I’m gonna get real with you folks, we’ve had way too many of these posts recently. I’ve been reflecting on this topic a lot the past few days. For me personally, I couldn’t care less about my gender identity. But just because that’s true for me, doesn’t make that true for everyone.
The beauty of the fediverse is that if you don’t like the way a particular instance or community is moderated you can simply choose another to hang out on, or create your own.
Blajah has made it pretty clear by now they will ban anyone who argues against the validity of xenogenders, in order to create a safe space for those folks. That’s fair enough imo.
Safe spaces should be respected, and Blajah’s admins/mods do not deserve abuse for creating and maintaining those spaces.
I can completely understand why Blajah users don’t want to have to constantly argue with external users about the validity of their chosen identities. Bans are one way Blajah has decided to manage that problem so that their users can experience lemmy in relative peace and safety. While it is a blunt tool and I have my reservations about preemptive bans, there are not many other options for @ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone, other than defederation from most instances. That would be a terrible outcome for the fediverse as a whole.
In order to help Blajah to maintain their safe space, I would like to propose, if @db0@lemmy.dbzer0.com agrees and community sentiment is positive:
- that we no longer accept posts about this topic in this community; and
- we also remove previous posts on this topic from the community.
That’s all folks, have at 'er.
Edit: thanks for all your feedback and comments. I think it’s clear that the vast majority of people are fed up with this topic coming up repeatedly.
Summarizing the feedback, I’d say most folks would prefer to retain previous posts for the sake of posterity, and to serve as an example of why we don’t want anymore of these posts. I’m happy to take that on board. For those folks saying I’m a PTB for intervening in this way, I’ll just remind you that I haven’t made any arbitrary mod decisions, and I’ve consulted with db0 and the community as a whole before taking any mod actions.
I think the way to move forward with this is to acknowledge that there’s a bunch of queer and straight people who have a problem with xenogenders. Personally, I think that’s a valid perspective and shouldn’t sanctioned on our instance. But for Blajah, they’ve drawn a line in the sand over this and that’s ok too. Our instance won’t be blocking anyone over their opinions on the topic, especially in this community where free discussion is necessary and encouraged. But safe spaces should be respected.
A lot of folks mentioned I should more more specific about the “no more posts about Blajah’s mod policies” rather than making it a sweeping and overly broad statement. I think that’s good feedback. I will amend this to "No more posts in this community about the validity or otherwise of neopronouns, xenogenders, and bans originating from Blajah about gatekeeping or transphobia. This is in recognition of Blajah’s safe space policy. You are of course free to discuss those topics outside of this community.
Note that this decision isn’t about ideological gatekeeping, its about reducing the workload for our own mods and admins in trying to moderate this community, and to avoid iterating over the same old topics again and again.
Blajah isn’t getting a “free pass” over YPTB posts - if you feel they are power tripping over other issues then feel free to make a post here. But if it’s a post questioning the validity of xenogenders or about Blajah bans for gatekeeping then that will no longer be allowed here. Those folks deserve a safe space on Lemmy, even if it’s not a mainstream opinion.
For those folks who feel aggrieved about being accused of “transphobia” or “gatekeeping” over their views on this topic, I completely understand just how hurtful it can be to be unfairly (imo) accused in this way. I’ve been in the same position, and I also found it difficult to deal with. I want those folks to know that our instance does not require you to support xenogenders in order to participate in our instance. However we do require that you use preferred pronouns whenever they are specified. That’s been a longstanding instance policy on dbzer0.
Thank everyone for your feedback.
I’m OK with that but it has to be a bit more targeted specifically to blahaj’s rule about gatekeeping and neopronouns, and I would add everything drag of course.
I wouldn’t delete old posts, just lock them.
Maybe make it a temporary moratorium?
I agree, this community should be a place to discuss mod abuse, not bellyache over transphobia and hate speech being censored or being banned from it. Such discourse makes this community extremely toxic and unusable to vulnerable groups, it also creates inherent bias here favoring alt-right shitheads.
I think @ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone would very much agree with this decision as well.
