Hey all,
Moderation philosophy posts started out as an exercise by myself to put down some of my thoughts on running communities that I’d learned over the years. As they continued I started to more heavily involve the other admins in the writing and brainstorming. This most recent post involved a lot of moderator voices as well, which is super exciting! This is a community, and we want the voices at all levels to represent the community and how it’s run.
This is probably the first of several posts on moderation philosophy, how we make decisions, and an exercise to bring additional transparency to how we operate.
A major problem I encountered on another site was pedantry.
Often, people would make a nuisance of themselves by being deliberately obtuse and fixating on minor details, while not explicitly breaking the site’s rules. Though not overtly hateful or bigoted, pedantic comments could be remarkably exhausting and annoying. It could seem like someone was trolling, or trying to bait you into an argument, while skirting the rules to stay out of trouble themselves.
How do you moderate posts like that? Should they be reported?
Being a jerk is definitely not nice behavior. Most pedantic people are prone to escalation - they’ll misinterpret what you say, assume ill intent, and fire back insults in your direction. This kind of stuff is simply not tolerated. On a more nuanced level, if they’re baiting you or even just trying to prove their point and ignore yours, there’s a level of bad faith going on. If they truly wanted to have a conversation or understand your viewpoint, it’s usually very clear.
Of course, this can get tricky when discussing real world issues with real world consequences but even then, think to a measured debate or discussion on a tricky subject and how the people involved treat each other- humanity and respect is easy to recognize. Think of the nicest person you know, and how they’d talk about the same subject. We can’t hold everyone to that standard, but we can try to hold ourselves to that standard and disengage when we find ourselves failing it.
Be sure to report any and everything you see that gives you pause which hasn’t been actioned or where a moderator hasn’t stepped in. The more eyes we can get on a conversation the better we can tune into whether it’s how we’re personally viewing it versus how others do.
That’s great to hear. I visit this site to chat, learn, and relax. Others may like antagonistic debates, but I’m over them.
Also, I know y’all are super busy. Thanks for taking the time to reply!
Feel free to report anything you might find questionable or in bad faith. We keep our rules simple and very broad to avoid this exact pedantry and give mods more leeway to interpret situations as needed. If something is riding the line and is reported we may or may not remove it, but we WILL read into it and make a judgement call. Most likely someone would step in and try to steer the discussion into a more productive line.
Thank you! Overly specific rules can encourage people who are trying to break the spirit of the rule, but want to stay untouchable because they aren’t violating the letter. A bit of leeway and room for interpretation are exactly what these situations call for. Thanks again!
Yeah this is a problem everywhere especially on that other site. The more specific you make a rule the harder people rule lawyer it; well the rule says this, but I didn’t do that
Open ended rules like ours for be nice can be subjective however. One person might think telling someone how bad they look is being nice so they can change the look. The person being told they thinks the other is an asshole. But in the spirit of the rule, just be nice. Unfortunately it is a balancing act.
That behavior is often called sealioning and is a very well-worn tool in the cryptofacist’s toolbox. See also The Card Says Moops.
Oh that sealioning comic is a must-see
That’s quality right there. Plus, I forgot that site existed years ago, so now I have something new to catch up on!
Huh! Interesting. I didn’t know this technique had a specific name. Thanks!
In that case, why is it not enough to just ignore and avoid them?
If it was just occasional, then yeah, that would be the best way to handle the situation. Unfortunately, it became so widespread that I’d see it in virtually every popular thread. That’s why I asked for advice. Pedantry severely drags down the quality of conversations.
Most of the time, it was pretty obvious that these people didn’t actually care about the trivial point they were arguing over; they were just trolls who were good with language. I don’t want any kind of troll to feel welcome on Beehaw.
I see your point. Yes, I can see banning that once they’ve established a pattern.
Great read, thank you so much for sharing these, as they help build confidence for users about whether this right instance for them. Personally, beehaw.org has quickly become one of my favorite online spaces to inhabit for a long time (as you can determine by my average of 10 comments per day since joining). I love how directly your philosophy of the distributed governance of the Fediverse aligns with my own, and it feels like there hasn’t been anywhere else I’ve explored in the Fediverse where I’ve seen this kind of deep shared understanding about that the Fediverse is not a pooled cluster of compute resources, but instead a loosely associated grouping of self-governing online gathering places.
Keep being great. I have high confidence in this instance
I definitely echo this! Thinking through site philosophy and moderation policy and communicating both clearly while being honest about where the nuance lies takes work, but it is also the secret sauce that makes the community special.
I think the frequency and detail in these announcement posts is really important for establishing the culture of this space as it grows, too. It’s very transparent, and helps keep everyone reminded of what we should be doing.
