Hey all,
In light of recent events concerning one of our communities (/c/vegan), we (as a team) have spent the last week working on how to address better some concerns that had arisen between the moderators of that community and the site admin team. We always strive to find a balance between the free expression of communities hosted here and protecting users from potentially harmful content.
We as a team try to stick to a general rule of respect and consideration for the physical and mental well-being of our users when drafting new rules and revising existing ones. Furthermore, we've done our best to try to codify these core beliefs into the additions to the ToS and a new by-laws section.
ToS Additions
That being said, we will be adding a new section to our “terms of service” concerning misinformation. While we do try to be as exact as reasonably able, we also understand that rules can be up to interpretation as well. This is a living document, and users are free to respectfully disagree. We as site admins will do our best to consider the recommendations of all users regarding potentially revising any rules.
Regarding misinformation, we've tried our best to capture these main ideas, which we believe are very reasonable:
- Users are encouraged to post information they believe is true and helpful.
- We recommend users conduct thorough research using reputable scientific sources.
- When in doubt, a policy of “Do No Harm”, based on the Hippocratic Oath, is a good compass on what is okay to post.
- Health-related information should ideally be from peer-reviewed, reproducible scientific studies.
- Single studies may be valid, but often provide inadequate sample sizes for health-related advice.
- Non-peer-reviewed studies by individuals are not considered safe for health matters.
We reserve the right to remove information that could cause imminent physical harm to any living being. This includes topics like conversion therapy, unhealthy diets, and dangerous medical procedures. Information that could result in imminent physical harm to property or other living beings may also be removed.
We know some folks who are free speech absolutists may disagree with this stance, but we need to look out for both the individuals who use this site and for the site itself.
By-laws Addition
We've also added a new by-laws section as well as a result of this incident. This new section is to better codify the course of action that should be taken by site and community moderators when resolving conflict on the site, and also how to deal with dormant communities.
This new section provides also provides a course of action for resolving conflict with site admin staff, should it arise. We want both the users and moderators here to feel like they have a voice that is heard, and essentially a contact point that they can feel safe going to, to “talk to the manager” type situation, more or less a new Lemmy.World HR department that we've created as a result of what has happened over the last week.
Please feel free to raise any questions in this thread. We encourage everyone to please take the time to read over these new additions detailing YOUR rights and how we hope to better protect everyone here.
https://legal.lemmy.world/tos/#80-misinformation
https://legal.lemmy.world/bylaws/
Sincerely,
FHF / LemmyWorld Operations Team
EDIT:
We will be releasing a separate post regarding the moderation incident in the next 24-48 hours, just getting final approval from the team.
EDIT 2 (2024-08-31):
We've posted a response, sorry for the delay.
Any chance the relevant incident could be unpacked and used as a demonstration of how these changes would alter the outcome or encourage a different outcome?
As someone who only saw pieces of it after the fact, I am potentially in the dark here about the purposes and context of these changes.
That being said, from what I did see, it seemed very much like an instance admin imposing themselves and their superior power on a community when there were probably plenty of other more subtle action that could have been taken, where subtlety becomes vital for any issue complex and nuanced enough to be handled remotely well. I'm not sure I'm seeing any awareness of this in this post and the links provided.
For instance, AFAICT, the "incident" involved a discussion of if or how a domestic cat could eat a vegan diet. Obviously that's not trivial as they, like humans, have some necessary nutrients, and AFAICT the vegans involved were talking about how it could be done, while the admin involved was basically having none of that and removed content on the basis that it would lead to a cat dying.
And then in the misinformation link we have:
In the context of cats and their food ... which "living beings" are being harmed and who is encouraging or discouraging this harm?
Whether you're vegan or not, this seems to me formally ambiguous and on the face of it only enshrines the source of the conflict rather than facilitating better forms of communication or resolution (perhaps there are things in the by-laws I've missed??).
Two groups can have exactly the same aim and core values (reduce harm to living beings) but in the complexity of the issue come to issue a bunch of friendly fire ... that's how complex issues work.
So, back to my original question ... how exactly would things be done better?
We will be releasing a separate post involving that incident in the next 24-48 hours, just getting final approval from the team.
Hi there, totally in the dark here. What was the incident?
Vegans saying that cats, which are obligate carnivores, can subsist on a vegan diet; admin removed it as misinformation. The vegan community then threw a fit over it.
Yeah, they're 100% in the wrong here. Cats aren't people, they can't consent to your personal code of ethics. They're meat-eaters by nature, and denying them of that is animal abuse. Good intentions don't override your pet's nutritional needs. Admins are right to remove any content that encourages animal abuse.
OK, so some counters:
All up, pets are absolutely subjected to human codes of ethics and values ... they're pets and subjecting them to our needs, desires and demands is exactly what owning a pet is all about (for better or worse).