Ada is in favor of banning dissent
It’s “bellyaching” over dissent from other queers
not bellyache over transphobia and hate speech being censored or being banned from it
Literally the comment you wrote immediately before this one involved you deriding bad faith arguments.
I agree, this community should be a place to discuss mod abuse, not bellyache over transphobia and hate speech being censored or being banned from it. Such discourse makes this community extremely toxic and unusable to vulnerable groups, it also creates inherent bias here favoring alt-right shitheads.
“It’s not mod abuse if I think they had it coming for Wrongthink, and even discussing the possibility should be banned.”
“It’s not mod abuse if I think they had it coming for Wrongthink, and even discussing the possibility should be banned.”
“I’m just going to ignore every point he makes and make up some worthless garbage about banning by disagreement because I can’t address Draconic’s actual points”
“I’m just going to ignore every point he makes and make up some worthless garbage about banning by disagreement because I can’t address Draconic’s actual points”
The issue brought up by these threads is whether moderator action was justified or not; whereas you are saying the very topic is verboten and makes this place “toxic” and “unusable” as you harass marginalized folk who commit the crime of disagreeing with you. The point you’re making is in favor of a topic ban on YPTB. Hence “and even discussing the possibility should be banned.” I’m sorry that you don’t understand what you yourself are advocating for.
You got your answer long ago. You Deserved It, They Deserved it. You and them are indeed gatekeeping other people’s identities and accusing them of being evil for identifying that way. Also for the record calling people out for gatekeeping and hostility is not “harassing minorities” people don’t get a free pass because they’re trans sweetie, if they’re gatekeeping assholes they get called out. Whether they scream bigotry afterwards or not is their choice but when they chose to falsely scream bigotry it says more about them than the person calling them out, and ironically puts them in that bad situation of being harmful since crying wolf about transphobia ends up being more harmful than helpful.
You got your answer long ago. You Deserved It, They Deserved it.
Yes, I know you think they deserved to be harassed by you and your pals, but generally in this comm the question is about moderator action.
You and them are indeed gatekeeping other people’s identities and accusing them of being evil for identifying that way.
Fucking what.
Also for the record calling people out for gatekeeping and hostility is not “harassing minorities” people don’t get a free pass because they’re trans sweetie, if they’re gatekeeping assholes they get called out. Whether they scream bigotry afterwards or not is their choice but when they chose to falsely scream bigotry it says more about them than the person calling them out, and ironically puts them in that bad situation of being harmful since crying wolf about transphobia ends up being more harmful than helpful.
God, that’s some painful fucking irony, to say that with no self-awareness. Bravo.
You seem like the kinda guy who says calling Nazis Nazis devalues the word Nazi.
… because I summarized someone else’s position accurately?
You’re being obtuse and I hope when things cool down you’re able to see the harm this behavior is causing in this specific circumstance and also more generally. I understand that you probably have good intentions but I think you’re either very misguided, trolling, reacting without thinking through the impact of your behavior, or some combination of these things, and I do feel like the ban was warranted especially considering the fit you’re throwing. I have respect for the involvement you have in sustaining and contributing platform and the effort you clearly put into it, and I have seen you say things I really agreed with, but this is too much for me. This is not how you encourage left unity and safe and sustainable practices that support as many people as possible. I know you know about the paradox of tolerance.
You’re being obtuse and I hope when things cool down you’re able to see the harm this behavior is causing in this specific circumstance and also more generally.
A trans user was just harassed off the Fediverse by these people, man. Is that harm invisible? I’m bitching about people doing that. That’s harmful?
I understand that you probably have good intentions but I think you’re either very misguided, trolling, reacting without thinking through the impact of your behavior, or some combination of these things, and I do feel like the ban was warranted especially considering the fit you’re throwing.
My ban’s not the issue, here. When it was locked the other day, I was content to let that be it. The ban was a minor thing; annoying and shitty, but ultimately not meaning much considering that, as mentioned in the OP, I didn’t even use Blahaj anymore.
If you think my ban was warranted, that’s fine. But “We shouldn’t discuss Blahaj anymore”, as in the comment I was replying to, is not.
