I just realised, I can’t post anything on lemmy.ml
So, I checked https://lemmy.ml/modlog, there’s a new moderator.
All posts and comments talking about China, Jinping, Russia, and Putin have been deleted and users banned
Coming from Reddit, the very existence of this thread is a breath of fresh air. That there are mod logs at all to be able to document this, that there is a place where it can be posted that is not under control of the mods being criticized, is an enormous improvement over an unaccountable centralized platform.
The other beautiful thing is that if you aren’t satisfied with the behavior of mods and admin on one instance, there are literally hundreds of others to choose from. You aren’t stuck dealing with bad actors if you want to participate. And if moderation of a particular community upsets the users, they are free to move to or create a similar community on a different instance.
The major downside of this is that it’s going to create echo chambers, but that’s unavoidable. It’s not like this is a new problem. Communities that reject outside ideas outright have existed long before the internet.
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I think this is bad for Lemmy as a whole, as a community but only due to misunderstanding and generalizations… People are going to equate the “censorship” on the server lemmy.ml as censorship on Lemmy, the platform/software. That is just NOT THE CASE. Please, whenever someone mentions lemmy.ml and its censorship or the likes, be fast to mention that that is a specific lemmy server and the beauty of lemmy is its decentralization and the fact that it is open source. There are plenty of other servers.
I fear that this kind of thing drives people away from Lemmy, when it should not.
Well, the situation is a bit more complex. Admins of this “specific Lemmy Server” are creators and main maintainers of the Lemmy project as such.
So, generalization you are afraid of makes some sense.
I have replied to someone else further down with my opinion on this topic. I think it also fits in a reply to you, so I will just copy paste it here:
Yes, it might sound worrisome, but I dont think you are pushing authoritarian ideology by using Lemmy. The code itself is fine. The code is not authoritarian. The server which hosts your account is also not authoritarian.
Lemmy is, right now, the best alternative for a reddit-like platform. It is something created for the users, by the users. By using lemmy, you are not enriching the wallets of the shareholders. By using something like reddit, you provide content and a select few get to buy a new yacht.
Also, plenty of people are contributing code to lemmy. It is no longer just these 2. The code is also Open-Source. Anyone can fork it and create a new version of lemmy, with compatibility with the current version of lemmy. By using lemmy, you are allowing the possibility that, at any time in the future, someone else comes and says “I have some ideas to improve lemmy, let’s do this on my own terms”, forks it and continues the work without massively spliting the community.
You have many good points here. Still, I have a feeling that Lemmy as a platform and as a software is still very coupled with its creators.
Yes, there are other contributors as well. But these guys currently own the official repo and make key decisions. And if you donate to Lemmy you pay a salary to these two guys (afaik, Lemmy is their full-time work these days).
So, for me, it is still rather complicated.
I don’t see a problem about their work, just because of their political orientation. And frankly, neither should you.
They develop good software, which is open source and everyone can inspect it. There is nothing wrong about them getting paid for it. Not giving donations to them because of what they believe would be the same as an employer running you through a political evaluation before actually employing you.
Don’t get me wrong: there is nothing wrong about not donating (i did not). But not donating, solely because of some ideology a developer of open source Software has (which does not reflect in the code), seems quite stuck up to me.
I guess lemme ask this. If the devs of lemmy were open Nazis, went to rallies, openly promoted it, etc, would you still feel the same way?
What are you asking about? I don’t support extremist ideology - be it left or right. Extremism and violence was never beneficial to the political discourse or greater public. So i disagree with those ideologies. I vote on laws and elect people which i believe will keep extremism out of our system.
If it comes to the quality of someones work, private conviction does not matter. Sure, they might let personal beliefs bleed into their work. But there the beauty of Open Source comes into play: I can check it myself and if i don’t have the capability to do so, many others do.