If you have problems with that, I personally understand, but modifying their diet without wanting to sacrifice their health is very much the type of thing that pet ownership is generally all about. The lines being drawn here seem to me to not be about the specific issue of whether a vegan cat diet is feasible ... and merely talking about it a reasonable thing ... but about how one feels about vegans in general.
On which, accusing vegans of animal abuse is certainly a choice. From what I've seen, any conversation about this from a vegan was always starting from a position of caring about the dietary requirements of cats (which may be more than what some pet food manufacturers and pet owners do) and being informed about them. Whether that's what happened in the relevant incident, I'm not sure, but the bits I've seen certainly indicate that it could have been reasonable too.
Which all comes back to my original point ... what is moderation to bring to such a conversation and situation and what are its aims?
Remove posts that have a serious potential to seriously harm cats, by making newer vegans believe it's okay to feed cats a vegan diet?
The issue here is that nowadays these posts become information to others. That's what the internet has become. People no longer read something like this, and then first talk to 2-3 vets about it before deciding, they read that "Yo totally fine to torture your cats, k" and then do it.
As someone whose FwB works with pets professionally, it's difficult to be more wrong, but granted that's for my central european context. There are absolutely bad cat foods about, but even those are not truly dangerous for the cat involved. They might have a higher percentage of grain added, but you're right in that to a degree this is doable for a cat.
Note however that many pure-grain or high-grain foods will be explicitly marked as "Not meant as a sole food item" over here, and have to be: They're not a balanced nutritional diet. Even worse, some add sugar, and now we're getting into truly shitty territory that sadly isn't clamped down on hard enough, this gets added to make the food look and smell better to the owner, while being either irrelevant or usually bad for the cat (since they consume too many calories for the amount of nourishment they get). However, again, as a supplementary item it'd not be terminal or something.
And that's kinda the thing here:
It's not a binary choice. Just use high-quality cat food. It's that simple. Ask someone who works with this professionally for help. And yes, high quality food will be 50%+ meat. That's supposed to tell you something.
"As someone whose FwB" is a new one for me. Hey buddy listen my FwB's in the military kinda vibes
Thanks for the post! (Highly relieving compared to some of the abusive stuff some are hurling).
Removing posts is arguably a pretty severe act when applied to discussion. I don’t know what the original incident was (thus my original questions), censorship around “dangerous” topics doesn’t need to be absolute and runs the risk of being dogmatic I’d say.
EG, How easily persuaded are “young vegans” and what else can be done to ensure no false impressions are made? Is outright banning the conversations actually preventing damaging behaviour or encouraging it by burying the issue and pushing it into more niche environments?
Also, it’s not irrelevant here, and hopefully common ground, that the underlying motive on both sides is to reduce harm to animals.
I have to say that given all of the concessions or potential issues with the pet food industry you go on to detail, this line seems strange.
In the end I appreciate your expertise and effort here (a great deal actually), but I think the only thing you’ve really convinced me of is that this could be an interesting discussion without posing any risks to cats.
It’d be interesting to know how good/bad some mainstream/popular cat food is and how it’d stack up against a decent attempt at a plant-based version and how well or badly it could be done.
Which doesn’t mean I’m about to go torture my cats with an experimental diet. Not at all! Many vegans, IME, care about their food (and of course animals), and so I find a default concern of vegans going off to do something stupid kinda weird and probably condescending.
Yeah that's an interesting point. I guess with good enough mod-tools, some sort of flag that shows up "Hey, please don't base your decisions on health or XYZ on something you hear from people you don't even know on the internet, just go and ask a professional please" would be neat instead of outright removal.
I have frankly no idea how good or bad the modding tools in Lemmy are, I just always hear they're pretty bad. But I know some other sites do this, flag potentially misleading or questionable content wit ha warning.
Yea flagging like that is definitely NOT (edit!, sorry) available.
But a mod/admin can post “as a moderator” which kinda counts. Beyond that a discussion can be had with the mods of a community to establish an understanding some new rules if necessary etc, and if negotiations breakdown, the community can be moved to a new instance in an orderly fashion.
It may not be enough for some situations, but seems like a reasonable starting point to me. AFAICT, there may have been a bit of a freak out from the admin in the original incident (which happens, it’d just be good to see if any lessons are being learned).
Thanks for the chat!
I like how your main rebuttal to vegan cat food is "its just silly". Appeals to intuition are surely substantial right?
This is purely shutting down a discussion based on emotional reasons, otherwise discussions about sexual abuse or child abuse would be banned as well "lest new gullible users think they might be suggestions".
If you want to actually read about the current scientific discussion on the matter I suggest reading "Obligate Carnivore: Cats, Dogs, and What it Really Means to be Vegan by Jed Gillen."
🤦
I like how that is what you got from it.
But yeah, sure. To break it down further, if you require more input than "it's silly as a concept" for this talk, or if you think of Jed Gillen as anything but a hack, you are neither mentally or intellectually adult enough to own a pet, in particular not a cat. Maybe a stone with glued-on wobbly eyes, and I'd be worried about that, too. Talk to an actual professional, geez. It's not difficult.