I know you know about the paradox of tolerance.
Sure. You tolerate Nazis, they’ll take over and won’t tolerate you.
Where are the Nazis, here?
Because it looks to me an awful lot like infinite purity tests inflicted even on users outside of the Blahaj instance, combined with sustained harassment; neither of which encourage left unity or safe and sustainable practices that support as many people as possible.
Where are the Nazis, here?
Luckily I don’t see many here (Lemmy), and if I do I am prepared to confront them in whatever way is required. Please point me in their direction if you know of any. I hope you’re not calling the people who are upset by this situation Nazis, because I haven’t seen any behavior that would warrant that and it would be very alarming and disappointing if that was happening here in a digital space I have come to feel safer in than most others, and would warrant an evaluation of what I am doing here, and I hope that I haven’t been spending my time reaching out and talking to and just associating with people who hold those beliefs.
A trans user was just harassed off the Fediverse by these people
I saw some of the comments that person was making. If they have to go somewhere else to learn how to respect spaces specifically curated by and for trans people that’s fine with me, I didn’t get the feeling they (or for that matter, you) were willing or able to do so at this point, at least in this specific case in the way that was asked.
And please don’t throw in my face again their (or for that matter, your own) marginalized status, it feels to me like it’s being used as some kind of gotcha or get out of jail free card, and that is disrespectful as much as most anything that I’ve seen* has happened in this thread.
I am hoping that by adding my perspective others might feel supported or safer here, and others yet will hopefully see that horizontal harm is a thing that we have to be aware of and identify and do the work to minimize, internally and externally (referring to both the harm and the work).
I’m bitching about people doing that.
I am not talking directly to anyone but you, and here, you are talking to me, please keep that in mind. It’s fine to complain and always good to speak out against harm coming unwarranted or unfairly to others, but I’m talking to you about your behavior.
Please feel free to reach out for further 1:1 discussion, or not if you do not want to. It’s about time we end the the perpetuation of harm in online and physical spaces and in the systems that we live under. Please also feel free to reach out for support with other efforts towards that goal or other similar ones.
Edited to add language to clarify a bit, if others feel like I’m wrong in my assessments and what I’ve said I am open to feedback, I’m not trying to deny anyone’s experience or minimize harm that has come to others. My goal is always to prevent and reduce harm and if I’m not doing that I would hope someone here would call me in.
Luckily I don’t see many here (Lemmy), and if I do I am prepared to confront them in whatever way is required.
In this comparison, where are the Nazis, here?
Where is the threat which, if tolerated, will oppress everyone else?
Please, enlighten me.
And please don’t throw in my face again their (or for that matter, your own) marginalized status, it feels to me like it’s being used as some kind of gotcha or get out of jail free card, and that is disrespectful as much as most anything that has happened in this thread.
Considering that this is all to the drumbeat of “We MUST protect marginalized people!”, it’s kind of fucking relevant.
I am not talking directly to anyone but you, and here, you are talking to me, please keep that in mind. It’s fine to complain and always good to speak out against harm coming unwarranted or unfairly to others, but I’m talking to you about your behavior.
My behavior being complaining something you don’t feel should be complained about, because you feel silence and complicity serves the LGBT community on Lemmy more than airing out the dirty laundry?
Where is the threat which, if tolerated, will oppress everyone else?
The current US admin and other actual Nazis.
where are the Nazis, here?
I told you I don’t see any, here in this thread, and rarely if ever on Lemmy as a whole would I describe the behavior of others as “Nazi” or as you put it “Where is the threat which, if tolerated, will oppress everyone else?”, which is apparently what you think Nazi means?
Please, enlighten me.
Please enlighten me as to where I said there were any here. As I recall that was you, still waiting for that link.
My behavior being complaining something you don’t feel should be complained about
I did not and would not say that.
because you feel silence and complicity serves the LGBT community on Lemmy more than airing out the dirty laundry?