So if they are on the far spectrum of something i disagree and i am very greatfull for good quality of work they provide for free, i might still give a small donation. If they are actually extremist, i prefer to let the authorities deal with it. Where i come from the police actually cracks down on this kind of people and they probably are better at doing so than me myself.
Just because there will be people who ask about freedom of speech… Someone way smarter than I said something like: “Your freedom ends where someone else’s freedom begins”. This should be the base rule to identify extremism. So to stay with NAZIs: A far right person who doesn’t want Jewish people owning a store infringes on someone else’s freedom. Therefore that person is an extremist, should not be protected by his freedom and authorities should deal with them.
Yes yes, the authorities should deal with them but would you support them? Would you recommend their software if it was good, would you use their products?
By using lemmy, you are not enriching the wallets of the shareholders.
You actually have no guarantee that any given deployment doesn’t harvest and sell data. They probably don’t, but it’s not guaranteed.
The data is public. It doesn’t matter.
Only if it’s actually having an effect on the Lemmy project.
From what I’ve seen, the Lemmy devs recognize that their opinions aren’t welcome everywhere, and that Lemmy should not have any biases.
That might still have secondary effects such as in what kind of moderation features they develop and support
Hint: the moderation tools they are choosing to develop are none.
They are intentionally refusing to develop any moderation tools despite current moderation tools not working and it being the biggest issue instance admins are facing.
“Intentionally” is a bit overdramatizing, don’t you think?
It’s just not as much of a priority, which is still questionable.
It was always a tankie den. The Lemmy developers are very openly tankies.
They held their heads relatively low during the whole Reddit exodus, but that’s about it.Here are some examples: https://raddle.me/f/lobby/159606/is-lemmy-still-a-tankie-platform-or-are-there-actual
Reading this really troubles me. I don’t like the implication that using lemmy is pushing authoritarian ideology.
If I was born 50 yrs earlier I would literally have been put in the gas chamber. I tick several qualifiers for it.
Yes, it might sound worrisome, but I dont think you are pushing authoritarian ideology by using Lemmy. The code itself is fine. The code is not authoritarian. The server which hosts your account is also not authoritarian.
Lemmy is, right now, the best alternative for a reddit-like platform. It is something created for the users, by the users. By using lemmy, you are not enriching the wallets of the shareholders. By using something like reddit, you provide content and a select few get to buy a new yacht.
Also, plenty of people are contributing code to lemmy. It is no longer just these 2. The code is also Open-Source. Anyone can fork it and create a new version of lemmy, with compatibility with the current version of lemmy. By using lemmy, you are allowing the possibility that, at any time in the future, someone else comes and says “I have some ideas to improve lemmy, let’s do this on my own terms”, forks it and continues the work without massively spliting the community.
I really enjoyed reading your explanation. Thank you very much.
This calms me down quite a bit. :) have a good day.
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I think you mean 80 years. Unless there were genociding gas chambers in 1973 I haven’t heard about.
(And I would have been put in one too, just not in 1973.)
Haui@discuss.tchncs.de: >If I was born 50 yrs earlier
FlyingSquid: >I think you mean 80 years
You presume to know his/her age?
Actually, I just misread.
Yeah, that happened to me once too.
OK maybe twice.😋
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Fuck I had no idea, why can’t we just have nice things.
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Yes. People who just consume content can easily switch. But for people who create content this is not that easy, especially for users who created communities there.
I agree it sucks but at least you have that option considering the nature of the Lemmy project.
Lemmy ml has always been radically pro-fascist, honestly it’s your fault for having made communities there. Start again but this time make sure the server is someone trustworthy
The most popular (?) Open source software community is hosted on Lemmy.ml
Time to make another one popular in another instance then
What? I don’t have a community, I’m not even a moderator. I’m trying to help lemmy to grow by populating small communities because there are a lot of people complaining because lack of content.
Then do not invest your time in communities hosted on lemmy.ml (if you do not agree with the instance ideology).
