this post was submitted on 29 Aug 2024
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MeanwhileOnGrad

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"Oh, this is calamity! Calamity! Oh no, he's on the floor!"

Welcome to MoG!

Meanwhile On Grad

Documenting hate speech, conspiracy theories, apologia/revisionism, and general tankie behaviour across the fediverse. Memes are welcome!

What is a Tankie?

Alternatively, a detailed blog post about Tankies.

(caution of biased source)

Basic Rules:

Sh.itjust.works Instance rules apply! If you are from other instances, please be mindful of the rules. — Basically, don't be a dick.

Hate-Speech — You should be familiar with this one already; practically all instances have the same rules on hate speech.

Apologia — (Using the Modern terminology for Apologia) No Defending, Denying, Justifying, Bolstering, or Differentiating authoritarian acts or endeavours, whether be a Pro-CCP viewpoint, Stalinism, Islamic Terrorism or any variation of Tankie Ideology.

Revisionism — No downplaying or denying atrocities past and present. Calling Tankies shills, foreign/federal agents, or bots also falls under this rule. Extremists exist. They are real. Do not call them shills or fake users as it handwaves their extremism.

Tankies can explain their views but may be criticised or attacked for them. Any slight infraction on the rules above will immediately earn a warning and possibly a ban.

Off-topic Discussion — Do not discuss unrelated topics to the point of derailing the thread. Stay focused on the direct content of the post as opposed to arguing.

You'll be warned if you're violating the instance and community rules. Continuing poor behaviour after being warned will result in a ban or removal of your comments. Bans typically only last 24 hours, but each subsequent infraction will double the amount. Depending on the content, the ban time may be increased. You may request an unban at any time.

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Got banned from ml and made a meme about it. Thought you guys might appreciate. (feddit.org)
submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/meanwhileongrad
23 comments fedilink hide all child comments
 

Since I was curious I checked the actual amount of upvotes and downvotes of my post on mbin. It got 56 upvotes and 66 downvotes according to them since I was curious. Seems I hurt their little ego when I mentioned blocking their instance.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

goes into a ML space

Criticizes ML

Gets banned

Here's how you bitch about their modding.

"They instance wide banned me for saying a federal democratic republic is, by definition, a form of democracy. I'm not surprised by that, MLs gonna ML, but I am kind of annoyed it wasn't for me calling Stalin a red fascist who killed the Revolution."

[–] [email protected] 18 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (2 children)

I haven't used lemmy up until this point. They pose as a general purpose instance and are the 2nd largest lemmy instance at that. I knew the lemmy devs had their preferences but I didn't know they would let it effect their moderating so strongly.

[–] goat 12 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (3 children)

It happens to everyone and is probably going to be the downfall of lemmy

hilarious thing is that they think banning a user is a win. Yeah you guys sure dunked on that random guy by banning him

[–] [email protected] 7 points 2 months ago

It will definetly hinder its growth. I hope the ml instance just gets mostly irrelevant when instances that allow for more free speech can grow accordingly. They might create a stronger cesspool of likemineded tankies but it hurts the overall platform

[–] sugar_in_your_tea 5 points 2 months ago

Yeah, I got banned from some random community there for suggesting that Russia wasn't exactly the most privacy-friendly country. To be fair, this was after a lengthy discussion where I essentially suggested the mod had an unhealthy obsession with the main dev of a FOSS project (/c/privacy, and the project was GrapheneOS), but the reason they gave was for the comment about Russia.

It wasn't an instance-wide ban, just a community ban, but that motivated me to unsub from enough of the lemmy.ml communities that I'm unlikely to get banned. And this wasn't one of the big admins, just some power-hungry reddit-refugee that was disliked on Reddit for doing exactly the same thing (obsession with GrapheneOS dev, not the Russia thing).

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

Well, it's the best they can do. They'd prefer to ding your social credit and throw you in a Gulag to work it off

[–] [email protected] 11 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Yeah they could definitely be a bit more upfront about it. Pity the poor "libertarians" who wander in from time to time thinking FOSS=free speech absolutism

[–] sugar_in_your_tea 6 points 2 months ago* (last edited 2 months ago) (1 children)

Yup, that's me, sort of. I consider myself libertarian and hoped Lemmy would be a free speech bastion (within reason, I respect healthy moderation, but any topic should be fair game for those who are considerate and constructive). But Lemmy.ml really doesn't like constructive criticism of China or Russia, and that's just not okay with me.