I definitely put more thought into my comments here then I have in other spaces, trying to be intentional about Beeing Kind.
For example, I told someone off in another thread much more politely in much more detail than I ever would in other spaces, where pithy witty comments were the only ones that got attention.
the Fediverse is not a pooled cluster of compute resources, but instead a loosely associated grouping of self-governing online gathering places.
I haven’t seen anybody express my feelings about the Fediverse quite so succinctly, thanks for for putting this into words!
the Fediverse is not a pooled cluster of compute resources, but instead a loosely associated grouping of self-governing online gathering places.
What about those of us who desire to be part of a collective consciousness Borg-like hivemind that exists in symbiosis with our computer AI overlords?
Well, then you will be assimilated. Resistance is futile. We will add your biological and technological distinctiveness to our own.
With the Fediverse, you can have your biological and technological distinctiveness and eat it too! Perfection for everyone.
“Add value and don’t be a dick” goes far as mantra.
Question:
“It’s ok to punch a Nazi” or “It’s ok to execute a pedo” content acceptable? and tangentially related Publishing “Mugshots of criminals” fetishism posts, in the moderation philosophy here?
My personal ethos of moderation is to recognize in written policy that we have these biases to have “they/them” which can backdoor exceptions content moderation standards. The backdoor is that if someone is sufficiently and clearly “bad” for the majority of the community then it becomes ok to wish harm on or dehumanize someone. In my opinion shouldn’t entertain these sorts of post because of the harm/damage done if the mob is wrong, or harm to ourselves by indulging in this sort of pornography of moral certainty. Because as long as a broader culture finds certain categories of people are ok to dehumanize, then there’s no (real) objective check upon what is acceptable based on the desire of that majority, even in a community like beehaw.org.
A tangible legal example which I think provides an example of my personal philosophy is how Human dignity is enshrined in the first article of the German Basic Law – which is the German Constitution. Article 1 reads:
Human dignity shall be inviolable. To respect and protect it shall be the duty of all state authority.
The German people therefore acknowledge inviolable and inalienable human rights as the basis of every community, of peace and of justice in the world.
The following basic rights shall bind the legislature, the executive and the judiciary as directly applicable law.
My two cents here is that if a social media policy is to succeed, it needs something akin to this in it’s “constitution”, because to not have it opens too much moral relativism by bad-faith actors unrestrained and unconcerned by cultural norms to test and push the limits of what they can get away with by dehumanizing their enemies off-platform. ( IE: imagine Pizzagate, and it’s ultimate effect on Beehaw if it’s premise was accepted by the broader community. )
I saw a very popular post on Beehaw yesterday that clearly fit this pattern, and it seems like content designed to test the relative limits of the moderation policy of philosophy of places like Beehaw.>
___–Ideally, we don’t want people dehumanizing others, ever. Realistically, if someone is intolerant to you, we’re not going to tone police you for responding in kind. There’s nuance in there we touched on a little with this post, but it’s hard to itemize every possible human behavior.
If you see anything on Beehaw that makes you think twice about whether it should be up, please report it.
I read this as modspeak for “ideally, those posts wouldn’t be up, but because it’s usually intolerant people we’ll file the calls for violence towards these groups as just minority frustration that shouldn’t be tone policed.” Am I correct in my interpretation?
There’s annoying insults and there’s normalizing violence and dehumanization of the Other. I’m going to be disgusted with myself if I ever dehumanize even the worst person out of frustration. Have to remember that no, they’ve not monsters, they’ve made a series of bad choices that any of us could have chosen to make, we could all be “monsters” if we choose wrong enough. They’re not some odd other species of being that we could never ever fall into being.
Kick them off the platform, figure out how to make acts of bigotry illegal, but I don’t believe in violence unless it’s protecting yourself or others. And what I see looks much less like a preemptive strike to protect yourself/others and more like “whee, acceptable target, it’s punching time baby!”
I’m not sure I completely follow what you’re saying or asking, could you reword if you still have questions for me?
Ideally, we don’t want people dehumanizing others, ever. Realistically, if someone is intolerant to you, we’re not going to tone police you for responding in kind. There’s nuance in there we touched on a little with this post, but it’s hard to itemize every possible human behavior.
You’re posting that in reply to someone’s question about whether content about mugshots of awful criminals, about Nazi punching, and pedophile execution is acceptable, and their concern about whether it’s okay to dehumanize and wish harm on these people.
I am interpreting your reply as a diplomatically-worded and unclear way to say “Ideally, this kind of content would be unacceptable, but in practice we will let it fly because it’s just minority frustration at people being awful and telling them to stop would be tone policing.” I am also autistic and would like to know if my interpretation is correct, because my disability has gotten in the way of me interpreting people correctly before.
