.ml
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        10 hours ago

        Hillary Clinton considered him a “great friend and mentor” so I guess I could have said her. I’m also fully aware of the liberal tendency to place a higher importance on image than on policy.

    • sunzu2@thebrainbin.org
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      10 hours ago

      Lemmy.world is just the regime front on the fediverse.

      News, politics subs, political memes are just place to talk about things the regime likes peasants to discuss. Trying saying vote for third party on there and watch that ban hammer lol

      Regime whores for ya.

  • Draconic NEO@lemmy.world
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    13 hours ago

    “So what, it’s the fediverse, you can use another instance.”

    Dismissal of this type of criticism by just telling people to use another instance or saying “fediverse is decentralized” is unproductive, and honestly should be called out as harmful because it ignores the fact that instances when they become large enough and centralized enough, carry weight and can be extremely problematic like shown here.

    A big part of dealing with these types of problems is to make people aware of them, another one is to deal with it at the instance level by defederating the problematic instances and cutting off the communities so that network effect doesn’t continue to rear its ugly head. Just creating new communities isn’t enough, if it was this wouldn’t be the problem that it is. When people tell others to stop complaining and dismiss the criticism because the fediverse is decentralized it seems like they either don’t understand the issue, or they would just rather it not be addressed.

    So while many people would prefer we just leave well enough alone, that’s not condusive to these problems being dealt with, people need to talk about them, and action needs to be taken.

  • fuckingkangaroos@lemm.ee
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    17 hours ago

    I wonder how many good, reasonable people have checked out Lemmy and seen all the CCP/Kremlin propaganda then just left.

    • SorteKanin@feddit.dk
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      12 hours ago

      I mean, lead them to instances that defederate hexbear for starters? Seems reasonable anyway.

    • Maxnmy's@lemmy.world
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      16 hours ago

      I was close to leaving. At first I’d been given the impression that “liberal” is a dirty word on Lemmy. It helps that PSAs like this one routinely appear on other instances to inform newcomers. Just keep spreading the knowledge and let it be known that everybody should block those communities.

      • aasatru@kbin.earth
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        15 hours ago

        I often see people say that pointing new users towards instances with a lax attitude to defederation is a good idea. I kind of understand the rationale, but I’m not sure I agree. Pointing new users to an instance federated with Hexbear seems to me to be a terrible idea.

        • OpenStars@discuss.online
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          12 hours ago

          Blaze for example blocks all the political communities. That’s… … … not entirely a normal thing that people are most likely to do and moreover to never not do that.

          Btw, lemmy.cafe is literally the only instance I’ve ever even so much as heard of that blocks all of the big 3, including lemmy.ml.

    • OpenStars@discuss.online
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      16 hours ago

      Personally I am sitting at 100% of the people who I mention Lemmy to irl doing so. Not only that, but they actually gave me dirty looks and admonished me for even so much as mentioning it. It is easy for us who have blocked such to forget but… the day-1 experience for someone new can be quite shocking. e.g. just search for the word “guillotine”, preferably from an instance you are not logged into, to see all the calls for literal and actual (and not joking… not really) murder of people who participate in such wildly anti-communist practices as … <checks notes> “have bank accounts”.

      Though maybe X is just as bad these days? I dunno, I never had an account even when it was Twitter:-D. In any case, it is grandfathered into the public consciousness, and the devil you know… you know? :-P

      • Communist@lemmy.frozeninferno.xyz
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        3 hours ago

        to see all the calls for literal and actual (and not joking… not really) murder of people who participate in such wildly anti-communist practices as … <checks notes> “have bank accounts”.

        I’m gonna need a source for this, that sounds too insane to be believable, and i’ve never seen anything like that.

      • fuckingkangaroos@lemm.ee
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        14 hours ago

        Yeah, I imagined basically exactly that happening and decided not to tell anyone about it, not yet anyway. Also, I don’t want them to get death threats from Hexbear like I did…

        • OpenStars@discuss.online
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          12 hours ago

          Yeesh, I am so sorry that happened to you - tankies are just the worst, aren’t they? You could literally put a URL to those exact conversations and they would still come back with “well no, see, we aren’t that way at all bc… shut up!” They enjoy all the drama that they stir up - it’s the point (go read the actual sidebar text of Chapotraphouse and the_dunk_tank and their posts e.g. talking about defederating with the rest of Lemmy, except no they actually don’t want to do that for the simple reason that it provides moar people “to dunk on” - let me know if you want the receipt for that statement and I’ll dig it up).

