this post was submitted on 19 Jun 2023
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The Agora

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Here is the thread of theirs

I have been looking through a long thread on another instance where a few users have been trying to convince that instance to defederate from Exploding Heads - because they do not want to see the content posted on Exploding Heads.

I have thought long and hard about how to please these people. They do have the option to individually block Exploding Heads communities or users, but they either do not know how to or simply do not want to.

In the end I realized if I ban those specific users requesting defederation from Exploding Heads - they will not see any content from Exploding Heads and therefore will not be offended by it. (Truth be told I am not sure if some of these users have really visited our site or interacted with our users).

So today I have banned those users with the explanation that they have said they do not want to see Exploding Heads content. If any of those users wish to be unbanned in the future, all they have to do is say so and I will happily unban them.

These users are not being banned in order to censor them, but to help them achieve what they have been requesting - to not see Exploding Heads content.

I hope you all find this a fair and reasonable action - if not let me know.

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[–] imaqtpie 14 points 1 year ago (3 children)

Explain how defederating them will stop them from causing problems? They can just as easily make an account over here to mess with us if they wanted.

If anything you're the one poking the hornet's nest. The OP is literally them trying not to offend or bother our users. Just let them be and everything will be fine.

[–] Socsa 3 points 1 year ago

Because the entire point of these places is to weaponize social media for far right propaganda purposes.

[–] Kecessa 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Most won't bother creating a new account just to bother users on other instances.

Defederation doesn't prevent them from posting here, we just won't see their comments. It doesn't prevent us from posting there if we want to either.

[–] imaqtpie 6 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Lol what?

That's exactly what defederation does, it will prevent them from posting here and us from posting there.

[–] Kecessa 5 points 1 year ago (3 children)

No, I can still post on Beehaw, only people federated with sh.itjust.works can see my messages

[–] imaqtpie 9 points 1 year ago (1 children)

If the only people who can see the messages are local users, than you're not really posting on Beehaw, you're posting on sh.itjust.works

[–] Kecessa 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

It's still replying to a discussion started on a beehaw community. All replies federated or not are "on your instance", only users on instances federated with yours can see your messages.

If we defederate from EH they'll still be able to post here and users from [insert instance federated with EH] would see their messages when looking at the post on our instance.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Not how it works.

Other instances get information about who posted/commented to your instance from your instance, and that tells them which instances to ask for the content of those posts/comments. If you're defederated from an instance, they will not get any notice that there is content to fetch from that instance in the first place.

Technically, it might be possible to ask the defederated instance directly if it had any content to show, but as it stands the only instance that gets "asked" directly is the local instance.

As such, if you defederate from EH, the rest of the fediverse won't see EH users posting shit to your instance. Only EH users will see EH posts/comments to your instance.

[–] Kecessa 0 points 1 year ago

Yeah that's what I've realised now by checking a post where I was discussing it with other users, turns out we were all from the same instance.

[–] goat 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Sorry, but comments you make on defederated instances are only available to you and other instance users. No one from beehaw will be able to see them. You'd be posting on sh.it, not beehaw.

[–] Kecessa 3 points 1 year ago (5 children)

That's exactly what I'm saying...

The goal is that sh.it don't have to deal with EH users, EH users can still comment "here" if they feel like it, we just don't see their post because we're registered to an instance that's defederated from theirs.

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[–] darkwing_duck 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

No, you can't. You're posting on sh.itjust.works's copy of beehaw's thread. Being defederated with them, not a single beehaw user will see your comment. Only users from your specific instance will.

[–] Kecessa 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes and that's exactly the point of defederating from an instance? They can do whatever they please on their side, we don't need to see it.

[–] darkwing_duck 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I want to see varied opinions. I do NOT want another filter bubble.

[–] Kecessa 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Then you're free to join EH and enjoy the freedom to look at racist, homophobic and conspiracy content, it doesn't mean that should be imposed on communities that value tolerance.

[–] darkwing_duck 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

You are way too intolerant to be pushing "tolerance".

[–] Kecessa 5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

Those who are tolerant can't afford to tolerate intolerance because it leads to intolerance. Only those who argue in good faith and with rational arguments should be allowed to share their intolerant views because it means they're open to actual discussion. This is not the case with the alt-right or tankies, therefore tolerating them leads to intolerance.

[–] darkwing_duck 3 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Only those who argue in good faith and with rational arguments should be allowed to share their intolerant views because it means they’re open to actual discussion.