The rest of my reply to you was not a question but me stating my own views for context. I’ll try to explain it again, sorry for any confusion.
There’s annoying insults and there’s normalizing violence and dehumanization of the Other. I’m going to be disgusted with myself if I ever dehumanize even the worst person out of frustration. Have to remember that no, they’ve not monsters, they’ve made a series of bad choices that any of us could have chosen to make, we could all be “monsters” if we choose wrong enough. They’re not some odd other species of being that we could never ever fall into being.
I also heavily disagree with allowing that sort of content. Dehumanization leads down dangerous roads, such as believing you could never ever be like your enemy, because after all, they’re not human. It leads to violation of rights because hey, they hurt someone too, let’s make them feel the pain 3x worse as punishment! Allowing calls to violence just seems very bad to me too.
Kick them off the platform, figure out how to make acts of bigotry illegal, but I don’t believe in violence unless it’s protecting yourself or others. And what I see looks much less like a preemptive strike to protect yourself/others and more like “whee, acceptable target, it’s punching time baby!”
I hold the view that that content should not be allowed while also believing that Nazi content and “it’s just freedom of speech” justifications for Nazi content should be removed and the Nazi should be banned. I do not support them or their views at all, but I do support not allowing any calls to violence or dehumanization, even if the person you want to dehumanize is really really bad. I also perceive the recent Nazi-punching content to be less about violence for the sake of protecting others and more about having an acceptable target to dehumanize.
it’s just minority frustration at people being awful and telling them to stop would be tone policing
I don’t think it’s fair to characterize it as simply frustration. These people are at serious risk of harm and death by some of the individuals who have passed or may even have friends or important figures in their lives who were directly harmed or even worse killed by intolerant people’s actions. I personally see no issues in them celebrating the fact that a person who caused harm and violence on the world is now unable to do so and that the world is a safer place with them gone.
Like any comment there’s going to be an axis of acceptability that it falls upon. A short comment simply celebrating this with words like ‘nice’ or ‘lol’ is very different from a one page manifesto of insults. There’s also just the general vibe of a thread- too much negativity and short one-liners which don’t promote discussion aren’t particularly helpful for the website either, so moderators may step in and lock the post or remove comments if it’s inspiring people to act negative towards each other.
For what it’s worth I’m also a heavily nonviolent person. I would rather die than inflict harm on just about anyone, simply because I do not wish to live with that burden. I’m not one to call for violence on anyone, but I understand that the world doesn’t exist in black and white and minority individuals need space to vent emotions, including anger, in a healthy manner. I think that it’s fair and necessary and good to be intolerant towards intolerant individuals and what that means from person to person is going to be different. I’ll probably never punch a nazi for the reasons above, but I’m not going to take that away from anyone else.
Do you have any recommendations for a space like Beehaw that’s free of that kind of content? I suppose I’m oversensitive. I wouldn’t tolerate a Nazi on an instance but I also really really really do not like celebrating violence. It’s not celebrating “they can’t cause harm anymore,” it’s celebrating the act of punching. Taking an army against the Nazis stopped them from committing more atrocities on a large scale, this is fine. Never heard of punching individual Nazis stopping any of them from just plotting out how to hurt more people and get back at the person who punched them.
For me acceptable intolerance is deplatforming, making it illegal, taking away their megaphone and not letting them play ball, not “violence is GREAT against the intolerant group and we’ll celebrate it” instead of “violence is a necessary evil we sometimes have to take out to stop intolerant people for making it worse for us.” Not violating basic human rights. Even “nice” and “lol” when someone fucking dies is not something I can really get behind. I get why people have the feelings, I really do, but I don’t want to see it and I have to figure out how to curate my experience to easily avoid that given that a lot of online safe spaces for minorities actually don’t curate that out. What to do when you’re a minority that needs to not have “but freedom of speech” when people post slurs, but also needs to not have “lol” when someone dies…
I suppose I should have spoken more carefully because I fully understand the actual threat the rise of neo-Nazis can pose, especially given the anti-LGBTQ+ laws actually being enacted in the modern day. “Minority frustration” was probably reductive though I did not intend to be—I think I grabbed it from several posts on the topic of “are people allowed their vent spaces” and I need a better way to express that I understand the dangers while also managing to convey my point. I understand people need their vent spaces. I want to find a space safe from the vents.
Blocking a lot of the news subs should be pretty helpful, but I’m still curious if you know of any spaces that don’t tolerate bigotry but also don’t make room for these type of posts.
We’re probably one of the most highly moderated spaces on federated software. I am not aware of any spaces that are more moderated. I would encourage you to take your mental health seriously and if you need a more sanitized space to seek it out or work with a professional to see if there are coping strategies that can help you when you encounter this kind of behavior as it’s openly and extremely present in the world at large.