          It is somehow worse than talking to Trump supporters, bc at least those believe in something, as opposed to existing solely for the purpose of “the dunk”.

          And then it’s so sad that the rest of Lemmy tolerates it. Not the communism mind you, I’m talking about the dunking and other harassment.

          Well, we learn at least, not to mention Lemmy to people irl. It’s so sad that it must be that way… it severely limits our growth, but it is what it is.:-(

    • WhiteOakBayou@lemmy.world
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      16 hours ago

      I’ve been here since the app exodus and see way more posts complaining about tankies than actual tankie unpleasantness in the popular and top posts. I think most people just looking at the popular posts would not come across any more unpleasantness than they’d see on reddit

      • OpenStars@discuss.online
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        15 hours ago

        This is b/c you are on lemmy.world, which defederated from both lemmygrad.ml and hexbear.net. So you only have the likes of lemmy.ml and midwest.social to contend with, which are nowhere near as extreme as those others.

        Also, by the time of the Rexodus a lot of that drama had already been hashed out, hence posts like the OP are rare these days. But it is preserved if you want to seek it out.

        A lot of what OP is talking about is the “unexpectedness” of making a comment that might seem reasonable to them (like “the Tiananmen Square massacre actually did happen tho”), and then shockingly they get banned even from communities that they had never even so much as heard of, never mind visited. The admins of that instance are VERY eager to whip out a VERY heavy ban hammer upon their slightest whim. Which is… fine, it’s theirs to do with as they please, but some newer people (like OP) are shocked at how anti-democratic that seems, and wish that they had been told. Especially since if you read the sidebar of places such as lemmy.world, you would not expect that behavior - all the more so from an admin instance. Hence they tell others. And then new people join, and the tanky vs. anti-tanky cycle repeats:-D.

          • OpenStars@discuss.online
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            12 hours ago

            First, the entire text is cross-posted from https://feddit.nl/post/16246531 - OP had nothing to add on their own, apparently. The OOP was likewise on feddit.nl. The community happens to be on Lemmy.world.

            You also brought up your own personal experiences to add to the situation, so I pointed out that you, being on lemmy.world, would have different experiences than e.g. someone on feddit.nl. I note that that instance has not defederated from either lemmygrad.ml or hexbear.net. If you don’t know what they are about, I’m saying that yes lemmy.ml are still “tankies”, but like 1% of the problems of toxicity compared to those other two instances, so much so that while lemmy.world remains federated with lemmy.ml, it has chosen to defederate from both of those other two.

            Also, don’t miss the main reason for the drama in the first place: the images show the OOP being banned. i.e. what you do not see is the point here, bc of the heavy handed banning. So you wouldn’t “see” it then, as you say just looking at the popular posts, unless you happened to have been viewing the mod log on your own initiative. The fact that any divergence of opinion is being suppressed is very much the point here. It leads to the creation of an echo chamber, which allows solely the opinions of the admins to be allowed to be spoken of.

            But you need not simply believe me: check it out for yourself. e.g. go to lemmygrad.ml and see what is there - it took me (not joking) like two seconds to find this comment: “Shoot him in the head” at https://lemmygrad.ml/post/6010525, all the while making fun of Americans for being violent etc. (though when it happens on lemmy.ml - example, this one admittedly took a lot longer to find, maybe 30 seconds, though it was still on the front page - it tends to be far more tame) Note I am not complaining about the violent rhetoric here, but the total lack of self-awareness. USA=bad bc of genocide, while Russia and China are “not” doing genocide. It’s a special brand of “my side good, their side bad”, that I for one do not find very intellectually engaging. Therefore I do not choose to engage with Truth Social, or the equivalent Lemmy instances.

      • SolOrion@sh.itjust.works
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        12 hours ago

        I didn’t see much of it except for one burst where Hexbear was getting rowdy with my instance- that was… annoying.

        There was some drama I don’t recall the specifics of but it apparently angered Hexbear enough that I started seeing a lot of them in basically every comment section.

      • TSG_Asmodeus (he, him)@lemmy.world
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        16 hours ago

        I browse ‘all’ quite a bit, a few times a day, and I have had the same experience as you. I see more posts complaining about “.ml/tankies/etc” than I ever see problematic/whatever posts from them.

