Admin update - Hexbear

This is an admin post, intended for blahaj lemmy users. Top level posts from members of other instances will be removed.

==

After recent events, it feels to me that sentiment has shifted and more people are asking for defederation of hexbear than previously.

I’ve been doing my best to try and mend bridges and keep us connected, as it’s my hope that we can maintain trans solidarity and work with them, despite the friction, however, ultimately, I feel that this is an issue for the blahaj lemmy community to decide, not the admins alone.

So here’s what we’re going to do.

We’re going to leave things as they are for a week. That will give time for things to calm down whilst we see if we can work together. After a week, I’ll put up a vote and get a feel for where the community is at in regards to our continued federation with hexbear. That poll will run for a week. If there is a strong will to defederate (a clear majority), then that’s what we will do.

AceProgrammer42,

It was inevitable after their atrocious behavior. It sounds horrible to be caught in such a crossfire as an instance admin. Especially because they used their queerness as a weapon to paint us as the bad ones for splitting the community. A painful reminder that not all queer people are necessarily good people.

Thank you for dealing with this situation and making this instance a safer place.

Franzia,

Thank you moderators, but especially Moss who I witnessed in the trenches dodging bayonets from those jerks.

ezri,
@ezri@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

No. Moss just stirred up drama by acting like a child. All they did was give poor Ada more to deal with

threegnomes,

Moss did the best they could to spare their community from tankies. It’s constant vigilance in a leftist shitposting community to make sure you’re proactive in dealing with tankies otherwise you now have a tankie community. You can’t engage them in good faith, you have to make sure they know they aren’t welcome.

moonsnotreal,
@moonsnotreal@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

They shouldn’t have leaked dms though. The admin of hexbear did ask respectfully, and Moss could’ve just kept their response private. I personally think that the banner is fine, but Moss should have acted more mature.

fiohnah,

When I moved from Reddit to Lemmy, I made an account on blahaj.zone because I wanted to be on an instance that’s run by progressive trans people. Being able to trust that the admins will run an instance that’s actually protective of its members is such a relief, especially coming from Reddit.

Experiencing Lemmy for the first time was an adjustment. I was using “all” when I normally don’t, and that brought a lot of new things, good and bad, into my feed. There were some posts and comments that I found gross, but the things were dealt with or not so bad.

I started noticing a lot of NSFW posts from lemmynsfw with women that looked very young, and I found myself thinking about whether or not to report the content and how the moderators were verifying content. As young looking as possible while being legal and without getting banned was obviously the purpose. I was relieved when defederation happened. All of a sudden my feed was still diverse content, just minus jailbait-simulator. I missed the A+ posts by some of the guys, an Adonis or three, but I survived.

Things were great, then I started noticing the “fuck Ukraine, NATO is evil” posts along with “Tianamen square deaths are CIA propaganda”. That’s when hexbear federated. Lemmy.ml brought different perspectives, and they were valuable regardless of me agreeing or not. Hexbear is different.

Touting LGBT rights in Cuba, that’s great, and I didn’t know about the the changes in 2022. TIL. That’s my entire list of positive hexbear posts I’ve seen so far. I’m sure there’s more, but the community doesn’t seem to prioritize showing that. “Dunking” and snark are not valuable contributions, and the simping for Putin is straight up evil.

Ada and other admins/mods, thank you so much for your thoughtful consideration, your work, and everything you give to make this community run. I’m just a lurker, but I appreciate you all so much.

eestileib,

Hexbear is a bare-knuckle community that encourages group think and hair trigger mockery (“LIB!” and variations). In general, they bring that mentality wherever they go. It reminds me of the Goons from SomethingAwful in that way: you could spot a group of Goons regardless of the game, site, whatever.

Those communities can be fun (a supporters section at a football match, for example), but you have to go in ready to take a stray punch or two.

I have an account on another instance for when I want to be out in the world and suffer the slings and arrows and look at shitposts on !chapotraphouse. Sometimes I’m in the mood.

But I think part of the intended vibe of blahaj.zone is that it’s somewhere that as highly marginalized people we can come and not expect to have slurs thrown around, 0-100 name calling criticism, etc.