Considering that one of those is about executing someone with an internationally recognized mental illness that is out of their control. For a thought crime.
Probably not.
Objectively, no “sympathizing” happening here, factual discussion can’t happen when one party assumes the other is arguing in bad faith and uses that as a premeditated weapon to push the argument in their direction.
You make a good example as to why such content should be discouraged. Because most people will be ignorant of the real-world details, and instead follow the crowd on social media opinions and misinformation. Thus, leading to nonsensical statement such as that, where the thing they think they are talking about is entirely different than the actual thing they are talking about.
You’re strong but nuanced take on moderation is exactly why I signed up. Keep on doing what you’re doing because I love it!
What about misinformation?
Without downvotes it will slowly bubble up to the top because the only barrier is finding enough people gullable or ignorant (precisely, not demeaning) enough to believe it. Or if it’s “pop culture misinformation”, it rises to the top by virtue of it being popular misinformation.
Both of those are not ideal for quality conten, or fact based discussion and debate when vote counts exist. As more often than not more votes = more true to a layman.
We’ve seen this on any other platform that has “the only direction is up” mechanics, because the only direction is up.
Another risk is promoting misinformed communities, who find comfort in each other because their shared, incorrect, opinions of what should be fact based truths find common ground. I don’t think those are the kinds of communities beehaw wants. Thankfully community creation is heavily managed, which may mitigation or remove such risks entirely.
What I’m getting at is what will the stance be here? If beehaw starts fostering anti-intellectualism, will that be allowed to grow and fester? It’s an insidious kind of toxicity that appears benign, till it’s not.
To be clear I’m not saying these things exist or will exist on beehaw in a significant capacity. I am stating a theoretical based on the truth that there is always a subset of your population that are misinformed and will believe and spread misinformation, and some of that subset will defend those views vehemently and illogically.
I would hate to see that grow in a place that appears to have all the quality characteristics I have been looking for in a community.
The lowest common denominator of social media will always push to normalize all other forms and communities. It’s like a social osmosis. Most communities on places like Reddit failed to combat and avoid such osmosis. Will beehaw avoid such osmosis over time?
Most misinformation is poorly veiled hate speech and as of such it would be removed. Down votes don’t change how visible it is, or how much it’s spread. You deal with misinformation by removing it and banning repeat offenders/spreaders.
I would argue that only a subset of misinformation of veiled hate speech. The rest, and majority, are misinformed individuals repeating/regurgitating their inherited misinformation.
There is definitely some hate speech veiled as misinformation, I’m not arguing against that. My argument is that’s not the majority. There are severity scales of misinformation, with hate speech being near the top, and mundane conversational, every day, transient factual incorrectness being near the bottom.
There exists between those two a range of unacceptable misinformation that should be considered.
A consequence of not considering or recognizing it is a lack of respect for the problem. Which leads to the problem existing unopposed.
I don’t have a solution here since this is a broad & sticky problem and moderating misinformation is an incredibly difficult thing to do. Identifying and categorizing the levels you care about and the potential methods to mitigate it (whether you can or can’t employ those is another problem) should, in my opinion, be on the radar.
If you’re volunteering to take it on, feel free to put together a plan. Until then you’ll have to trust that we’re trying to moderate within scope of the tools we have and the size of our platform, but we’re still human and don’t catch everything. Please report any misinformation you see.
Maybe my edit was too late! I did not communicate my objective clearly and edited my comment to reflect that.
I’m not proposing you solve misinformation, but rather that you recognize it as more than you stated, and respect the problem. That’s the first step.
This is not something I can do, it is only something that admins can do in synchrony as a first step. I am doing my part in trying to convince you of that.
Only after that has been achieved can solutions be theorized/probed. Which is something I would happily be part of, and do foot work towards (Though I’m sure there are experts in the community, it’s a matter of surfacing them). That’s a long term project, which takes a considerable amount of research and time, doing it without first gaining traction on the problem space would be a fools errand.
At the risk of sounding abrasive (I intend no disrespect, just not sure how else to ask this atm), is that understood/clear?
Edit: Want to note that I am actually impressed by the level of engagement community founders have had. It’s appreciated.
Yes it’s one of many problems with modern social media, no I don’t have time right now to elaborate a plan on how to tackle it. Something on this subject will likely come much further in the future but right now I’m focused mostly on creating the docs necessary for people to understand our ethos more when I’m not busy living my life.
An excellent example of very sneaky misinformation was an article in the Guardian the other day, which kept talking about 700,000 immigrants. Since 350,000 of those are foreign students, that is a blatant lie. Foreign students aren’t immigrants.