Thanks for repeating yourself again and proving me right.
Got any peer reviewed scientific evidence for your positions?
Got any peer reviewed studies that show that a vegan diet is impossible for a cat?
Oh wait this isnt a medical journal, its a shit posting board on the internet, so who gives a flying fuck.
I feel sorry for your cat
Obligatory "I'm not a vegan," but this comment seems like it's at least partially mischaracterizing the issue.
Some of the comments removed seem to advocate for a vegan cat diet that specifically includes the amino acids and protein that cats need, albeit sourced in a vegan-friendly way:
I am also not a vet (go figure) but this seems reasonable on its face and lines up with the 5 minutes of Google research that I did. It sounds like not all vegan formulated cat food actually strikes the balance cats need and that this diet would need to be balanced very carefully, but it seems possible to do it in a healthy way, especially if done in concert with a vet and frequent checkups.
Yes, it is possible, with constant blood tests (which means monthly vet appointments and the corresponding stress for the cat) and a heap of knowledge.
it's very easy to fuck this up to the detriment of the cat, and because of that every vet i've talked to about it said it is just too risky and stressful for the cat (and monthly bloodwork is costly too). Just putting the information "cats can be fed vegan" out is asking for trouble, because you can be sure that someone just does it without taking the necessary steps to make sure the pet is safe from harm. it is not even recommended to do BARF with cats, because it's too easy to mess things up; there's just not enough margin for errors to do it safely.
I agree with you but wanted to add that non vegan cat food has the same quality and nutritional value issues.
I think some people assume vegan cat food means feeding them whole foods prepared at home but thats ridiculous. It would be just as ridiculous to decide to start formulating your own cats nutritional needs with non vegan food.
Preparing your own animal food is its own subject entirely, and vegan and non vegan cat foods share a lot of the same processes and ingredients.
God damn. So that means theres a whole community of people whos cats are living their worst life, because some asshole adopted them and feels self rightous.
And those are the ones who set a bad example for vegans. I'm sure there are mild mannered non-asshole vegans out there. I'd even believe they were a silent majority. But MY interactions with vegans are always the loud pushy types who try to make you feel that YOU need to follow THEIR choices.
And to that type of person, I actually have an endless supply of middle fingers and a chronic drought of fucks to give. I tell them I'm going to eat THREE cheeseburgers now. One for the cheeseburger I was already going to eat. One for the cheeseburger they're NOT eating, and one more just to make their veganism a net loss. Since I'd only be eating just the one if they weren't getting in my face about being vegan.
Yup. Imagine eating supplements instead of normal food your whole life. It makes me sad. Poor animals.
Right ... so talking about whether a vegan cat diet is possible is some form of intrinsically bad animal harming behaviour ...
... but needlessly killing and eating cows to put up figurative middle fingers is ... all good?
No vegan would ever accept any degradation in their cats life just to make them vegan.
The only discussions are around maintaining a cats health and happiness while feeding them a vegan diet that contains all the same supplements non vegan food does.
Theres plenty of cats who just dont like the two vegan brands available and so thats that, they aren't vegan.
Its absurd that you all think that vegans of all people would tolerate hurting an animal or reducing its quality of life in any way.
What do you all think vegan even means?
Yea ... they way some get abusive and accusatory against vegans or pro-vegan people around topics like this is really revealing. Strawman arguments, thin presumptions and generally unfriendly behaviour ... all to avoid talking/thinking about a moral issue. You can tell that for some it's a touchy issue that they're not comfortable with because for so many other things plenty of people are happy to admit that they're fallible and shitty, like we all are. But somehow this issue seems to get under people's skin, which to me only indicates that there's some serious cognitive dissonance going on.
Yikes
How to not be taken serious by people - Vegan cat abusers edition
Yeah my thoughts exactly. And... "harm to living beings" is really thin ice. One could argue that not being vegan/vegetarian is by default harming living beings. I love my steak and would never abstain, but I'm very much aware that my succulent meal meant that some poor cow had to die.
Merely existing is harming living beings
Our bodies fight and kill bacteria all the time
Who decides what is malicious?
I occasionally go hunting and fishing. Is giving advice on either malicious? It definitely can lead to harm of a living being, but I don't consider it malicious, while others think it's barbaric and evil.
Not the point I imagine, the rule as written makes no requirement of being able to specifically identify who or how. It's like Google AI suggesting you add glue to your pizza sauce. Is it likely that you, /u/maegul, would follow that advise? Hopefully not. But is it absolutely endandering to leave the information there and not just flat out delete it on the off-chance someone takes it serious? Of course!
Fun fact! Glue is put into the cheese on pizza slices for promotional purposes. It's what gets them that nice stringing stretching cheese on video.
Okay so no jokes on the internet anymore then right.
Y'all need to follow your premises through mentally.