Hey, everyone. Hope this post finds you all well! A few days ago, PM_ME_YOUR_FOUCAULTS opened a comm request thread to name the community formerly known as The Dredge Tank. Now that it’s been about 4 days and the votes seem pretty steady, we’re rea-
“STOP THE COUNT!!!”
“Mr. President, she’s talking.”
As I was saying, we’re ready to call the vote. Nobody’s been happy with counterpropaganda, and we’ve heard you loud and clear. I’m excited to announce that Slop. is now open for all the posts you’d have previously posted to The Dredge Tank.
El Chisme continues to remain the new space for posts that would have been at home in The Dunk Tank.
In case anyone’s confused about this, I’m gonna give a really quick explanation so everyone’s on the same page with what’s going on with the Tanks. The names of The Dunk Tank and The Dredge Tank have racist origins. The moderators of those communities agreed that the names of these communities should be changed. Unfortunately, while Lemmy allows the display names of communities to be changed, it does not currently allow the actual comm names to be changed. In order to change the names of these communities, we would have to shut them down and re-open new comms under new names. The mods of the dunk tank and dredge tank requested the name c/gossip. While there are some legitimate arguments being made relating to misogynistic societal perceptions of that word, the mods include women and enbies who disagree and specifically requested this name. I feel that this situation parallels the initial pushback that was experienced with disabled in which users voiced concerns that this name could be ableist, but the moderators of that community are themselves disabled and specifically requested that comm name, verbatim. Along with this name change, the mods felt that slightly expanding the scope of the community and simultaneously lowering the bar for the previous Rule 8 would allow users to post about more minor public figures as well as more major ones. This was seen as an expansion of the community’s role, allowing posts to the new Dredge Tank replacement (counterpropaganda) to become a little more focused. We communicated this poorly, but the intention was to have users offer a sentence or two countering the reactionary take shown in the screenshot. Given how things spiraled from there, we’ve taken a step back from changing any of the rules during the switchover from The Dredge tank to Slop. We’re trying to take time to let everyone breathe without changing too many things too quickly, but we also want to actually make sure people can get back to posting. Hopefully you’re all okay with this pacing, lemme know below.
In upcoming admin updates:
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I’ll post some analysis of mistakes and missteps that were made in recent days, including some of the context that led up to those errors.
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I’ll offer a clearer and more complete explanation and description of the ongoing site culture issues that have been previously mentioned. These were poorly communicated before, but I’ll do my best to explain both the issues at hand as well as the importance of dealing with them.
The last few days have been really confusing and frustrating for a lot of people and a lot has happened. This is not an appropriate place to reopen, re-litigate, or rehash the struggle session. I will not be debating either the struggle session or the subjects of the upcoming admin update posts here. Please refrain from doing so as well.
“Folks, we’re feeding the fish their slop, they’re tremendously hungry, incredibly famished. And look: I get to feed them. They say: Mr President, please feed the koi fish, its din din time, and it is! I get to do the little shaka-shaka with the can, and they’re happy, they’re eating -they’re eating- out of the palm of my hand, and they’re getting so big and so strong. Look at all these koi fish! I bet they won’t have any issues finding -finding- a special someone. And it’s wonderful, it’s great. Greydon Carter could never be a tremendously effective keeper of fish. His party is not so hot, and all of his betta fishes are dying! But Lyudmila’s letting me feed them, and I’m doing a tremendously great job, and a looot better than what Sleepy Joe would do!”
In all of this, not once have we gotten an explanation of why it HAS to be gossip, or why gossip doesn’t have the connotations that we keep arguing it does. The most we get is ‘we don’t think it’s that bad’. You’d think that if there was such a strong case for it despite all the protest against it, it would be easy to put together a comment explaining the logic, but not once has that happened, and at this point I don’t think we’re going to be told.
In all honesty, it’s starting to feel less like they don’t think it has the baggage it does, and instead they’re fully aware but just really, really want to call it that anyway, everyone else’s feelings be damned. I don’t want to be cynical, but absent literally any explanation what am I supposed to think?
Thank you for the comment
Every community that has been made the past couple years has had the name chosen by the people moderating it.
Just because “gossip” can be used in an offensive and condescending way, does not make it so.
Women talking to each other is an important part of how we keep communities safe.
Women mods of the community specifically asked for the community name as they felt it best represented the types of posts welcome there.
You are more than welcome to make a !commrequest@hexbear.net post suggesting better names for a community
Ironically, doesn’t this apply to “dunk tanks” too? It’s a concept that has racist origins but has for like seven decades been nothing but an innocent, non-racist fairground game.