The culture of hexbear is the opposite of that; it’s not about not subscribing to !chapotraphouse, it’s about how the instance approaches the whole idea of online interaction.

booty,
@booty@hexbear.net avatar

not expect to have slurs thrown around,

Are you suggesting that you expect to be called slurs by the overwhelmingly queer users of Hexbear, who swiftly ban anyone using basically any kind of slur, and whose mods have recently had comments removed for calling out users on this instance for using slurs???

vzq,

Also, that particular incident is a prime example of the problem.

Here, we’re used to de-escalate and talk about stuff. That poster has started at least three threads just escalating and escalating.

We’re just not compatible.

nonbinarytwink,

I honestly think the hate toward hexbear is mostly manufactured. A lot of the people complaining are the same ones erroneously comparing them to places like exploding heads, claiming they’re nazi trolls, that they go on downvoting raids (they can’t even downvote btw), accusing them of terrible things, but then don’t (or won’t) provide any proof of them acting this way. And when people like me who aren’t on hexbear question it, we get accused of being a “hexbear in disguise” and ignored. It all feels very dramatic and reddit, and I thought the point of lemmy was to not be like reddit. Defederating from problematic instances I get, but defederating because you hate tankies or because of a few bad members seems more of an ‘echo chamber’ choice than a ‘keep the community safe’ choice to me.

Natanael,

Have you really not seen any threads on stuff like Russia’s war? There’s liberal defense of genocide coming from there. They swarm threads, in a way that looks somewhat coordinated.

Defederating them doesn’t create an echo chamber. Keeping them around is giving them permission to build their own echo chamber in your spaces by chasing away everybody else who want a chill space to hang out in.

nonbinarytwink,

Have I seen individuals say shitty things? Of course, but I don’t assume every person on hexbear is an enemy. For instance, over on lemm.ee I just had a convo with someone who was vehemently pro-landlord and hated “communism” while admitting they’ve never read any communist literature. Should I assume this is what everyone on lemm.ee is like? I’ve run across a TON of trolls and anti-leftists on lemmy.world… should I assume everyone on lemmy.world is a troll? Lemmynsfw is constantly throwing up communities that somehow bypass the nsfw filters. Should I make assumptions about everyone on lemmynsfw too now? That is a slippery slope into an echo chamber imho.

Give users the ability to block whole instances, and only defederate when a WHOLE instance is geared towards disruption, like explodingheads. I wandered around hexbear yesterday looking through their communites and posts, and there’s definitely some opinions I don’t agree with, but I’m not seeing calls to flood posts on other instances like people are claiming. All I’m seeing is a lot of in-jokes, memes, and civil discussions.

Natanael,

It’s not just singular anecdotes. It’s the proportion of users who are like that. A huge fraction of the activity from that server is specifically this type of horrible replies, and their admins aren’t doing anything about it. They absolutely flood many threads with trash and make many conversations entirely unreadable. At that point when you do nothing about filtering out that trash then you’re inviting them to hijack your community.

leraje,
@leraje@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

I’m pretty new to this instance, having moved from .world recently. I haven’t interacted with anyone from hexbear yet but I’ve seen some of their members behaviour on other instances and followed threads back to that instance.

They seem to have a self fulfilling persecution complex centred around their political opinions. I see them on their own instance saying things like ‘any instance that doesn’t believe the exact, very narrowly defined ideology that we do are stupid and they hate what we stand for’, then they go onto the other instances and make even the most innocent posts that have nothing to do with politics into commentary on their ideology. It’s like they can’t see the world in any other way, or respect that others might. Then, when they get banned, they head back to their instance and say ‘see? they’re just intolerant boot lickers’. It often feels like they’re trying to get banned, or their instance defederated simply so they can happily confirm to each other their belief that everyone is out to get them.

It can get pretty mentally exhausting seeing people say something utterly innocuous like ‘I like chips’ and then a bunch of hexbear users launch into a long winded political sub-thread on what a dick you are for liking NATO-loving, liberal, colonialist chips.

They are trans and lgbtq+ allies and that’s a good thing. I’m just not sure that that one aspect of their makeup drowns out all the baggage that comes with it. I always feel it comes with conditions attached - we’ll be your allies as long as we can flood your instance. I have no doubt that if this instance were to defed with them, their allyship would no longer extend to blahaj members.

vzq,

It can get pretty mentally exhausting seeing people say something utterly innocuous like ‘I like chips’ and then a bunch of hexbear users launch into a long winded political sub-thread on what a dick you are for liking NATO-loving, liberal, colonialist chips.

