this post was submitted on 30 Jun 2023
-36 points (28.0% liked)

The Agora

1602 readers
1 users here now

In the spirit of the Ancient Greek Agora, we invite you to join our vibrant community - a contemporary meeting place for the exchange of ideas, inspired by the practices of old. Just as the Agora served as the heart of public life in Ancient Athens, our platform is designed to be the epicenter of meaningful discussion and thought-provoking dialogue.

Here, you are encouraged to speak your mind, share your insights, and engage in stimulating discussions. This is your opportunity to shape and influence our collective journey, just like the free citizens of Athens who gathered at the Agora to make significant decisions that impacted their society.

You're not alone in your quest for knowledge and understanding. In this community, you'll find support from like-minded individuals who, like you, are eager to explore new perspectives, challenge their preconceptions, and grow intellectually.

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.

Community guidelines
New posts should begin with one of the following:

Only moderators may create a [Vote] post.

Voting History & Results

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
-36
submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by robd003 to c/agora
 

We should try to keep this instance as a Free Speech destination, rather than yet another island controlled by the thought police.

Could we please set some rules for defederation? I'd like to suggest these two:

  1. Is it spam?
  2. Is it illegal?

If either is yes, then go ahead and ban it, otherwise allow free discussion and don't get upset that some people think differently than yourself.

top 23 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Why don't you leave? Why do other people need to tolerate things for your benefit? It seems like if there is a particular kind of content the majority of your instance does not want to have around but that you still want to engage with, then the onus should be on you to leave right?

[–] [email protected] 18 points 1 year ago

I believe that the [Insert Ethnic Group here] should not be allowed to exist on this planet.

This is not spam and it is not illegal in my country to believe that my people are superior. You may not remove this post since that's censorship.

/s

Go visit explodingheads if that pleases you, this is not a free speech zone.

[–] Barbarian 12 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I will copy/paste the excellent starting point written by @[email protected]:

If I were to write such a standing policy for defederation, I think it would read something like this:

Admins of sh.itjust.works shall defederate with another instance immediately when that instance:

is operated for the purpose of hosting bot accounts for the purposes of spam, scams, denial-of-service attacks, or other traffic generally unwelcome or disruptive to the Fediverse.

is operated for the purpose of posting commercial advertisements to other instances.

is operated primarily for the purpose of illegal or harmful acts, such as sharing child pornography, human trafficking, inciting/facilitating acts of violence or terrorism, etc.

is operated primarily for the purpose of political extremism/radicalization to include rampant bigotry, racism, sexism, calls to violence.

is generally operated in good faith but some temporary issue such as a credential theft has deprived the genuine admins of control of the instance and problematic posts/communities/members are being created. The admins may defederate or refederate as needed to meet this condition.

Admins or members of sh.itjust.works may call a member vote in the Agora on the matter of defederating when another instance when that instance:

was historically operated in good faith but has more recently entered a state of low moderation; illegal/immoral/spam traffic is posted against the intsance’s own rules with no attempt to moderate.

is a very small instance operated by one or a few individuals to circumvent a ban if ban-worthy behavior continues.

A non-emergency technical issue arises, for example an instance starts sending garbled posts which fill feeds with nonsense, members may request temporary defederation until the glitch is resolved.

[–] Kecessa 11 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Why create another thread for a subject that's been covered extensively over many threads already? 🤔 How funny that the only post history you've got is about your being pro free speech... Seems like a troll account to me!

[–] sentient_loom -5 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Your posts are also all about banning baddies, and you're more insulting than any of the anti-defed people I've seen. Constantly criticizing people for having the discussion in the first place. Toxic!

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

I also post on other, non political, communities if you look at my history (like Quebec's), it just so happens that my subscribed feed includes The Agora and this instance's main community and it's the most active communities I'm subscribed to and the subject keeps coming back.

[–] sentient_loom -3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

So let it keep coming back. It's not going to go away.

[–] Kecessa 3 points 1 year ago

Pretty sure it will after the vote answers the question of what the community wants to do once and for all 😉

[–] Zaphodquixote 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Are you not aware of previous discussions about this?

It's getting kinda old tbh. Like, take the time to scroll a c/ before posting there, doubly so for this c/ which isn't for random stuff like this to begin with.

[–] Difficult_Bit_1339 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

There was another discussion about setting guidelines for de-federation instead of voting for every single instance that someone finds objectionable. I was going to link it to the OP and lock the thread but it appears that the poster of the previous thread has deleted it, so I guess this gets to be the new one.

[–] Barbarian 2 points 1 year ago

I wanted to wait for the vote on E-H to get rolling before starting this as the next logical step, but I'm not a fan of the bias in the title and non-comprehensive nature of the body. Assuming nobody does it before me, would it be an issue if I made a new post once that happens?

[–] Zaphodquixote 2 points 1 year ago

Ahhhh, that helps!

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

If you don't want to have the discussion again, just don't. It's 100% okay for a user to post a thread and keep the discussion going. It has no effect on you if you opt out.

It's very weird to criticize fellow users for having discussions.

And this topic will never, ever go away. It's a permanent fixture of federation.

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

You may have forgotten which c/ you're in. The agora isn't for random discussions.

While there's going to be some repeat subjects, at the time I originally commented, it had just been brought up on this c/ maybe a day before. Which means that this post (at that time) was a duplicate that would split the discussion. Now, it turns out that the previous post had been deleted but the poster, and (had you scrolled down a bit) a mod had stated that they were going to link to it, but this would be the thread for that discussion since it was gone, and I expressed a lack of objection at that point.

The objection, when it was made, was purely because of the nature of this c/. You can't clog up an instance functional c/ with repeats of a matter because that makes it impossible to have a cohesive discussion. If you have to bounce between multiple threads, the debate gets both unwieldy, and easy to lose track of.

But, even is it was a regular c/, a repeat of a subject every day is still excessive.

[–] sentient_loom -4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

The ongoing activity in these discussions shows that it's not over. You just want people who disagree to stop voicing their disagreement.

[–] Zaphodquixote 4 points 1 year ago

You either didn't read what I wrote, or you're looking for an argument. It doesn't matter which, I'm done.

[–] surfcocktailsynth 4 points 1 year ago

Illégal only makes sens when you add where.

And hate speech is definitely not illegal in many places but should be, and banned by whatever means necessary, including defederation if it comes to this.

There are also technical issues that may need defederation e.g. bots.

[–] haxe11 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I do not believe that free speech is compatible with social media. None of the social media platforms are public squares. They are all private. For instance, sh.itjust.works has the “no bigotry” and “be respectful” rules which disqualify us from being a free speech platform. Doxxing is, in and of itself, not illegal, and yet it's not allowed even on Twitter. Most places are not friendly to porn, either.

[–] Difficult_Bit_1339 2 points 1 year ago

I think having an approach of de-federation where we decide guidelines and then depend on the admin staff to implement them on the individual instances is more sustainable than having to have constant vote threads about the topic.

Illegal content, places where people congregate to plan violence or doxing, etc.

This instance is not a 'free speech zone' and we have rules for people posting on communities here. I don't think we should get in the habit of using de-federation as a downvote button for instances that have opinions that people find objectionable. The block button exists for that, it isn't just a tool for passive aggressively winning arguments.

[–] sentient_loom -2 points 1 year ago

I agree. And there are many like us. But we might have to bail and join a less triggered instance. But I don't want to be in a right wing hell hole either. I just want to read people's posts!