The point is that people are upset by the term “gossip”, whether or not the intent is to be upsetting, in the same way that modern ‘dunk tanks’ aren’t intending to be racist or hold racist baggage.
I’m sorry but a racist game that killed and maimed people for years has no redeemable qualities.
Gossip has been used to protect communities and has a recent misogynistic association.
There were people concerned about !disabled@hexbear.net name yet the disabled mods that wanted the community specifically chose the name.
You’re just creating some made up relationship between two things when there is none. Some people disagreed about this, some people disagreed about that. They’re the same.
Using Disabled for a comm name is a shit ton different than using Gossip.
It seems the real difference and what I keep hearing is that it’s the mods choice on the names they choose. If they’re name is steeped in bigotry so what the mods wanted it and who are you the community to go against the mods?
How is gossip steeped in bigotry? I would posit that a social concept that protected women was demonized by the patriarchy to reduce its effectiveness.
The comparison between dunk tanks and gossip is incorrect. Women have been hurt for gossiping in defense of their community. The dunk tank is literally a violent racist thing.
A dunk tank at a fair ground in the 21st century isn’t a violent racist thing, it’s a thing that has violent racism in its early history but is otherwise just an abstract neutral concept that can be perfectly innocent in modern contexts.
I’m not advocating for the return of the name on this site by any means; I think we, as leftists, should be aware of deeper implications of terms, and not use terms that can or do upset people even if in general society they are used without any malicious connotations or intentions. Can you seriously not see any parallel?
I cannot but if you care to explain I am happy to listen
Many users posted articles explaining the horrible history of racism. I am open to being shown how gossip as a term has harmed women more than it has helped.
It’s a term that’s clearly upsetting people here, for reasons that have been gone over again and again in these threads.
I feel like that’s the only thing that should matter. It doesn’t need to provide “more help than harm”; that’s some weird utilitarian logic. If it upsets people, change it. How is that hard? Genuinely don’t understand why you’re so bound to this name?
Go to the message by yoink you responded to in this thread and then go to the message she was responding to and there you go. If that’s not enough to convince you it’s obvious you have no interest in being open to feedback on this issue.
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shush
Where did I compare them? You’re doing that, not me.
Many users have given you countless examples of how it’s sexist and misogynistic and the mods and admins response is continuously been the community, many of whom are trans and not white, is behaving like cishet white men because the view of these select few mods is different than yours.
It’s gross and toxic behavior. It would be so easy to just listen to your community.
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you have no friends
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Through all that’s happened, I’ve been repeatedly encouraged by how quickly and nearly unanimously the whole community agreed that the tank names needed to be changed. The dunk tank had been around for years, but once the harm was pointed out, it was time to for it to go.
Seeing the staunch defense of the name “gossip” when quite a few people immediately say they find it offensive makes me think that was a special case, and not the sign of the strength of the community I had hoped it was.
Because there was ample evidence of the dunk tank being an abhorrently racist term that killed people where as gossip is a tool that has been vital to marginilized communities demonized by the patrirarchy over time. The site has recently commited to addressing the issue of misogyny on the site and lemmy at large.
description of torture
This instrument called the scold’s/witch’s/gossip bridle was an iron muzzle that locked onto the women’s head and mouth, pressing their tongue down to prevent them from speaking.
Gossip as a gendered term
Origin of Gossip
History of Gossip
Evolution of Gossip
As your sources say gossip as a tool can protect women. Gossip as a term, or potentially as the name for a community, can be used to oppress women. While it would be great for this site to play a role in strengthening the tool and weakening the term, it shouldn’t be taken as a given that the users who are affected by this are comfortable taking on the fight of reclaiming the word, or that they think this change is effective in doing so.
I appreciate how seriously you are taking the harm of the racist term. I don’t appreciate how, at least from the outside, it looks like the position you are in of needing to defend the mods has led you to downplay the harm of misogyny to create a comparison.
While the general principle is the similar, the impact of “the dunk tank” on Black men in particular is so much worse than the connotations of gossip
There is also work to reclaim gossip as a gendered term owing to it’s contribution to women’s solidarity and safety - there’s no similar attempt for “dunk tank” and I’m not aware of anything positive arising from brutalising people of colour for entertainment
I’m trying to thing of a similar phrase to dunk tank that’s been decontextualised, I’ll post again if I think of one
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go to bed if you’re tired
Thank you for replying.