This fits my experience to a T. They aren’t interested in having discussions. They want to goad everyone into having the same discussion over and over.

good_girl,
@good_girl@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

I really really really dislike how fast so many people here are to discount their members and clamor for defederation. Queer solidarity, Trans solidarity, and Left solidarity is important. The people from hexbear aren’t an “other” we’re all in the same boat, it just happens that people from hexbear tend to be more jaded with the systems that a lot of us are slaves to in the west and in first world countries. Every single one of us is one little disillusionment away from holding the same or similar views as any person from hexbear, (I was already moving in that direction and have already made my own account there, though I started my lemmy usage here on Blahaj.)

Can they be a little overwhelming? Sure. But again, their users trend towards individuals fed up with the systems in place and are past the point of engaging in ways that look “respectable” or in their words, “liberal.”

dire_rhea,

I don’t agree on defederating on principle (I think it should be more a user level decision to mute communities/servers) but I also think identity politics like this is harmful; especially with how much disagreement on OTHER political issues we have with them, solidarity means you are okay with some of the more insane stances they have over other equally important human rights issues

Swiggles,

I think not much value would be lost by defederating.

They are denying genocides, they are supporting regimes which are not compatible with LGBT+, they don’t discuss in good faith, there is a lot of whataboutism. They want to dunk people and be right and not have their view challenged.

Unfortunately they have so radical ideas about it all (mostly US centric whataboutism as far as I can tell). They fall into fascist/authoritarian traps where they can’t even recognize they are fighting against people like me or us. They dehumanize people.

I don’t think their views are compatible with LGBT+ spaces and values even though they claim to be one while cheering for the people who would remove them from existence the first chance they would get.

Some people are moderate over there and that were the only pleasant interactions I had with them. I can’t tell if the radicals are a loud minority or the majority. They poison the well though.

Even after all that said I don’t know if defederation is the right choice. I mean they provide some good content and in the end they are a big community. On the other hand I have already blocked the instance using the Connect app and my experience improved a lot.

I think in summary they create a hostile space for all people. Even left leaning people are not safe due to their radicalized views and it is exhausting to have every thread derailed with some unrelated rant by them.

StalinwasaGryffindor,

I don’t believe anyone on hexbear is actually cheering for people who would remove us from existence. I’m LGBT+ myself, and a huge part of why I’m against the current capitalist system we live under is that I see it as incredibly harmful for people like me. There are numerous examples, such as anti-trans laws in the US, the extreme anti-trans rhetoric in the UK, the American funding of draconian anti-LGBT+ laws in African countries. I also truly don’t value people in western countries higher than people in the rest of the world, so when I see the death toll from our military interventions and siege warfare in the form of sanctions, it makes my blood boil. 100s of thousands of people were killed by the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan alone; statistically thousands of them were LGBT+. This means the coalition forces killed more queer people than the countries that have actual death penalties for homosexuality.

I don’t love Russia, they’re a capitalist country with terrible laws and a regressive culture, but Ukraine isn’t really any better. They’ve elevated right wing militias which have targeted people like me and banned trans women from leaving the country.

China is behind on LGBT+ rights, but seem to be moving in the right direction. Cuba has the most progressive LGBT+ laws in the world. Vietnam is moving in the right direction pretty rapidly as well.

I hope this helps you understand why at least one of our users thoughts on these issues. I don’t speak for anyone but myself, but I feel certain my views are quite close to the majority of hexbears.

Swiggles,

At least half of it is reasonable and I would fully agree with it. Unfortunately then it went of the rails.

I read the same argument the other day with the US/NATO wars/invasions and equated to the persecution of other countries and that’s just ridiculous. If they were sent there and died because they were queer it would be a whole other story, but if they were there because they were equal to their comrades then it was the actual equality we strive for. Not that I support any wars or any military, but that rhetoric is just dumb. Also guess what this is true for any military ever. Queer people exist even if they don’t have the freedom to live their lives in the open.

Regarding Ukraine it doesn’t really matter. Russia is the agressor here. There is no way Ukraine was ever a threat to Russia yet here we are. It is a developing souvereign (!) country with many problems they try to solve one step at a time. Russia is actively working against everything we fight for. Whatever you believe Ukraine is the situation got only worse due to Russia and there is no way the invasion should ever be glorified by any sane queer person at all.