        • m_f@midwest.social
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          15 hours ago

          You’re both on .world, which isn’t federated with hexbear, which is the most annoying instance. They’ll brigade other communities, for example the recent thread over at https://jlai.lu/post/11504685 (view it from that instance to see the hexbear comments)

          I browse all sometimes from an instance federated with hexbear and I roll my eyes quite a bit whenever I do

          • WanderingVentra@lemm.ee
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            2 hours ago

            Lemmy.world has like 80% of the lemmy fediverse or something like that, so this I’d a problem not thag many people are actually going to run into realistically.

    • FarraigePlaisteach@lemmy.world
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      15 hours ago

      I don’t tell anyone I use this site in case they come across that stuff first. I just say I use a site “similar to Reddit”. I’m surprised that they don’t ask me the name but most of my friends don’t spend so much time online.

      • fuckingkangaroos@lemm.ee
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        14 hours ago

        Same, I haven’t told a soul I use it despite being active here over a year. I still believe in it though (or just really hate the idea of accepting corporate social media).

  • merthyr1831@lemmy.ml
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    15 hours ago

    Every influx of users and the usual suspects who are DESPERATE to have Lemmy turn into Reddit start pissing and shitting themselves that maybe their American liberal opinions arent dominant anymore.

    This shit is pathetic.

    • lemmydividebyzero@reddthat.com
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      12 hours ago

      How can it be dominant on ml instances, if it’s removed after 10 seconds by scared ml mods that can’t handle different views on anything?

    • ContrarianTrail@lemm.ee
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      13 hours ago

      Hope you at least see the irony in being able to come here to criticize our ‘American liberal opinions’ in a thread about the systematic censorship of people criticizing yours.

      • OpenStars@discuss.online
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        7 hours ago

        It is hilarious to see that on every single “we should defed from the tankies” post, the tankies always show up to demonstrate for us all first-hand precisely why we should defederate from the tankies. Not b/c of their political views, but b/c of the abusive toxicity.

    • SupraMario@lemmy.world
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      14 hours ago

      You mean that people are annoyed that tankies like you, want to turn this into an echo chamber that’s just like the right wing republicans…and that bothers you?

      Edit: checking your history… yes you’re a solid tankie idiot.

    • 🇰 🌀 🇱 🇦 🇳 🇦 🇰 ℹ️@yiffit.net
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      14 hours ago

      Yeah, no… We just don’t like people who straight up deny history that actually happened nor do we like fascist fuck heads. Seen enough bullshit from your instance to know it’s full of Nazi dumbshits acting like they’re actually leftists. Not to even mention the mountain of hypocrisy shown by the admins and moderators.

    • FundMECFSResearch@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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      13 hours ago

      It’s obviously an alt. And I want to say I understand OP’s decision to use an alt. I’ve had some creepy stalking and people downvote large parts of my entire post history for criticism of ML.

      • IndustryStandard@lemmy.world
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        11 hours ago

        They need an alt to go around Lemmy badmouthing another instance?

        The user states they have a political agenda as well.

        • FundMECFSResearch@lemmy.blahaj.zone
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          11 hours ago

          Well I don’t know how you like it when a user gets mad at you for something you share and goes back months in your post history until they found something personal you said and then starts insulting you based on that. But I’d prefer to avoid the situation.

          And “bad mouth” is very subjective here. They are shaeing an older post which is basically a transcript of the modlog.

  • helloworld55@lemm.ee
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    14 hours ago

    Frankly, who cares? If you don’t want to see or participate in tankie propoganda, then don’t. People point out that lemmy.ml is the hub for a lot of communities, so it isn’t reasonable to switch to another instance. And then they bring up communities like [email protected] Guess what, Linux isn’t meant to be a hub for political discourse, and for the most part, it isn’t. Use lemmy.ml how you want to use it, and if you want to participate in other political leanings, go to a different instance. No one is really stopping you, and that’s the whole idea of the fediverse. And there really isn’t any value lost, because this isn’t a “choose one and only one” situation. You’ve got all of the fediverse at your fingertips

    <EDIT> So this came off a bit abrasive. But the point I want to convey is that if you want to have deep/heated political discourse, either do that on a community (and instance) suitable for it, or use an account specifically for political discussion. I think it helps everyone. The mods can referee communities with more clear boundaries, the lurkers/users don’t need to worry about political debates when looking up tech support or whatever, and you (the reader/political dissident) can still enjoy your discussions with less worry about being randomly banned. </EDIT>

    • Solar Bear@slrpnk.net
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      10 hours ago

      Use lemmy.ml how you want to use it, and if you want to participate in other political leanings, go to a different instance. No one is really stopping you, and that’s the whole idea of the fediverse. And there really isn’t any value lost, because this isn’t a “choose one and only one” situation. You’ve got all of the fediverse at your fingertips.