I’m quoting your comment
Yes. People who just consume content can easily switch. But for people who create content this is not that easy, especially for users who created communities there.
Look there community on lemmy.ml who might have similar things to say about China or Uyghurs. Do they have to move?
Misread, mb, but the point stands like the other commenter said
I’ve already done that twice. It’s annoying, and a pain in the ass to reset subscriptions and blocks. If I am forced to do so again, I don’t know if I will. I doubt I’m alone in this feeling.
For me, 4th time’s hopefully the charm
Obviously a bit thin skinned, but IMO lemmy.ml can do what they want with their moderation. It is not anybody else’s decision how they moderate, except of course keeping it legal.
Seems to me almost all those comments are somewhat offensive, for instance calling people tankies, claiming they should go back under their stone, and frequently use the word fuck, as if those are some sort of argument. I’m guessing rule 2 is something about not being rude. Personally I find that perfectly OK not to allow rude comments.
OP should “read the room” and terms better, then maybe they could have a proper debate.
PS:
Rule 2 of lemmy.ml includes: "Be respectful, especially when disagreeing. " Clearly that rule is ignored over and over again by the above user.
I’m shocked the statement that lemmy.ml can moderate as they want is in any way controversial, yet here we are, and this post has about a third downvotes.
Lemmy dot ml is like, one step away from becoming another Lemmygrad.
and I think thats probably by design, Since lemmygrad is defederated from a lot of the better instances, what better way to get back into them than to take over a federated instance.
Especially when the admins and lemmy creators are down with your tankie ideology and support you taking over the instance.
lemmy.ml defederated lemmygrad.com ages ago
I mean, if you’re gonna lie about it, you could at least lie in a way thats not provably false. https://defed.xyz/check/lemmy.ml
also, dot ml is one of the lemmies i frequented (well, used to, until the tankies became such a fucking problem), so I can tell you from personal experience that lemmygraders are there, in droves, and posting constantly, from their lemmygrad accounts.
um… but it’s listed under blocked instances right here… https://lemmy.ml/instances
That’s .com. I’ve never even heard of lemmygrad.com until now. I have heard of .ml though.
Seems .com’s no longer up. I guess .ml’s just where they migrated to, is my best guess?
Theres literally posts from lemmygrad on the front page of lemmy dot ml local right now right now.
Just use the period. It’s so weird you keep saying “dot”.
Anyways, notice what I said vs what your post contains:
Excuse me for giving you the benefit of the doubt of just typing .com by habit, instead of assuming you are trying to actually, legitimately talk about a site that doesnt exist.
They are literally run by the same people and everyone can look and see they are not defederated. Why are you blatantly lying about something that is easily verifiable?
Again, lemmygrad.com is literally on the blocked list, and it’s easily verifiable. I did not know that lemmygrad.ml was where it was at now. Sue me ig.
Uh, lemmygrad.com isn’t the URL for lemmygrad. It’s lemmygrad.ml.
But you already knew that and are being intentionally disingenuous. You should stop lying.
except of course keeping it legal
This is also up to them. If the admins are ok to get corresponding consequences - they can do this.
Posts like this posted here from time to time.
And I think the main problem is: the fact that an instance has a very strong political view and even a censorship becomes a big surprise for people using this exact instance.
It looks like an instance and community policies must be somehow better visible.
This is also up to them.
No it’s not, they may walk the line, but if they cross it, the law will ultimately be enforced. So in the long run, a service can only exist if it is kept legal.
Posts like this posted here from time to time.
I’m not sure what you mean, but yes there are repeated attacks on lemmy.ml, and it’s getting tiring, because it always turns out to be very speculative, and not really an issue.
an instance has a very strong political view and even a censorship
They are moderating according to their own rules. Rule 2: “Be respectful, especially when disagreeing. Everyone should feel welcome here.” Clearly the above poster violated this rule over and over.
It looks like an instance and community policies must be somehow better visible.
That’s a completely different debate.