Yeah, that’s clearly consistent with my behavior and what I say here and elsewhere 🙄 fuck off troll
They’re just wanting you to call them a Nazi so it can be screenshotted and posted as proof of something elsewhere.
I’d want the old posts kept for historical reference, but otherwise I’m fine with this.
Why do you need to delete old posts?
Where can users banned by blahaj admins for lurking in other communities report it? Especially because the lahaj admins ban so many people for gatekeeping despite them not gatekeeping.
There’s a theme here of covering up dissent instead of engaging.
Blahaj admins started this whole ordeal in december for banning dissent and losing dozens of users instead of engaging with their community.
PTB
THANK YOU
In favor of doing this, but keep the old posts locked without removing them so people know what happened and what led up to this.
I have a related question:
Where do the users who get banned from YPTB go, when they eventually get banned from YPTB?
I’m completely in favor of this.
Frankly, most of what I see on this comm is BPR and YDI, and most people could probably benefit from taking their bans and touching grass. But having some posts be YDI makes the PTB’s more exciting so maybe i’m wrong.
Maybe we should make some penalty for earning a YDI or BPR, so that people who receive them aren’t encouraged to re-hash the same conflicts over and over? I’m honestly not sure. Part of the problem is that the same people cross-post the same conflict on similar comms, which makes it feel as if the same issue is being litigated repeatedly.
But complaining about receiving a ban from a protective community with strict conduct policies is certainly not the intent of this community, i don’t think.
But complaining about receiving a ban from a protective community with strict conduct policies is certainly not the intent of this community, i don’t think.
Is that all it takes to be immune from PTB status? Being a ‘protective’ community, but only towards the ‘right’ people who think in the ‘right’ way?
Maybe it is? Don’t non-binary people have a right to moderate their own space as they like?
If they have a rule against gatekeeping gender identities and pronouns in their own instance, don’t they have a right to remove offenders from their servers?
You’re all over this topic today, maybe just take a second and listen to what the community is saying. You’ve more than said your piece.
And what about queer people who don’t play the pronoun police power tripping game? We should just go fuck ourselves I guess
No, you should find a community that’s a better fit for you
Oh, the irony.
Don’t non-binary people have a right to moderate their own space as they like?
Sure, though it seems as if their right extends to not being satirized in other communities for being power-tripping bastards. Don’t they have a right to not be criticized for stifling any discussion and banning people based on vibes and posting history, using thought-terminating cliches in place of arguments? Well, it seems they do.
Maybe it is? Don’t non-binary people have a right to moderate their own space as they like?
Is there a group out there that doesn’t have the right to moderate their own space ‘as they like’?
If they have a rule against gatekeeping gender identities and pronouns in their own instance, don’t they have a right to remove offenders from their servers?
“They have the right” and “It is always the correct call” are two entirely different concepts.
You’re all over this topic today, maybe just take a second and listen to what the community is saying. You’ve more than said your piece.
Yeah, well maybe I’m fucking pissed that I just watched a user get harassed out of the Fediverse because Blahaj wants to play harassment games on other people’s instances, and that I’m the one who had to fucking bring it up to be discussed. Maybe I don’t like the idea that if I stayed quiet this all would’ve been swept under the rug.
Jesus
I haven’t a clue what event you’re referring to even though I feel as though I’ve encountered nothing but your comments today. If your goal is to discuss a specific abuse then you’ve done a piss poor job of it.
I’d recommend reaching out to @dbzero@lemmy.dbzer0.com if you think there’s been that severe of an abuse that’s happened, and the community mod hasn’t addressed it well enough.
Honestly, though, it just seems like you have an axe to grind and you’re taking it out on everyone else. Either settle it with the admins or cool off a bit, you’re souring the space for everyone by flaming out like this.
I haven’t a clue what event you’re referring to even though I feel as though I’ve encountered nothing but your comments today.
I’ve summarized the events in this thread alone at least twice.
My opinions on xenogender aside, the fact that Blahaj defenders, in this very comm, harassed a trans user into leaving the Fediverse has me fuming, and rightfully so in my opinion. And they play it off as “[The harassed user] deserved it.” even now. That is pretty core to the anger I feel right now.