Thank you (and all of the mods, admins, and devs) for working to create a thoughtful instance on Lemmy … I love it here even though I don’t have the opportunity to spend much time online :-)
I’ve seen a couple of really ugly comments recently, where a mod had replied, and I had to click on the person (wanting to block them) to realize they had been banned. I really hope a future Lemmy update shows very clearly when that happens, because right now it just looks like we’re leaving the comment up. LEaving the comment up but showing the user as banned would be a relatively okay middle ground, I think.
it’s the best way actually, because it’s instructive to the rest. a red “user was banned for this post” like it was back on 4chan, it’s really such a simple and elegant solution to communicating rules & enforcement to the userbase through example.
I only have one very specific situational question. On Reddit I was permanently banned from r/politics because when Rand Paul tested positive for COVID, I commented “lol.” Is that also considered unacceptable here? If it is I am fine with that, I just want to know what level of basic decency we’re expected to show towards public figures we don’t like so I can properly self-edit my tone. I am not going to go actively wishing harm on anyone but I thought this was a relatively innocuous comment when I made it and not deserving of a ban, much less a permanent one.
I wouldn’t ban someone permanently over something so minor. A mod might remove a comment like that, but that’s a really minor thing to get banned over. Celebrating the fact that a figure who did tangible harm to people can no longer do so isn’t exactly the kind of behavior I’m worried about on this site.
Cool thanks for the reply.
It’s this friendly environment that keeps me on this server. Keep up the good work.
A question I have about this is when we have communities with diametrically opposite points of view on a topic… Eg I’m a carnivore, and while I respect vegans/vegetarians I completely disagree with them on fundamental levels. Both sides have logical arguments, but the foundations and life experiences are different. Does beehaw have space for such opposing points of views, or does it lean to one side, opposing the other?
We are not thought police. You’re welcome to have opposing views to other members of the community. But if you share a view that is fundamentally hateful, erases the humanity of another individual, or is confrontational and escalating in nature, you may find yourself getting a reminder from a moderator to be(e)have and if you don’t you may find your content removed from our instance.
I’m really excited and happy to be a mod here. It feels supportive, friendly, and useful. I enjoy the transparency and the community aspect that all Beeples share. I am looking forward to the next steps in our adventures!
Thank you for this, another great read. I’ve also enjoyed reading through the comments and discussions on it and feel like I’m getting more of a handle on the balance you’re trying to strike here. I really appreciate all the clear, engaging and comprehensive comments. They’re giving me a lot of food for thought! :)
Does not check out, anyway. This is most definitely a “sanitized space”. Just for liberals, not leftists. Reddit 2.0. https://beehaw.org/comment/606420
This comment doesn’t seem to be in good faith. Can you elaborate?
It’s in good faith. Follow the link. Check that community’s modlog if the big tree of removed comments isn’t sufficient.
TL;DR - OC shit on people who don’t vote for Democrats. I replied saying the current state of affairs is thanks to people like them who vote for mainstream parties, with the same kind of snark they used against the implied target of anyone who doesn’t vote or votes third-party. The mod removal based on “needlessly antagonistic” started with me—the leftist—and left alone the reactionary liberal who blamed leftists and working-class voters for the state of U.S. politics. Removing whole conversation trees for the sake of people who want to defend the honor of Democrats looks an awful lot like a liberal “sanitized space”, I’d say.
with the same kind of snark […] “needlessly antagonistic”
From a meta point of view, sounds like you started the antagonistic comment tree; was it needed, or could you have addressed the issuse while trying to deescalate? Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think some of the moderation philosophy docs address favoring deescalation and disengagement, as opposed to escalation, even when it is "in kind’.
From a meta point of view, sounds like you started the antagonistic comment tree
Wrong. The original comment was antagonistic toward any and all users (as well as the broader population) who didn’t vote the way the liberal wanted them to. I guess it’s okay to be antagonistic toward a whole segment of a community, but being “antagonistic” back to a single user who’s doing that…that is a no-no.
Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think some of the moderation philosophy docs address favoring deescalation and disengagement, as opposed to escalation, even when it is "in kind’.
I’ll quote @Gaywallet, Beehaw admin and OP of this thread (and, probably, the linked document) here:
Realistically, if someone is intolerant to you, we’re not going to tone police you for responding in kind.
Whatever “realistic” means here, I guess. But it sounds a great deal like responding “in kind”, as you put it, isn’t fundamentally something that’s expected to be moderated against. Allegedly, at least.
The original comment was yours… it seemed to include an attack onto everyone who doesn’t think like you, with nothing constructive to offer. At least the response included an explanation of their point of view, but then you kept derailing the discussion towards antagonism and personal attacks.