This is the only good take I’ve read on this thread so far. People are mad their opinions, vitriol, and/or FUD aren’t tacitly approved by the mods of another instance.
Thank you. I find it sad that so many people don’t seem to understand that their right to free speech, is not a right to dictate other people, or force themselves on whatever forum they want.
But they are taking away free speech!!! \s
Truly sad to see a majority is down voting this, meaning they believe free speech includes how a lemmy instance is moderated?!
About 30% (just my estimate) of the people here from Reddit had a problem with mods having too much freedom granted to them by Spez. There is an irony that such people would be attracted to a decentralized network where instances have even more freedom to shape their communities, but as you said- it doesn’t really matter what people think when anyone can go start their own.
Genuine question, is that 30% a real number with a source?
Just my estimate based on observation. It’s been my experience that most of the people on the Fediverse seem to want strong moderation tools, but there’s definitley a contingent that would prefer a looser form of moderation (or none at all). The cool thing about the Fediverse is that both can peacefully coexist.
The cool thing about the Fediverse is that both can peacefully coexist.
Ya I love this feature of the platform. Some instances can be strict on what content they want to have (e.g. beehaw and exploding-heads) while others can be the libertarian platform of their dreams (e.g. personal instances).
It would be interesting to see some polling on this, but I’m no statistician and wouldn’t be able to perform it in a way that wouldn’t be bias, nor could I account for that bias. 😔
I prefer looser mod powers
Reddit mods were capricious and drunk with petty power
Always has been.
It’s one of the reasons why lemmy never really took off until the great reddit migration despite having a decent software product.
tankies + fedidrama = classic lemmy
This is where I learned the word tankies. It sounds like British slang honestly.
Think that’s where it started actually.
Curious to see how this develops
In typical internet fashion, rather than read these mod logs and decide who was right, I’m just going to say “down with the CCP” a bunch of times there and see if I get banned.
typical internet fash
I laughed
The real, cool, interesting content that isn’t worthy of deletion at all
Obviously I’m going to post it when relevant, not in reply to beef stroganoff recipes.
Oddly specific. I’d like this to become a new meme please. The beef stroganoffadors will have no idea what’s going on.
CCP delenda est
The creators are known to lean towards tankie rhetotic and I‘ve read they chose .ml because of Marx and Lenin before. That rose concerns from the beginning so it‘s hardly surprising a moderator there would do this. It is very concerning nonetheless and threatens to throw the creators‘ work into jeopardy because at that point you might as well use twixxer or whatever it‘s called now.
Fascists aren’t morally healthy humans. Authoritarians can’t cope with social reality, where different people can have different opinions and loyalties and yet support each other. They always seem to end up succumbing to patriarchal cults, where Lenin-Hitler-Mao-Trump gets to do whatever he wants to your sons and your daughters, and you and your working class have no recourse.
Remember children, anything authoritarian (especially when talking about the left) is now “fascist.” This totally isn’t a maneuver in the right-wing fascist playbook to water down the term “fascist” to push for greater acceptance in the idea of fascism in the general public that we’re seeing today.
…Dude. Do you want to, I dunno, read about the purges of loyal communists by Stalin in the 30s and 40s? Can you explain to me how that’s significantly different from the Night of Long Knives?
Well obviously one was done by fascists and the other was done by communists.
Comparing two really different ideologies with just one aspect / event and saying they are essentially the same is not really the way to go. Coming from a country that has a history with liberal capitalism, state socialism/communism and fascism I feel like its really unsettling how you are throwing together the different ideologies.
Communism and Fascism are really different in as many aspect as they are similar. Especially because fascism and communism both really vary from the specific context they got to power. Like fascism in austria was different from fascism in germany or communism in china is different than it was in poland.
I you want to talk about how they got to power, well, fascists usually got there by votes, and communists by revolution. It’s rare–but not unheard of–for a communist gov’t to be voted into power.