      Until you make the mistake of replying with the wrong kind of comment to the wrong sub, and get banned from the entire instance and lose the ability to post on many of the largest subs on this side of the fediverse. Or maybe they just see you out and about and decide to ban you on sight because they don’t like what you said. There’s nothing stopping that.

      Admin overreach and abuse is a major issue for the fediverse because it affects more than just the user in question. Admins of large instances get to decide who has access to the users and communities on their instances, and very often the users of the instance aren’t even aware of the actions taken on their behalf. Mastodon recently implemented a notification for when blocks and defederation remove your follows or followers, and this is a great first step. Users deserve to know when they are impacted by decisions such as these.

      I love the fediverse and want to see it thrive, so we need to stop putting our heads in the sand on this issue. It’s always discussed as if it’s an issue with a few problematic instances rather than the systemic issue in need of a solution that is is. Admins need the tools to protect their instances from real abuse, but we need to balance that with the right of the users to know what’s going on and not be unfairly deprived of the social aspect of this social media experiment, especially without knowing.

      • EatATaco@lemm.ee
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        7 hours ago

        It’s shocking to me when people say that reddit moderators are more overbearing than here. They’ll literally ban you for how you vote here. Lol

    • Jrockwar@feddit.uk
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      17 hours ago

      What’s the problem with hexbear, is it the same? Genuine question - I think the only community in hexbear I follow is “Gaming” and it’s reasonably civil there.

      • LiberalSoCalist@lemm.ee
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        11 hours ago

        the problem with hexbear is the same handful of users that have made it their hobby to complain incessantly about hexbear all over the fediverse

      • lemmydividebyzero@reddthat.com
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        11 hours ago

        My experience: I saw a post on hexbear and only one view was present in the comments below… I did not know them then… So. I thought: Let’s share my view.

        In the end, I got blocked for arguing and they removed my comment. And the people who responded to my comment with burning flags of a country and wanted its total destruction had nothing to fear. It was the most disgusting experience I have ever had on Lemmy.

        But after they removed my comment, I understood why there is only 1 view present… Because the other view gets removed.

      • Monstrosity@lemm.ee
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        17 hours ago

        Hexbear is way worse, imo. Those folks will straight up harass dissenters. Stay away or maybe just stick to your gaming sub if you’re happy there.

      • GiantChickDicks@lemmy.ml
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        15 hours ago

        I can only speak to my own experience. Most of their communities I’ve seen are not a place where nuanced views are appreciated. I saw a particularly 4Chanesque take where a guy was trashing a girl he dated for her interest in astrology. He was more than fine supporting it and humoring it while they were together. Once dumped, though, he had to use it as an example of everything he had to be tortured with in the relationship.

        I had a couple of things to say about that kind of attitude, but the whole of my response centered around learning to pick partners who are aligned with our own values and goals. They banned me because of my username. I have no idea why, other than making assumptions about my views and values in a negative way. A peep into my post history should suggest otherwise, but anyway.

        I don’t have a lot of respect for people with strong views that are sensitive about having them challenged. It isn’t a good faith argument.

      • OpenStars@discuss.online
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        15 hours ago

        The hexbear community predated Lemmy iirc, so they have existed in an isolated bubble for a very long time. Imagine edgy teenagers with an axe to grind and no particular reason to avoid grinding it on anything that they set their sights onto.

        Despite running off so much of their own community members, including some actual developers, they seem happy with the way they are. Sadly, they are also happy to spread out from their instance and fuck up everyone else’s day as well - rulez be damned. Notably, they continually keep floating the idea of defederating themselves from the rest of the Fediverse - I mean ofc those instances that have not already cut them off - so if that gives you an idea of what is going on (they are aware of their toxicity, they simply choose to not care).

        That particular community might be fine though. Or not. Either way it’s probably more tolerable than many hexbear users that you will see in general across the Fediverse. You’ll see for yourself.

      • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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        17 hours ago

        Hexbear has Marxists and Anarchists, it’s a non-sectarian “left-unity” instance. Lemmy.ml is admin’d and moderated by Marxists and some Anarchists. Similar, but different.

        • aasatru@kbin.earth
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          15 hours ago

          non-sectarian “left-unity”

          Lol. I’m a social democrat. They’d send me to a camp if they had the chance to.

          Then again, when put in charge of things they sent each other to camps as well, so maybe this is what tankie unity looks like.

          • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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            15 hours ago

            To be fair, the only people who consider Social Democrats to be “left” are Social Democrats and the people to the right of them. Most people use “left” to refer to anti-capitalism, be it Socialism, Communism, Syndicalism, Anarchism, etc, and not to refer to Capitalism but with large safety nets.

            • zbyte64@awful.systems
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              6 hours ago

              Frankly I find this view disregards the differing material conditions that are present. Social Democrats are left of what the Americas have now, just like Capitalism was to the left of having a Monarchy. Your take is a-historical, anti-materialist, and thus anti-marxist.

              • aasatru@kbin.earth
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                12 minutes ago

                I’m Scandinavian, so I come from a country defined by workers unions in the post-war era. The Norwegian post-war social democratic agenda was defined by a group of socialists while locked in a nazi concentration camp. They were locked in there not for being centrist.

                Recently, the labour parties of Scandinavia have moved towards the centre, so I am alternating votes between the socialist left party, the communists when it makes sense (they have a problem of ageing ML members, but their younger people are mostly fine), and the Greens. The Greens are in some ways further to the centre than the Labour party, but they have their reasons to compromise.

                The labour party is, however, still left of centre. We’re a representative democracy with four parties in parliament describing themselves as the centre, so it’s not very hard for us to make the distinction.

                And recognizing that capital can be a useful way of organizing one’s economy under controlled conditions is different from capitalism.

                The whole take is just stupid, and always made in bad faith. It doesn’t take American relativism for social democracy to be a left wing ideology. The generations before me faught like hell against the capitalists in order to give me rights, and implying they were not leftists because the social democrats left the comintern is ahistorical.

                Furthermore, there is no “to be fair” in relation to sending your political opponents to labour camps to basically have them killed. This is something tankies will never understand.

                And Anarchists need to read about the Spanish Civil War and learn to keep the fuck away from tankies. I love you guys, but just because you’re right on a fundamental level doesn’t mean you can ignore history.

            • taipan@lemmy.world
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              11 hours ago

              Most people use “left” to refer to anti-capitalism, be it Socialism, Communism, Syndicalism, Anarchism, etc, and not to refer to Capitalism but with large safety nets.

              Yikes, your Overton window is completely unbalanced if you think that “most people” exclude liberal progressives from the “left”. Look at any mainstream news channel or read any mainstream news website, and you’ll see that most people have a much more inclusive definition of left-wing politics, which encompasses center-left politics.

              • Cowbee [he/him]@lemmy.ml
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                11 hours ago

                We are on an international internet forum, basing terminology on the Overton Window of the US is silly. What makes more sense is to not rely on arbitrary vibes and lines that shift second by second and instead base terminology off of structures.

                The center-left includes moderate Socialists and Market Socialists, having structures that support and reinforce Capitalism like Social Democracy creep across into “left” territory blurs the lines in ways that add confusion.

      • MyOpinion@lemm.ee
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        16 hours ago

        Hexbear is just as toxic as ml. They will bait you to comment on topics and then remove your comments if they don’t like them. Just a terrible group of people.

      • lemmydividebyzero@reddthat.com
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        11 hours ago

        My instance does not block them either, but I do.

        Had 2 experiences where they tried to silence me via blocking me… And one time, the people I argued with and who wanted the total destruction of a state and posted burning flags of it did not get blocked or warned. I hope, they stay in their echo chamber and don’t ever leave their homes…

        • SorteKanin@feddit.dk
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          11 hours ago

          User blocking merely blocks their communities. You’ll still see comments from the instance and you’ll still see posts in other communities from their users. You’ll also still have their votes influence your feed.

          Defederation is the more proper tool to use. Individual user blocking is not effective.

          • lemmydividebyzero@reddthat.com
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            11 hours ago

            My instance has downvotes disabled. Only upvotes matter. So, at least, I don’t see destructive voting…

            And as long, as I don’t post in their communities, they can’t silence me and have to deal with my view differently than just by removing it…

            • WanderingVentra@lemm.ee
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              2 hours ago

              Hexbear doesn’t have downvotes either actually. That seems to be the main reason they brigade. Everyone has to comment to show their negative opinion on something.

  • merthyr1831@lemmy.ml
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    14 hours ago

    “turn this place into an echo chamber” motherfucker Lemmy world has 10 times the users, and the only “echo chamber” shit I see is insistent Kamala Harris cope and seethe whenever someone mentions Israel or Palestine.

    Meanwhile Lemmy . world mods change the TOS to spite individual communities, ban discussion of piracy despite it being perfectly legal and present on a different instance! Grow up.