If I understand the rules correctly (any admin/mod feel free to chime in if I’m wrong), the right way to continue that conversation would’ve been to acknowledge the other person’s point of view, excuse yourself, and either try to work towards a constructive consensus, or just leave it be.
You can also edit your previous comments to add context or correct any mistakes to avoid misunderstandings.
The original comment was yours…
Wrong. Here is the bit of the original comment—still unremoved and not mine, but the one I replied to—which shits on anyone who doesn’t vote for Democrats, and anyone who knows enough about other political philosophies to know the two liberal mainstream U.S. political brands are basically identical in all but rhetoric (so yeah, that user “included an attack onto everyone who doesn’t thing like [them]” as you so helpfully put it).
i swear, you have either be super out of touch with the people actively under threat by republicans or putting your principles over the lives of actual people to even begin equating the two parties. work on utopian political projects every other day of the year, build movements to affect broader social change, but i swear if you end up not voting blue during one of the most precarious moments of this shithole’s democracy what comes next is worse for all of us.
Does that help clarify things for you? I hope so, because you’d honestly have to be willfully misreading things if not.
Your original comment was this one: https://beehaw.org/comment/604794
Its contents are still in the modlog, no need to copy either content in here, it was not a nice comment. You hit someone’s nerve, which made them reply “in kind”. I personally disagree with your interpretation of their comment, even if I agree with your premise, but neither of that is relevant here. What matters is you shouldn’t also escalate “in kind”. Such escalation, along the other escalating comments, appears to have been correctly seen as “needlessly antagonistic”. There was no need for any of it.
And since I have your attention… let me tell you an anecdote: a long time ago, I used to have a blog, which allowed people to comment. Not all comments were nice, and for some time it was fun to moderate them by editing and replacing the not nice parts with “[slur]”, “[ad hominem]”, “[straw man]”, and similar, to the point where some comments ended up 100% edited. This place doesn’t do that, but I would find it fun to find a place that did (…and wonder if some AI could help with the process).
In addition to what jarfil said about this comment let alone the other removed comments, even now your behaviour is very confrontational and not conducive to intelligent, meaningful discussion even if we don’t agree on political beliefs.
You are free to state your opinion, but instead of opening with “Wrong.”, I suggest you express yourself in a way that invites discussion with anyone willing to discuss similarly, be it a liberal, conservative, anarchist, socialist, monarchist, libertarian, or what have you.
I’ll go first. I agree with you that Beehaw is a sanitized space, kept clean to encourage friendly, respectful conversation. Where I disagree with you is where you say only certain political opinions are permitted. The focus of “sanitization” is for inflammatory, inappropriately judgmental, ragebait and flamebait, antagonistic and off-topic comments and posts. It is possible to detach an opinion from its inflammatory delivery, you know. I recommend you give it a try.
Question:
What’s the stand on discussing points of view on charged subjects?
For example, I got banned from Reddit for discussing the possible thought process of someone who might be attracted to minors. Reason for the ban: “sexualization of minors”… even though the content policy refers to the act itself, not to its discussion.
Is it allowed in here to discuss negative or controversial points of view expressed, or actions taken, by third parties? Or does it taint the whole discussion? Are there some particular “taboo” themes that would do that, while others might not? Would such discussions be allowed with a disclaimer of non-support, or get banned anyway?
I sometimes like to reflect on, and discuss, some themes that I understand some might find uncomfortable or even revolting. I also understand that there might be themes not allowed in the server’s jurisdiction.
If this was the case, then I think a clear list of “taboo themes” could be useful to everyone, even if most of the moderation was focused on applying a more flexible set of rules.
Any discussion topic which involves potentially dehumanizing others is not a topic that should be ‘debated’. So talking about whether phrenology has any merits is off the table, because it dehumanizes anyone who isn’t white. Discussing what constitutes rape can often lead to dehumanizing women.
Subjects like this are often rife with bad actors, who weaponize language with techniques like just asking questions (JAQ), concern trolling, appealing to nature or other methods. Perhaps more importantly, they’re often discussions on topics for which no one present is an expert, and for which an expert opinion is necessary to have any kind of fruitful discussion.
In general you should ask yourself - is there someone who exists who could be seriously uncomfortable or harmed by this discussion happening in the first place? If you’re discussing any topic about which people have been seriously harmed or killed by (and not simply reporting the news), the answer to this is pretty much unequivocally do not have that conversation here. As a general rule of thumb, any topic which you have self described as the following:
some might find uncomfortable or even revolting.
is probably not a good candidate for this website. Minority individuals are subject to this kind of behavior practically everywhere else in the world and we’re not interested in having those discussions here, either.
