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submitted 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago) by TransComrade69@hexbear.net to c/main@hexbear.net

“wow hexbear’s most annoying user returns and the site immediately starts to implode. really makes you think!” -a brave but fallen commenter

It’s an honor to be y’all’s most annoying user. I have been back for all of 3 days and I’m already catching strays, hell yeah.

To start out this classic “TC69 takes the reigns” post, I want everyone to take a moment to read this “I’m leaving” post I made during the Great Pronoun Wars and it’s slew of bloody battles before we move on as a refresher for where things were when I left. I want everyone in this chat to take a big step back and look at the overall reaction to this struggle session with my leaving post in mind. I want everyone to consider if there is still work to be done in the community.

Over the years while completely detached from the community for mental health reasons, I’ve heard whispers on the wind about the state of Hexbear – telling me that while things have massively improved for trans people, there is still work to be done in the chauvinism, misogyny, and overall toxicity departments. Wild that I managed to catch some strays, but I hope that “really makes you think”, I guess.

To cool everyone’s jets, you will be getting your slop back, but it’s definitely not going to come without some changes to the community as a whole. I’m talkin’ constitutional amendments. We will be updating the COC in the coming week-ish to explicitly disallow misogynistic and chauvinistic language/sentiments – what will be explicitly said, I don’t yet know but I do have some ideas having reviewed the COC for the first time in 3 years last night.

Having just come back outta the blue, I didn’t have much of a stake in this struggle session nor much context for the circumstances that led to this decision being made but from what I can make sense of, it sounds like we’re combing for the aforementioned issues with too fine of a comb. My view of the situation is this:

  • I will provide an example to start. There are three overlapping communities that I remember receiving heavy pushback to have separated: Politics, Electoralism, and News. Each of these communities may have the same posts on average, but the way in which users discuss the content is distinctly different. I view this attempt at community changes in a similar light. Before the next point, I will say that from what I’ve gathered, I view the dunk_tank in more of a "here is some general stinky shit regarding politics, lib brain rot, electoral copium, etc., etc. Let’s all point, laugh, crack jokes, regurgitate the lukewarm takes we saw on Twitter yesterday” way.
  • With point #1 in mind, I agree with the overall sentiment of a counterpropaganda community as well as see a healthy appetite amongst users for a more educational approach to “dunking”. However, I don’t think taking out the holy centrist middle ground and asking for more effortful posts was the best step. Perhaps all we want to do is point and laugh, perhaps a baby leftist sees something Not Good TM somewhere else on the internet, and while they do not have all the context or education on the matter to make an effort post of why said thing is Not Good TM, they do have the ability to identify it as Not Good TM and can post it to let other people tear it apart. There is value in that, but we need to work on the shadowboxing and cut down on the aforementioned chauvinistic, misogynistic and overall toxic tendencies, folks.
  • There is equally value in seeing chud shit online and wanting to go in-depth for new leftists about why something is reactionary, but I don’t think everyone is meant to be a poster – not that I don’t believe in y’all’s posting power, but it’s true. 353K posts, 4.75M comments. Some people just live for the comment sections and that’s okay, I love you all the same. Commenters are still braver than any troop.

I feel like the overall sentiment is that we don’t have a problem with dunk-esque content, just the means by which it’s discussed – particularly involving, again, the aforementioned issues and conversations devolving into shadowboxing.

So here’s what we’re gonna do. COC Update, then run a slop channel naming competition for a new contained community. I’m going to make a megathread for the community to decide the name of our new slop trough. Most upvoted comment after a week decides the name (some restrictions may apply, I’m not going to let this turn into the Mountain Dew naming competition, obviously).

That’s it, that’s the post. I apologize for the rustiness in making community announcements, it has been a while. Love you all.

Original post here: https://hexbear.net/post/3856299?scrollToComments=false

EDIT: Look, I just got back from a 3 year hiatus 3 days ago. I'm definitely not privy to everything that has been said or done with regards to this issue while I've been slowly walking down the pool stairs and adjusting to the temperature of the water. From what I've read, some outta pocket shit was definitely said, and I apologize on behalf of the team for the defensiveness and botched communication on this rollout. For now, I'm working on addressing things that are immediately within my control and power as per usual with these types of "TC69 picks up the pieces" posts.

