Hello users of Hexbear, we wanted to inform you that we are going to be locking the_dunk_tank and dredge_tank communities. We have created two new communities /c/gossip and /c/counterpropaganda to serve a similar but clearly distinct purpose than the dunk/dredge tanks.

Not only is the dunk tank a term that has racist origins, but also many posts there were almost no effort and often times requiring later edits to show how they weren’t reactionary, not useful with regard to developing rhetoric and furthering dialectical analysis of that which we dunk upon.

To that end, we wish posts of reactionaries to be placed in !counterpropaganda@hexbear.net along with an accompanying explanation (as simple or complex as desired) with the intent of countering the reactionary propaganda in the post body, as of now comments are not subject to the same rhetorical rigor rule.

For the posts that are not "low-hanging fruit’ of notable people we ask that you use !gossip@hexbear.net .

These changes are mainly part of a continued effort to remove the racist and misogynistic elements from our community and grow.

Any moderators of the dunk tank or dredge tank that want to be a mod in the new communities let me know.

Any users with questions or comments please use this post, this change was made at the behest of the entire Hexbear mod and admin team. We will be looking for more moderators in an organized volunteer drive shortly, if you wish to submit an application you may send it to me via hexbear or matrix direct messages.

Use this post as a place for discussion to these changes. We will keep things as they are for 2 weeks and then reflect on the feedback, including this post: https://hexbear.net/post/3858346

As a personal addendum I am sorry if the closing of the tanks these changes removes a beloved space on the site and if you want to suggest a community to replace them you may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.

Sitewide or community changes come from proposals put forth from the mod team, discussed, and voted on by the mod team.

Any users wanting to suggest a community to replace the tanks, may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net current discussion is here https://hexbear.net/post/3858346 or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.

You may also consider using !shitreactionariessay@lemmygrad.ml as a substitute for dunk/dredge tank posts as well

The mod statement can be found here: https://hexbear.net/comment/5613033

Application

What is your Hexbear username? Do you have any preferred pronouns? What are your thoughts on capitalism? What are your thoughts on imperialism? What are your thoughts on trans rights? What are your thoughts on racial justice? What do think about current and previous protests around the world? What are your thoughts on Veganism and Animal Liberation? Do you have any experience with other leftist online communities? What did those experiences teach you? What is your approach to moderation, and how do you work with teams? How do you deal with online drama and people who try to start things for the sake of it? What current comms would you be interested in moderating? Do you have any ideas for community engagement? What is your general time availability? (Time zone, amounts, common browsing times, etc)

  • HelluvaBottomCarter [comrade/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
    52·
    10 days ago

    I think it would go a long way for all the people involved making these decisions to post an actual cogent reason for the moderation. Rule 8 wasn’t exactly clear why it needed to be there. We defined the problem, that people were posting literal whos, but we never heard why that is a problem. I see some small attempts at trying to say it hurts the site in some way, but nobody can describe the harm.

    Controversy over Rule 8 turns into a new comm. But now people are mad that the new comm is popular and again, it’s somehow harming the site or leftism or rhetoric.

    There only needs to be one comm for this. It’s all the same thing. Mocking Rob Reiner for posting cringe isn’t accomplishing more than mocking pepehitler42069 on reddit. Again, it’s like there is someone with an idea of how all this matters and is important and needs to be changed but can’t articulate why.

    Here are my guesses:

    1. Someone wants the comm to be a compilation of the day’s hottest takes but is thwarted by images of pepehitler88 on reddit being cringe. They want to use the comm as twitter news, to see what all the big dogs and they don’t care about the little stuff.
    2. Someone thinks that critiquing twitter posts is some kind of agitprop and not critiquing power (aka people with follower) is ruining praxis. The election of burger king exacerbated this as high-level users saw it as an opportunity to agitate.
    3. Someone hates twitter posts, they hate any post that isn’t super serious leftist literature except for community in-jokes and power users posting pee-pee poo-poo
    4. There’s not much else going on so mods are trying to solve a problem that doesn’t need solving. We’re just keeping busy, trying to find some grievance to salve for our users.