As an aside, the very fact that you are self aware enough to see this is something others find problematic but have not questioned yourself as to why these discussions need to happen is something you should be questioning yourself about. Do you feel this way about every subject for which you have no education? Do you have these kinds of discussions about complicated medical issues or do you listen to your doctor? Do you hypothesize about the necessary conditions for deep sea life to thrive, or do you leave those questions to marine biologists? I mean this in as non-confrontational a way as possible, but rather as a question to someone who seems to value the process of thinking and arriving at a well-reasoned conclusion, why do you think that you have the tools to discuss these topics without having acquired the necessary education to weigh in with any kind of credence? I don’t discuss the theoretical limitations of spacecraft because I’m not a physicist and I realize that I need a physicist in order to come to any kind of reasonable conclusion.
OK, I understand the general rule of not making people uncomfortable, and agree that some subjects tend to attract bad actors more than others.
My reason for discussing —not “debating” as in a confrontation— some subjects that I know little about, is that I find it a good opportunity to learn more. Both through own research, self-reflection, and… you never know who might chime in with more knowledge from a different point of view. More importantly, there are actual experts on the Internet, some do offer their point of view, but even experts don’t have the full picture, may have outdated knowledge, and a respectful “non-expert” can sometimes add a bit that might help both learn something.
Education is not an all or nothing, thanks to the Internet (which has sources ranging from the Wikipedia to preprint papers), it’s relatively easy to acquire an education in a very narrow field, that is better than that of someone who has more education in a much wider field. Having expertise in one field, while acquiring narrow education in another, can lead to synergies and knowledge transfer that wouldn’t happen otherwise… which requires the parties to talk, or discuss the matter in the first place.
But going back to not making people uncomfortable… there is another issue: I’m not an expert in all the things that might make others uncomfortable.
For example, I only learned about the issues surrounding phrenology, by looking into it after seeing it mentioned in this instance’s rules. Previously, I just considered it debunked science and nothing more. I’m sure there are many other subjects like that which I don’t know the full implications of.
Wouldn’t it make sense to have at least a non-exhaustive list of some of the subjects to avoid, for those who might learn something from it? Or should people acquire that education on their own, before participating?
PS: In the particular case of listening to your doctor, I have actually learned more about a few particular issues, than some of the doctors I’ve met. Some have been grateful for the extra knowledge, some have been dismissive, some have switched to “patient talk” mode when they realized I actually understood them “talking shop”, which I find demeaning.
even experts don’t have the full picture, may have outdated knowledge, and a respectful “non-expert” can sometimes add a bit that might help both learn something.
You’re not wrong, but we don’t have the tools to screen out bad actors and to moderate appropriate, professional discussions on complicated, nuanced topics with experts to help address what’s signal and what’s noise. This is simply not the venue for that.
Wouldn’t it make sense to have at least a non-exhaustive list of some of the subjects to avoid, for those who might learn something from it? Or should people acquire that education on their own, before participating?
I want to point out two things here:
- We have taken an explicit stance against itemized rules to try and prevent rules lawyering behavior - an explicit list invites people to go “but it’s not on the list!”
- Yes, you should educate yourself by at least googling the subject first. If you see a lot of heated discussions, it’s probably something that makes other people upset. If it’s something that requires a lot of education to understand, it’s also probably not a discussion destined for this space.
we don’t have the tools to screen out bad actors and to moderate appropriate, professional discussions on complicated, nuanced topics with experts to help address what’s signal and what’s noise
I don’t think you need experts in a given field to recognize whether a discussion is being conducted in a respectful and constructive way or not. The participants themselves are likely to tell you that through the report function.
Suggestion: For tools, would it be possible to set a discussion to be collapsed/hidden/flagged when in doubt? (like what Reddit does through downvotes, but via mod action) Then just let the participants continue if they wish, without disturbing the rest of the community.
you should educate yourself by at least googling the subject first
That requires identifying that I lack some education in it, and while I’m all for it, after so many years there are likely many subjects that I think I have enough education to present a point of view about, even if I might be wrong. Googling each and every possible subject “just in case” before commenting, isn’t practical.
If you see a lot of heated discussions, it’s probably something that makes other people upset.
Heated discussions get used politically all the time, and in this age of AI chatbots, professional troll farms, mis- and counter-informative spam, and such, they can even be faked precisely to get them out of rational discussions.
I don’t think “heat” is a good indicator of whether a subject should be avoided or not; pretty much all the subjects for every community in here, are used in heated discussions somewhere else.
If it’s something that requires a lot of education to understand, it’s also probably not a discussion destined for this space.
Wouldn’t that leave only the most mundane, bland and minimum common consensus subjects? But if everyone knows everything already, with the same point of view, what’s there left to talk about?
an explicit list invites people to go “but it’s not on the list!”