We aren't some turbo transphobic cabal, as I said 3 years ago in the exact same way, we're just volunteers trying to continually better the community and navigate taking action against certain types of behaviors/sentiments (something literally no other social media platform gives a fuck about doing, if they aren't actively encouraging negative behaviors to begin with). While what was said did not come from me, I can guarantee it was made under immense stress and pressure, per usual. That does not excuse it, but there is certainly a reason why the running joke is "wow TC69 is literally Stalin with her 5 attempted resignations" - see Carcosa's attempted resignation last night. I love y'all, but this is getting outta hand.

Please be patient as we work through these issues and navigate taking steps to improve. And for the love of G O D please let me catch up some more before our next struggle session.

EDIT 2: I said it 3 years ago, I'll say it again today. I'm not going to sit here and post every little example of things we're describing as an issue when the modlog is publicly available. It's accessible from any page on the site at the very bottom and in the sidebar of all comms. Please let your keyboard breath and spend like 15 minutes reviewing the modlog, lmao.

EDIT 3: Sangria was Alaskaball. Banning themself was a bit. Furthermore, they were unaware that fella was a gendered term, as was I. Yes, they did effectively misgender themselves if you consider fella to be a gendered term. They don't consider it to be. Therefore, non-issue on this point.

EDIT 4: I'm locking the thread. I tried my best to give some decent paths forward amidst the chaos. Someone else can deal with this.

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[-] Aradina@lemmy.ml 87 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

"To cool everyone’s jets, you will be getting your slop back,"

The slop was only the catalyst. The issue quickly became that mod statement misgendering much of the site(and having an un-CWed self harm reference), harassment against people who were against it, and the fact that other lemmy mods got told before we did. Is there any plan to address those issues?

Edit:

Or just ban people for opposing it I guess

[-] aaaaaaadjsf@hexbear.net 68 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Yeah are there going to be any consequences for whoever cooked up 20 alt accounts to harrass everyone that disagreed with them, and tell users that they should kys/their parents should never had them/should have been killed? On top of purposeful misgendering and claiming that a user who exclusively used they/them pronouns was actually a cisgender man. I really did not care about this issue much, until that started.

[-] REgon@hexbear.net 53 points 3 weeks ago

I'd really like some general consequences for a good part of the mod team as a whole. This wasn't just an issue with one person, they were just the most egregious member, but they've been allowed to hang around for far too long. On top of that there were a lot of bullshit coming from those mods - "white cishet" being the top of a big turdpile.

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[-] imogen_underscore@hexbear.net 82 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

a plea to the admins generally: please address the flagrant transphobia/bizarre gender essentialism that was the thrust of a couple of the (anonymous!) mod takes from the big thread. if this gets swept under the rug my faith in admins/mods to consistently oppose bigotry will be severely damaged. the silence is already deafening on the issue.

[-] Yukiko@hexbear.net 59 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

This needs addressed immediately. This type of shit can't be running rampant around leadership let alone the userbase.

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[-] Crucible@hexbear.net 80 points 3 weeks ago

The antagonism shown by the admins and mods every time they decide something behind the scenes then spring it on everyone unilaterally is so exhausting. If you hate interacting with users so much that you're making alts to harass people or just deciding to ban people who politely disagree with you then this really isn't the right gig for you

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[-] GarbageShoot@hexbear.net 74 points 3 weeks ago

Obviously this isn't directed at you, TC

So, I don't give a shit about the controversy itself, but the way that the mods in a closed chat just hyped themselves up on saying "This is what white bros do" to each other and then handing down the pronouncement that some of the most popular communities are only for chauvinists and then masking their real motives with an excuse about the names is just awful. The disingenuousness, the insular snobbishness, the immaturity, the cynicality. It's just disgusting.

I have no further thoughts.

[-] imogen_underscore@hexbear.net 73 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

this is being handled so childishly by what seems like a good handful of the mods and admins lol. complete shit show. why not just lock the thread and perma everyone criticizing you all at this point, or do you enjoy arguing with us that much? i acknowledge that some users have acted overly hostile and crossed lines which sucks for you all to have to deal with but you all have created this situation (problem was fake to begin with) and gone on to drop the ball on resolving it several times in comical fashion.