Uh, considering recent events, where Blahaj defenders dogpiled a trans person on another instance for disagreeing with them, you sure about that
Most of my comments have been refutations to specific arguments put forth in the context of those events.
What user was it?
Do you have something more specific than your (purely objective) recounting of what happened? A link to it?
At the moment, I’m not sure I’d trust you if you told me the sky was blue
https://lemmy.world/post/26286098
It’s one of the most recent threads on this comm.
Boy you sure are pissed you got blocked before getting to say a slur.
Boy you sure are pissed you got blocked before getting to say a slur.
what
I think people should be allowed to complain about any mod, on any community, on any instance.
Otherwise, it shows a pretty clear favoritism.
I don’t come here for fruitless arguments regarding lemmy.ml or blahaj.zone moderation, but that is the cost of open discussion. If people want to fight each other, who are we to prevent them?
That’s just it, though. The blahaj people don’t want to fight about this, that’s literally the entire point of the rule. This is about other people coming into their spaces, starting fights, getting banned for rules that are very clear and then pitching a shit fit about it.
I don’t complain when I get booted from lemmy.ml communities for breaking a clear rule because I went to their place and fucked around. It would literally be a waste of everyone’s time for me to complain about.
The rule about pronouns is pretty cut and dried. You can either respect them, or you can not engage with the people who you think are trolling at all, which to be clear, is incredibly fucking easy to do. No one is forcing these people to make comments like that in those communities. That’s a personal choice.
Once again, if you show up on blahaj and start fucking around with pretty clearly defined rules, only one side is fighting, the other side is just banning them for breaking clear rules. That’s not a fight, that’s enforcing the rules they’ve laid out.
Dbzero is not their space and they don’t get to police other people’s conceptions of them.
Blahaj admins started this whole ordeal in december for banning dissent and losing dozens of users instead of engaging with their community.
“Do not confront the people doing bad things” is a very shitty advice.
Do not confront the people doing bad things
That’s not the rule. The rule is don’t misgender them.
If you can’t use their pronouns or otherwise interact with them without invalidating their identity, then, you aren’t to interact with them.
If you can’t use their pronouns or otherwise interact with them without invalidating their identity, then, you aren’t to interact with them.
Who was I interacting with, Ada? :)
I think there are far worse and far bigger things for folks to be worried about in real life than getting their fucking panties in a twist because trans people want to be left alone.
If you really think banning people for not being able to respect pronouns is a “bad thing” my dude you gotta get a fuckin grip on reality. Seriously touch some fucking grass and realize there’s actual real life shit that’s actually bad.
It’s not about pronouns. It’s that they lose their fucking minds over any kind of pushback at all. They/them/their is gender neutral and does not negate someone’s gender. Neopronouns are a joke in the real world. Species dysphoria? Get fucking mental health help. You’re a human not a cat.
In the real world this kind of fantasy bullshit that blahaj promotes actively harms queer people.
And then in the context of current events - America is right now starting a genocide against us and this is what the community thinks is important? Fucking pronouns?!
Trans people are being genocided. They deserve a safe space to be themselves. You don’t need to bring that Republican nonsense into their communities. Now isn’t the time to be transphobic.
QUEER people are being genocided. I am a queer person. Fuck off.
Equating not taking fantasy nonsense seriously and being actively against it because it is transphobic trolling with the very real existence of trans people and then equating it to “republican” and “tRaNsPhObIc” is fucking rich.
THEY are tRaNsPhObIc. Fantasy identities and neopronouns are not real and are actively harmful to the very real queer community.
Mmmmm, nah. They’re not hurting you, but you’re hurting them. Just ignore them.
If we’re at the point where Blahaj gets a pass for power-tripping by using the idea that they’re a trans safe-space as a shield, even as they harass other trans users on other instances to the point of leaving the Fediverse, I’m out of this comm.
Did they harass you though? Or just ban you from blahaj?
Not me, LittleRatInAHat, whom they, Draconic Neo below playing dumb included, called a fascist and a transphobe for daring to disagree with them.