Suggestion: I think stating that it’s a “non-exhaustive list of examples” would take care of that. Right now there is one example (phrenology), all I suggest is adding more examples.
(and anyway, Reddit’s explicit list didn’t stop them from banning me for talking about something only tangentially related to one of the points… ultimately, instance admins have all the power, even to edit user comments, Reddit did it)
I don’t think you need experts in a given field to recognize whether a discussion is being conducted in a respectful and constructive way or not.
That’s okay that you don’t think so, but we as a team absolutely do. It’s part of the reason we’ve not created communities such as “mental health”, “legal”, and other places which are at risk of uninformed opinions causing serious and actual harm.
would it be possible to set a discussion to be collapsed/hidden/flagged when in doubt?
This functionality does not exist. Even if it did exist, I would not want it used for this purpose.
That requires identifying that I lack some education in it
It sure does! There’s an educational burden for you if you want to speak about subjects which have real world effects on others but not on you. If you don’t do that research before asking questions, that’s your fault and not ours - it’s not difficult to ask yourself the question of whether something might negatively effect others or to at least do a cursory search on google, go to the library and find some reading, or otherwise receive some base level of education before discussion a charged question on the platform. You have a responsibility to your fellow humans to be educated in this manner before broaching a topic in a public space.
there are likely many subjects that I think I have enough education to present a point of view about, even if I might be wrong
In the scope of the document linked, we’re going to take into consideration the viewpoints of others. People who are sufferers of sexual abuse won’t particularly like you going on amateurishly about whether you think there are real risks, however, so if you try to start a conversation about this you might find your content removed and if this becomes a repeat problem you may end up temporarily and eventually permanently banned.
I don’t think “heat” is a good indicator of whether a subject should be avoided or not; pretty much all the subjects for every community in here, are used in heated discussions somewhere else.
I don’t agree with this statement at all. If a discussion ultimately questions someone else’s humanity, it’s not a great subject to discuss when those people are present. Or if you do, and do so without considering the opinions and thoughts of this group or at the very least become educated on this issue, you should expect consequences to your speech - such as being insulted, having your comment removed, or being removed from your platform entirely.
all I suggest is adding more examples.
I don’t have the time or energy to build a list of all content in the world aimed at dehumanizing others. If you do, more power to you, I’d encourage you to make and maintain said list with my blessing.
we’ve not created communities such as “mental health”, “legal”
You may not have created specific communities, but both mental health advice and legal commentary are being offered in the communities already created. Does this mean those contents should be avoided and/or reported? I hope not… they’re actually interesting.
There’s an educational burden for you if you want to speak about subjects which have real world effects on others but not on you.
That gets us back to my initial question: if I speak about a subject that has direct effects on me, but only tangentially references effects on others but not on me… what’s the stance on that?
go to the library and find some reading
Fun fact: my “sexualization of minors” ban on Reddit came from citing a book… so this doesn’t seem like a safe recommendation… 😐
People […] won’t particularly like […] amateurishly […] you might find your content removed and if this becomes a repeat problem you may end up temporarily and eventually permanently banned.
I got that, don’t make people uncomfortable. I’m even fine with backing off when made aware of it, even if I actually have more than amateurish knowledge about a subject. Heck, I’m even fine with my expert knowledge getting removed (did that on Reddit myself already).
What I wouldn’t like, is to get banned because someone felt uncomfortable and I wasn’t made aware, or someone thought that someone might have felt uncomfortable by proxy, without a chance to fix it.
If a discussion ultimately questions someone else’s humanity, it’s not a great subject to discuss when those people are present.
I agree with that.
My objection was that there are people “out there” who will use any subject to dehumanize others, even when the subjects themselves are not inherently dehumanizing and can otherwise be discussed with respect. Should we let third parties guide which subjects should be banned, just because someone might have seen them use it in a dehumanizing way?
There is also the matter of which people “are present”, since the contents here are public and even federated, so technically “everyone is present”.
I don’t have the time or energy to build a list of all content in the world aimed at dehumanizing others. If you do, more power to you, I’d encourage you to make and maintain said list with my blessing.
Yeah… it’s not an attractive task. I was thinking that since mods are going to see the content anyway, you could run it as a kind of FAQ, just add items to a list when you see them appear on the instance. Kind of “I’ll know it when I see it, and now everyone else will too”.
I wonder if a list could be extracted from the modlog… I’ll look into that.
The best I can say to you at this point is that if you’ve received pushback in the past it’s probably not meant for this site. I can’t itemize everything for you. I understand you’re neurodivergent and need a bit more clarity on what’s acceptable and what’s not but I don’t have the time to build that list for you. Maybe just avoid any subject you have questions about or haven’t seen others discussing to be safe