Who decides whether a particular user is arguing in good or bad faith, exactly? I've seen a few comments on "tolerant" communities get deleted that I personally thought were made in good faith but brought up inconvenient points for the majority opinion. Before you ask, there is exactly zero chance I will find them for a demo.

[–] Kecessa 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

In this case we're talking about a whole community where we've got proof that people post intolerant content with false premises. There's a whole thread with pictures of it. People who disagree with that shouldn't subscribe to an instance that allows it.

It's not an issue that can be tackled on a user by user basis... Unless you want to hire and pay for a bunch of full time mods to watch every posts on our instance? You know... What private social medias need to resort to to try and keep extremism and false information under control?

You know what they say, if you hang out with a bunch of racists then you are too.

[–] darkwing_duck 3 points 1 year ago (2 children)

What I am seeing is any opposition no matter how reasonable instantly gets equated to fascist/nazi/whatever and exiled. This results in the people that subscribe to these views being siloed in an echochamber themselves. I want to see good faith discussions that aren't cut short by mods or admins because they are too intolerant of what they consider to be "intolerance".

[–] Kecessa 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (12 children)

And having them in an echo chamber reduces their numbers in the long run because they have less space to post their ideas and to convince others to adhere to them.

Let's not pretend what we can see in the screenshots in the other thread is "reasonable opposition".

https://sh.itjust.works/post/216888

Good faith discussions with extremists/those who subscribe to conspiracy theories doesn't work and all experts agree with that hence why they don't debate them in the first place.

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[–] FlagonOfMe 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I just read your whole conversation, and I understand what you are saying. I, myself, was once banned from a community for simply talking about the language people use for gender and sex, and what it all means. Anyone who knows me knows I'm really high on the tolerance spectrum, so being banned for that comment really threw me for a loop. That mod took zero time to try to figure out who I was and gave my words no charity at all. "He's talking about the semantics of gender vs sex. Ban!" (This was reddit, and it was one of the power mods)

It seems to me a lot of mods have a hair trigger when it comes to banning people who want to have a deeper discussion on a topic. Those who want to raise questions that might make people a little uncomfortable because they have to think. They instantly assume you're "concern trolling" or something. Nope! I'm just a philosopher. I have questions, and I have ideas, and I like to talk about our use of language. Especially when the use of language is a major point of contention between the two sides.

I just proofread this comment and realized that it would probably get me banned from certain liberal communities. I sound like a right-winger crying about free speech. That couldn't be further from the truth.

Fucking humans. We waste so much brain power trying to figure out what "side" a person is on so we know whether to hate them or not.

That being said, nothing in the screenshots is good discussion.

[–] darkwing_duck 1 points 1 year ago

I sound like a right-winger crying about free speech.

That's exactly what they would claim as the ban reason. I am way too familiar with this myself.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

Have you gone onto the beehaw instance directly to see if your posts are there? From what i'm aware it's possible to post in the snapshot of a defederated instance but it won't actually reach that site.

The only threads that should be on your instance are the ones from prior to defederation

[–] Kecessa 1 points 1 year ago

Thanks for the clarification!

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[–] goat 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

@[email protected] is a bit of a troll, don't expect a discussion. They've been following my posts and comments for a while now. Report and move on.

[–] Kecessa 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I never forced you to reply to the messages I posted and you disagreed with 🤷

[–] goat 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yet you continue to follow me and spam the same emoji on my comments. Your post history is public.

[–] Kecessa 10 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Stop replying to me if you don't like it... Or... Block me?

That's your solution with exploding heads users isn't it? People should block the users that post comments they don't like and the mods shouldn't intervene... Yet you're saying I should be reported to the mod? Isn't that hypocritical on your part?

[–] goat 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Stop replying to you? But you replied to me first.

And no, I'm not going to block you. That's against the values of this community. See in the sidebar,

Remember, every voice matters and your contribution can make a difference. We believe that through open dialogue, mutual respect, and a shared commitment to discovery, we can foster a community that embodies the democratic spirit of the Agora in our modern world.

[–] Kecessa 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Really? I made it pretty clear in the first discussion that I didn't want to argue with you anymore, you saw my message in the second discussion and replied to me 🤷

[–] goat 2 points 1 year ago

That's an entirely different thread. You were also the first one to contact me in the original thread on a different community as well.