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[-] Piment@hexbear.net 72 points 3 weeks ago

This wasn't really adressed, so I'm just gonna include my comment from the last thread, so maybe it will get adressed, as it was way out of pocket and deserves a response.

I think there should probably be some accountability for whoever was/were behind "the white cishet man vibes" part of the post, editing it out of the original post doesn't change that is was there, saying that shit was kinda fucked, as many people in the original post noted

[-] aaaaaaadjsf@hexbear.net 66 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Yeah if you go view the front page of the dredge tank right now, only 4/20 of the posts there are made by people primarily using he/him pronouns. So not only was it a shitty thing to say, it was also factually untrue. And that's not even mentioning that some of those guys using he/him pronouns are likely not het and/or cis either, given the demographics on hexbear.

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[-] imogen_underscore@hexbear.net 61 points 3 weeks ago

seconding this again... feels like admins just want us to move on from how wildly objectionable that was. whoever came up with that shit should certainly not be a mod and should honestly have to do some self crit or get banned.

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[-] chair@hexbear.net 68 points 3 weeks ago

which one of you did this please

[-] morte@hexbear.net 76 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

This smug condescension is exactly the kind of shit that pissed me off about the anonymous mod post. Its not like they were even shitposting they were contributing to the conversation constructively

E: and its from TC69??? Disappointing to say the least

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[-] DengistDonnieDarko@hexbear.net 63 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

absolutely wild lmao, love too be infantilized on my serious commieposting forum

[-] Aradina@lemmy.ml 62 points 3 weeks ago
[-] chair@hexbear.net 54 points 3 weeks ago

what the fuck lol who is doing these

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[-] ShareThatBread@hexbear.net 66 points 3 weeks ago

Also to add.

Can mods/admin stop making big changes to the site without posing the question to the community? Can this be written in big bold font somewhere? Was nothing learned during the vcj incident?

[-] CoolerOpposide@hexbear.net 54 points 3 weeks ago

It needs to be an unamendable part of the Hexbear constitution. Never have these unilateral efforts gone smoothly for those implementing them or being subjected to them.

Like if something is deadass a major problem with the site, pitch you case for changing what is wrong. This site is full of good people who want it to constantly change for the better

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[-] buh@hexbear.net 66 points 3 weeks ago

then run a slop channel naming competition for a new contained community

this will be the most important election of our lives

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[-] abc@hexbear.net 65 points 3 weeks ago

This post has mentioned chauvinistic, misogynistic, and toxic tendencies three times but provided literally no examples of such - nor did Carcosa's original post. I am not trying to say that these things have never existed or never will exist in posts/comments on my beloved Hexbear nor am I saying that you (or any other admin/mod) should have to provide examples of literally any/everything TC69 - but I am begging you to actually provide some legitimate examples because otherwise this just sounds like the same "we don't want the dunk tank because white cishet male behavior" justification that everyone was like jesse-wtf to

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[-] NewAcctWhoDis@hexbear.net 61 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

Why is someone who just returned after 3 years in charge of fixing this? Nothing personal but you're in the worst position to address culture.

I said it 3 years ago, I'll say it again today. I'm not going to sit here and post every little example of things we're describing as an issue when the modlog is publicly available.

If mods/admins want us to take the modlog seriously they have to take it seriously first. What is a user supposed to think when they look at the modlog and see this or this?

[-] imogen_underscore@hexbear.net 58 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

suddenly turning bans into a big joke feels like a way to deflect criticism for... banning people for valid criticism (as well as condescending in ban messages). cynical and irony poisoned.

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[-] REgon@hexbear.net 59 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

I'm glad to wrt to the slop things and the rules things. I'm surprised there's no mention of any actions wrt to the mods or transparency. Unless that falls under COC somehow, but that's not the vibe I'm getting.

This strugglesession evolved slowly over time as it became clear the actual reasons for closing the comms were not the reasons given. It gradually became evident a subsection of the mod team have really shitty attitudes about what it is they do and the position they have in the community. They're reddit power mods wishing to rule over ever shrinking digital fiefdoms. If we want to reckon with "chauvinism" then we need to start with those holding the most influential positions, and we need to set in place a system that makes it so this cliquey backdoors ratfuckery shit does not happen again.