Funny you mentioned Cuba. Cuba still has major problems with corruption and all the LGBT+ laws are very, very recent additions. I want it to be a success story probably for the same reasons as you, but let’s wait and see for a few more years or decades. I dearly hope they manage and so far it looks better than ever, but unfortunately that’s not great yet.

Anyway this post is also a great example for the US centric whataboutism I talked about in my initial post.

StalinwasaGryffindor,

I’m very confused by what you mean about sending people to die? I’m talking about civilian deaths due to invasions and sanctions. I don’t believe you can actually be supporting queer people while bombing them and/or starving them with sanctions.

I also don’t fully agree that my arguments are us-centric. I focus on the US and UK because I am Anglo and so am more aware of the role they play in the world.

Swiggles,

Wars are all the same. The argument is just dumb. Either queer people are targeted specifically or it is irrelevant to any discussion about queer persecution.

GarbageShoot,

Are you familiar with the concept of atrocity propaganda? Like, for example, the Nayirah Testimony?

As I was telling someone else, it is very difficult to discuss the criticisms of us without talking about political issues because those criticisms are predicated on political claims, such as what you accuse us of here.

Swiggles,

Of course there is some propaganda around. That’s nothing new, never was. Stop the notion that you are somehow enlightened or have any information others don’t have. It is ridiculous.

The thing is big lies historically never lasted long if many people are involved. With digital communication around it has become even easier to receive first party accounts of events.

I honestly don’t know what in particular you are hinting at here. None of the things I mentioned would even be terrible if they were lies or have otherwise a huge ilnegative impact. With all the information around it is unlikely that anything is completely untrue though. Not recognizing any of the atrocities and ignoring the situation is seriously terrible though.

Always keep in mind the same argument is also used to deny the Holocaust, other genocides and massacres to this day. It’s a huge gamble all for the sake of dunking whoever…

chumbalumber,

I’m happy to remain federated; I think the communities, mods and the instance admins (thanks!) do a good job of curating the community, and by and large hexbear users interacting with us on this instance seem to do so in good faith.

That being said, I would make the observation that, from my perspective at least, there seem to be more than a few hexbear users that are apologists for authoritarian regimes. I want to preface this by saying that I am of an anarchist bent, so am not exactly enamoured with ‘Western’ political systems either, but this should not preclude criticism of (bringing up the most often contested examples) the USSR or China.

That being said, discussion of these things are important and differing views should be seen, as I have often found enlightening articles or overlooked areas of history through reading these kinds of discussion.

Bottom line: I would remain federated, but ensure we maintain the character of our instance.

Blahaj_Blast,
@Blahaj_Blast@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

I’ve seen a few people from there on here and my experiences have been nothing but pleasant.

On the other hand, the communities I’ve seen there seem almost troll like. Like the dumbest worst right-wing circlejerk except some insane left ideas and they hate on “liberals”? It’s so confusing to me.

Definitely some very cool people are from there though, from what I see here. I am conflicted. I don’t want the shitshow some of their communities starting over here.

melmi,
@melmi@lemmy.blahaj.zone avatar

Leftists use the term liberal to refer to people who are moderates, e.g. the Democrats rather than the communists. Liberals often hold some progressive ideals, but ultimately believe it should happen within the context of capitalism and our existing systems.

Hexbear hates on liberals a lot, but they’re hating on them because they’re not progressive enough. It’s not a right wing thing.

SolomonTheMagnificent,

I’ve seen some of them claim to be a “leftist unity group” while “lib dunking” on anyone with a slightly different geopolitical opinion then them. And then there’s the incessant questioning if someone is “really a leftist”. It doesn’t seem to matter how progressive you are.

I used to call people libs, but after contact with them it feels cringe now, not gonna lie.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • random
  • uselessserver093
  • Food
  • aaaaaaacccccccce
  • test
  • CafeMeta
  • testmag
  • MUD
  • RhythmGameZone
  • RSS
  • dabs
  • KamenRider
  • TheResearchGuardian
  • KbinCafe
  • Socialism
  • oklahoma
  • SuperSentai
  • feritale
  • All magazines
    •