Arguing in bad faith as always eh? Just for the record I called them transphobic and fascist not because they disagree with me but because their attitude of dismissing gender identities is transphobic and is indeed reminiscent of fascist behavior. But continue arguing in bad faith and lying, it’s what you do best.
Arguing in bad faith as always eh? Just for the record I called them transphobic and fascist not because they disagree with me but because their attitude of dismissing gender identities is transphobic and is indeed reminiscent of fascist behavior.
“Not because they disagreed with me, but because they disagreed with me.”
Jesus fucking Christ.
They just banned him from blahaj.zone and he’s been bellyaching about it for a while.
I’ll die on the hill that their bullshit about pronouns and respecting nonsense and made up troll identities that make a mockery of us makes the world LESS SAFE for queer people. As a queer person who is visibly gender nonconforming and at physical risk in our current political environment. Im willing to be banned from all of lemmy over this idgaf.
Millennial queers and our elders fought like hell for acceptance so children could get their panties in a twist over being “misgendered” by strangers on the internet who don’t know them nor give a fuck what their gender is. Do these kids even touch grass? Chronically online children putting us all at risk.
Meanwhile we have real serious threats to our physical safety in America but yeah. Let’s whine and cry about being misgendered! it’s oppression!
Edit - IRL I call people what they want to be called. Online I have no idea who the fuck you are or what your gender is nor am I going to remember. And the genderless “they” is not undermining your gender you don’t get to police the English language. And that’s really what this is about. People who feel powerless grabbing on to what little power they have to police others behavior under the ironic concept of “gatekeeping.” That’s the pronoun whining in a nutshell.
As for the question at hand, lock old posts, let new ones through. Their moderation is heavy handed and not queer friendly and they deserve criticism for it. Only their kind of queer is accepted. Not people like me living in reality, staring down the beginning of a genocide and telling them to grow the fuck up.
In a similar vein: they promote a redefined version of asexuality that can end in more people than ever thinking asexual people are just picky and will be happy to do it for their partner and/or “can be fixed”.
The more the redefinition leaks into the real world, the more people once considered broken who were finally starting to be accepted as normal will end up dealing with forced consent via peer pressure and corrective rape.
No means NO, and that was starting to be understood for what it was. With the redefinition of asexual into “No means I have quirky requirements that The One will have”, it ends in real harm for actual no means NO people.
So yes. Real life harm can be caused by toxic gatecrashing. And people causing it call the ones at risk names for the terrible sin of not wanting to be taken as a joke in reality. Literal insult added to injury.
edit: oops i posted this in the wrong thread apologize
They’re a bunch of petulant children who care more about pronoun policing and power tripping and ironically gatekeeping than preparing for the incoming fucking genocide.
They provide a safe space for made up identities and actively harm actual queer people.
here’s a tldr of your spectacular crashout
them: “i acknowledge that memory is fallible but if you know someone and have been introduced to your pronouns you should at least do your best and it’s not very loving to default to they/them you should at least try :)
you: “you are a piss baby and are responsible for your oppression”
you: gets banned
you: “piss baby im being so oppressed also you don’t care about genocide”
Yeah. That’s language policing of they/them just to get butthurt and feel oppressed. I’m not playing this game. We’re dealing with the start of a genocide in America nobody has time for this childish bullshit.
I’m dying on this hill. Fuck their feelings.
Why do you care so deeply about a physical genocide of these people while simultaneously refusing to even respect their given culture and self-governing practices?
Perhaps it could be because you don’t actually care about queer/LGBT genocide and are implicitly okay with it so long as it doesn’t spill over onto you? Allyship ain’t a one way street, and it sounds like you’re not even an ally. Sounds like you just wanna coopt their existence as labor to protect you while simultaneously plotting against them and their culture after the threat has passed. You’re no comrade; the only reason you’re not a bigoted fascist is because you’re not übermensch. Unfuck yourself.