Again, I’m trying not to be cynical, but that does sound like it just confirms that at the core of it the decision has been made by the mods and that’s all there is to it. If so, I genuinely disagree on all levels with how this is being handled, but at least that is finally honest about what’s going on - there is no real debate about it, it’s just so.
To be honest, I’m not even really all that hung up on the literal thing that started all this anymore, I’m just stuck at the fact that this is just tacit recognition that it really doesn’t matter how we feel, the mods will just overrule us. And while I appreciate the suggestion at the end of the comment, in light of that fact I really don’t see how my voice is suddenly going to matter if/when I suggest names. There’s no guarantee that anything I say, any attempt to hold people accountable, isn’t just going to be met with ‘well we disagree, so that’s that’. It’s genuinely disheartening.
This is also not even touching the idea of ‘this can be used in an offensive way, but I’m not using it offensively so you should’t take it that way’. I’m sure I don’t have to point out where else that exact argument pops up - not to draw direct parallels, just to point out this is pretty weak as a justification.
A post in that exact community was what determined the name of slop.
Anyone is welcome to submit a mod application.
For the first two years admins and sitemods made the decisions with occasional temp checks from the userbase.
I added mods to the decision making process and due to what happened we are working a way for users to also be involved with the process.
You are correct though that the people interested in creating, cultivating and moderating a community get the choice of what it is called. It has been that way the entire time the site has existed.
That being said we are trying to open up this process for transparency as well as user engagement.
In the least snappy way possible - I’ve been here and active for four years, I’m aware of the history of moderation on this site. I am aware anyone is welcome to submit a mod application, but that has nothing to do with what I’m saying. I’m not asking to be a mod, I fully recognise that it takes volunteer work to be done and that not everyone is willing to do it.
I am saying that each of these decisions, and the way that it seems that it doesn’t matter how we, or hell how I feel as part of this community. From this comment all I can gleam is that the response is ‘well, this community is not for you then’. Which seems counter to the whole renaming exercise to begin with, considering it’s an attempt to make the space feel safer.
But again, so be it if this is how things are. Like I’ve said in another comment, I’m not going anywhere cos I don’t have anywhere else like this, I’m stuck having to put my trust in the team, even if I feel shaky about it. This whole thing has just made me sad, I’m not gonna lie.
We recognize that what has been done is not working and are actively seeking to change the way future decisions are made.
If you have specific ideas for how things could be made better with regard to how site changes are made I would love to hear them.
All I’m really asking is for things to be more democratic. I know we joke about voting all the time, but genuinely it feels like the only way to truly avoid things like this happening is to open up the decision making process. I’m sure I’m not the first to suggest that, and I know it’s not as simple as just ‘make everything a vote’, but as it stands right now it does feel very one-way, and it doubtless contributes to the way things spark up like this over and again. Obviously, even under a process like that things like this will still happen, where decisions are made that I don’t agree with, but at least it would be transparent and in line with our ethos of good faith and open discussion. Everything so far has felt very closed - it’s only now that it feels obvious that we’re working from ‘the mods want this to happen’ backwards in order to find justifications for this particular change and wording.
And while we can repeat that ‘mod applications are always open’, it doesn’t solve the inherent problem here - why should it be only for the mods to have all the say? And is it really good practice to join a mod team just to try and change the culture as a single, new mod? Yes, I agree that moderating is thankless work, and that in a lot of ways it does matter a lot what the people guiding the community feel about the direction of said community - but on the flip side, as someone who works full time and who isn’t posting constantly, why should I count for less? I think we really need to put more time into recognising that this is a shared space, and that both sides of things are ultimately needed for a community.
It really does feel like at the centre of this is just a feeling of discontinuity between the mod base and the users, and the end result is feeling like there is no true recourse for someone who is ‘only’ a user in situations like this. We’ve opened and closed user union, we’ve opened and closed feedback - and whether intended or not, it does feel like the power is entirely one directional. I don’t know if I can offer anything else, beyond the thanks I have for administrating and even getting this entire community started in the first place - I just want to say again that the reason I do feel so passionate about trying to resolve this is the fact that a space like Hexbear feels important, both to me and in the wider context. I don’t want to be telling myself to just accept things here, I want to feel like when I try and contribute and explain my reasoning for or against anything here, that it feels like it’s taken on-board by the people involved and considered for what it is.
100% we are looking at finding a way to have every user be able to meaningfully participate in the site going forward in a way that is a bit more hardened to wrecking and reduces the drama inherent to them.
Thank you for listening and replying - I hope the future changes do what we both hope they do.