But the end results end up being remarkable similar; they’re both dictatorial, and both use state-sponsored violence to suppress or eliminate competing political ideology. (I want to be clear that I’m not talking about Marxism specifically; Marx was opposed to the existence of a state. Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Castro, et al. were authoritarian.) As long as you are part of the political in group, you’re golden. Once you’re out, you’re an enemy of the state.
Stalin wasn’t a communist. He had the Bolsheviks assassinated. He was an imperialist.
He got into power through the Bolsheviks however. A wolf in sheep’s clothing. There was similar with the Nazis in Germany, but I see that more as left wing infighting making them blind to a far right threat.
Nothing in my post is defensive of Stalin, you fucking buffoons.
You’re acting like this is a right wing play, but the tactic of using fascism as an insult toward left wing parties actually has precedent even within left wing politics. [Before world war 2, even.](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_fascism#:~:text=Social fascism (also socio-fascism,dictatorship of the proletariat and)
Dude, you’re just as transparent as you are shallow.
Replying to everyone’s comments, comment history stalking, being a tankie, bro, literally go touch grass.
From my experience it was the leftists who started to call everybody and their mother fascist.
So there could be no different outcome from this.
I had no idea what a tankie was until I read the comments here.
I can’t Ctrl+F on my phone, can you tell me?
People who support fascist governments - specifically, Russia, China, North korea.
They will also rightly say things about how America does bad things too. And that is true. It’s ok to admit that.
They, on the other hand, will never admit that Russia or China is ever doing something unethical or wrong.
They have a critical logic mistake they always make:
US bad = not_US good
They’re effectively obsessed with America in a negative way, where they have to hate anything the US likes and like anything the US hates. They find themselves defending oppressive regimes and, instead of having a realization, dig in further. All the news about NK being bad is just propaganda, and China isn’t doing anything bad to the Uighurs even though they have official government statements on it.
It’s just like nationalist patriotism in a way, just the negative of it. One’s obsessed with what the US likes, the other is obsessed with what the US dislikes. The US can do no wrong to one, and everything it does is bad to the other. It’s an incredibly childish logic.
Great nuanced definition you provided to ignorant people who are looking to learn. You totally don’t have an agenda here.
Thanks for your nuanced take, @KillAllPoorPeople
Your own comment above basically supports the definition of tankie. Specifically, this:
The term is also used to describe people who endorse, defend, or deny the crimes committed by communist leaders such as Vladimir Lenin,[9][10] Joseph Stalin, Mao Zedong, Enver Hoxha, Pol Pot, and Kim il-Sung. In modern times, the term is used across the political spectrum to describe those who have a bias in favor of illiberal or authoritarian states with a socialist legacy or a nominally left-wing government, such as the Republic of Belarus, People’s Republic of China, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, the Republic of Nicaragua, the Russian Federation, the Republic of Serbia, the Syrian Arab Republic, and the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela. Additionally, tankies have a tendency to support non-socialist states with no socialist legacy if they are opposed to the United States and the Western world in general, regardless of their ideology,[4][11] such as the Islamic Republic of Iran. (emphasis mine)
I would take issue with the single word ‘fascist’ that @figaro@lemdro.id is using, as the government doesn’t need to be full-on fascist to it qualify for tankies to defend it. It only needs to be illiberal with a socialist legacy or nominally left-leaning government. So the definition is more broad than what figaro defines. But all the elements of Figaro’s defintion are literally there in your own linked Wikipedia article.
I’m sure you’re above board. It’s literally the definition of Tankie.
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Just read the Wikipedia page. Don’t listen to people pushing their Joseph McCarthy-“esque” views.
Tankies literally are history revisionists. There is no justification for the Cultural Revolution or Stalinism, even in the face of Western hegemony.
Joseph McCarthy-esk
-esque
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Lemmy’s been known for them for years.
Noticed that majority of tankie and genocide defending users are from lemmy.ml, grad of hexbear.
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