So that's why I'm here. I'm fine abiding by the rules of this instance, and generally speaking I don't have issues expressing well-sourced arguments that may be a bit unpopular. I get a bunch of downvotes if that opinion is unpopular (even if well-supported by empirical evidence), but I haven't been banned for it. I did get banned from lemmy.ml/c/privacy for posting a well-sourced argument that Russia may not be the most privacy-friendly country in the world.

[–] [email protected] -2 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Just out of curiosity, do you consider your ban comment to be "constructive criticism?"

[–] sugar_in_your_tea 7 points 2 months ago

The comment I got banned for? Yes.

Since I was banned and my posts removed (not sure if manually removed or just disabled while the ban was in force), I don't know if I can go find the comment chain any more. If you know of a way to search for comment replies from another user, I'd be happy to go find it.

But basically the discussion was about GrapheneOS. The mod really didn't like the lead dev and recommended people avoid the software, and my position was that the software should be evaluated on its merits, not its association with any particular individual. I agreed that the lead dev was toxic (they're autistic and very vocal, which can lead to issues), but that fact is irrelevant to whether someone should use a particular piece of software. They threatened to ban me, and I said something like, "If you choose to, that's your prerogative, I obviously can't stop you," and then they mentioned something vaguely related to Russia (I think saying they're privacy friendly because of Snowdon? I honestly don't recall), and I replied that Russia doesn't have a particularly good track record for privacy, and that's when I got the ban. All of my communication was in pretty neutral language (like I'm doing here), and throughout the comment chain I linked to a lot of sources, so I obviously wasn't trying to hide anything (the mod mostly linked to screenshots of their own posts from Reddit about their "research").

I'm not going to mention their username here because I don't want anyone to go harass them, but they were one of the mods at /c/privacy and they post quite a bit there, while the other mods don't seem to. I reached out to one of the mods there over private DM about it, and here's that message (they never got back to me). I don't recall saying anything about Israel or Palestine, but maybe our conversation briefly touched on it.

And here it is in text if that's easier (redacted usernames):

Hey, I’m messaging you since you’re a mod on [email protected] about one of the other mods, ~~redacted~~. I recently got banned (temporary, 10 days) with the following justification:

calling Palestine military terrorists (Zionism), calling mods Russian shills

I believe I did nothing of the sort, and you’re obviously welcome to review our interaction. I only noticed because I got unsubscribed (looks like there’s a feature pending to notify users of bans).

I’m not asking you to unban me or anything like that, and it’s probably for the best that I take a step back for a few days anyway. I did want to point your attention to it since I’m concerned that mod may be making emotional modding decisions.

I noticed one other user got banned for supporting GrapheneOS, here’s the modlog (user ~~redacted~~):

GrapheneOS propaganda posting (fearmongering that it is the only mobile privacy/security solution)

Basically, that user said GrapheneOS was the most secure Android ROM, and that mod flipped out.

You’re the only mod I reached out to, and I’m not trying to stir any drama or anything like that. I’m just concerned that free, relevant discussion is going to be restricted if it’s about a project headed by someone that mod doesn’t like. That mod was also very vocal about Jonah Aragon from privacy guides, which is a commonly cited resource, so I’m worried more users will get banned as well.

Anyway, thanks for listening.

I don't recall talking about Palestine, but I did imply that maybe this mod in particular is from Russia or supports Russia and thus doesn't see the privacy issues they have over there.

Anyway, feel free to look for that comment chain. I think I messaged the mod on the same day that it happened, so the 5 months ago time should be pretty accurate. Be warned, the comments were very long because we went back and forth over various disagreements, with me citing sources and them (IIRC) basically spouting FUD.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 2 months ago

Yeah it’s like going to North Korea and bad mouthing the leader and then going to prison

It’s shitty that it is that way, but you can’t exactly be shocked or surprised about it.

I do get it. It’s some bullshit, yes.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 2 months ago

They need to pick whether or not they're "an ML instance." Clearly being one while going "nuh uh we're just general" is partially to blame for this "confusion." (Of course I know they do it on purpose to fuel their victim complex and attempt to normalize their propaganda and extremist positions rather than relegate them to their own purpose built communities.)

[–] [email protected] 2 points 2 months ago

"general purpose instance" yeah thats the big problem.

[–] [email protected] -5 points 2 months ago

if you wanted us to be on your side you shouldn't have posted screenshots of you just being obnoxious