Like the labour shitfuck to your tory fuckshit I applaud your initiative, but I invite you to go further :tory:
There's a lot that could be done to achieve more transparency. I'll find my old comment for some of the bulletpoints

edit: Christ I had to scroll thru a lot of dreg to find it. Can't believe you'd literally force me to see all those dumb takes and not even give me the ability to post, truly this is onethousandninehundredeightyfour.
Anyway, link to long post The relevant bit:

I don't think this is the last time this situation will erupt, if nothing changes about how moderation is handled and how site changes are handled.
Keeping the two comms open just leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Not kicking the mods who wrote that shit out is also a bad sign, for the direction this whole thing is headed.

I would really recommend that mod discussions aren't anonymous anymore. Have the matrix board or whatever it is, but make it so everyone can go and look what is being posted, just like with the modlog. The only time discussions should be anonymous, should be when there is a risk to operational security, and not a vague risk, an actual one. It should also be announced whenever those anonymous discussions take place and explained why they have to be anonymous.

Early in the site days we went away from displaying which mod took an action in the modlog, and just blaming everything on automod. I think reverting that would go a very long way to bust a lot of this cliquey shit.

When users notice certain users get special treatment, they get banned for commenting on it, until the situation becomes so egregious that it cannot be hidden anymore. Not allowing the userbase to call out bad mod practice, is also not good. We've closed both userunion and feedback because the mods don't like the "drama" - Getting called out for shitty behaviour. We really need a comm where the userbase is free to voice concerns and grievances. That would also go a long way towards avoiding these situations in the future. And this time mods shouldn't remove posts just because they dislike them, that's pissbaby shit.

Other good effortposts I found while scrolling thru the dreg

Finally: For those who are just now tuning in and wondering if all the fuss is about the naming of some comms. It's not. It's about people feeling lied to, talked down to and mistrustful of the mod team due past behaviours and the way this was handled. This comment thread probably gives you the best idea of what was the catalyst for being Very Mad Online.

@TransComrade69@hexbear.net I'm done now, you can dunk on me knowing no more edits will come. one-more-thing I'll still think Naruto is worse than One Piece though

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[-] imogen_underscore@hexbear.net 57 points 3 weeks ago

feeling very foolish for ever thinking the internet moderators on here don't have that much in common with all internet moderators ever

[-] DefinitelyNotAPhone@hexbear.net 57 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

There's something really funny about a bunch of commie admins who want a serious leftist community, but rather than actually committing to anything like democratic centralism by gauging their communities' thoughts on things they instead unironically do the whole undemocratic shadow cabal 1984 meme by dropping half-baked ideas on everyone with zero prior warning or discussion.

And by "really funny," I of course mean that the admins should take their own advice and go touch grass for a bit, because this is by far the dumbest struggle session this site has had and that's saying something.

[-] yoink@hexbear.net 55 points 3 weeks ago* (last edited 3 weeks ago)

again, posting here after posting in the other thread because i need to get words out, even if they're not taken up

one of the founding principles, and one of the most important things that makes this site something I return to often, is the fact that we are willing to take each other in good faith. Absolutely there are times when people are posting dripping in irony, but for the most part I think this is something we've done well, and something we've managed to maintain over the years since this site launched. That said, the jacketing that keeps happening, and especially what took place yesterday in regards to 'cishet white vibes', needs to stop. We can change the rules all we want, we can struggle and struggle over and over again but until the leadership team here internalises this, the issue is never going to go away. It is clear that there is some level of contempt for the userbase, even if it's not framed as such. Even if we meme about it, the underlying culture of the leadership team seems to allow for this contempt to fester, and it's most clear when the team throws aside any nuance and understanding of the users here in favour of casting swathes of us as 'white' or 'cishet', so that sweeping decisions can be made about us. I don't know how you weed this out, I just recognise it as the seed that it is.

As a trans woman, as a Person of Colour, this is one of the few sane places online. Ultimately, I don't care about the tanks closing, even if I want them around. I don't even really care that we have struggles every now and then, but I admit I say that as a regular user and not a mod or admin. I'm not about to leave this site, I don't have elsewhere to go, but that is precisely why things like this concern me. I understand the effort and everything needed to run a site, let alone a site like this one, so I understand slip ups and miscommunication. I'm not about to call for the abolishment of the system, but some level of self diagnosis of the problem and consequences thereafter feels like the only good way forward here.

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this post was submitted on 10 Nov 2024
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