I’m queer, fuck you. Fuck your feelings and fuck your pronouns too. Fuck everything about you. Call me a fascist? For holding queer people accountable for their bullshit while we have a genocide approaching us? Fuck alllllll the way off. Fucking child. Waaaah my pronounssssss go complain to the fucking concentration camp guard about being misgendered in a few years!
I stopped visiting this instance because the transphobic screeds became too much for me. Someone who doesn’t ‘get’ half of young trans people but just feels being nice to people exploring themselves or ignoring them if they’re too much is easier.
Good move.
This shouldn’t even be a debate or question. This hateful bullshit against Blahaj just needs to stop and mods need to put their foot down and say enough is enough. Like if this kind of shit arguing against a queer friendly instance for being queer friendly is okay or permitted I don’t think that !yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com should even be on our instance anymore, and our admins should just remove it.
I hope it doesn’t come to that. I hope this community can put an end to this bullshit and stop endorsing queerphobic users’ complaints.
They’re not queer friendly because they don’t tolerate serious dissent from queers. They’re a safe space for people who live in a fucking fantasy world and not reality.
Reality is overrated. Belief is perception.
Reality definitely is overrated
So why force queer people to live in it when they say it hurts them? Sadism?
Fantasy non human identities aren’t queer.
Okay, so if someone says their gender is cat, you’re saying they’re not queer. Fine, which non queer identity do they have? For argument’s sake, let’s say they prefer cat/cats pronouns and object to being he/himed or she/hered. How are they not queer? Make a specific claim please.
Trolls be trolling. I’m not giving into this sea lion nonsense.
They need mental health help, they’re not queer. Cat isn’t a gender anymore than attack helicopter is. You can’t be a cat just like you can’t be an attack helicopter. I’m not putting up with this queerphobic let’s tolerate everyone! nonsense.
Being queer-friendly doesn’t mean they’re immune to criticism. The issues people have with that instance have little to do with it being queer-friendly, and more to do with heavy-handed mod practices, and I think it’s incredibly disingenuous to suggest that that’s the reason why people are upset.
Nah the core of most of these posts is whether or not it’s ok to disrespect someone for their xenogender or using neopronouns. People will come in here to say they have been banned for accidentally misgendering or just ‘sharing their opinion’ but every case I’ve seen so far, if you look into their modlog you see that they were actually being really disrespectful about it, making other people with xenogender and/or neopronouns feel unsafe. Blahaj admin has made it clear that disrespecting someones pronouns or identity is not allowed on the instance, which most blahaj users agree with. Anyone who would still like to argue about this rule is just better off on another instance.
Like if this kind of shit arguing against a queer friendly instance for being queer friendly
Nobody is arguing against blahaj for being queer friendly. People are arguing against some of their members for being unfriendly to people, including queer people, among them LittleRatInALittleHat. That’s the only reason people are caring about this.
The type of mentality “you’re not allowed to criticize me, because I am X, and so unless you agree with me you’re being anti-X” is tempting but it is wrong. You might think dragon is a gender, or you might not, it is fine, but refusing to agree that dragon is a gender is not and has never been “transphobia” or in any way anti-queer.
but refusing to agree that dragon is a gender is not and has never been “transphobia” or in any way anti-queer.
Well I think queer people can have any gender they want, and you just have to deal with it because it’s none of your business.
You might think dragon is a gender, or you might not, it is fine, but refusing to agree that dragon is a gender …
Well, I’m gonna chime in again, because it’s a nice jumping off point.
That argument, that anyone is actually saying dragon is a gender, is simply misrepresenting all of the subject.
Regardless of one’s view on xenopronouns in specific, or neopronouns one general, the claim hasn’t been that dragon is a gender.
The rule, and the argument behind it, is about pronouns. And it isn’t really about the pronouns themselves, as much as it is about who gets to decide when someone is deserving of being respected as an individual.
We’re not biking being asked to share a belief that a person is a dragon, or fucks dragons, or that humans can be part dragon.
What we’re being asked to do is to respect pronouns or just not talk to someone. That’s it. That’s what it’s about.
The rule simply lays out what will happen if people don’t do one of those two things.
You don’t have to agree with the word being used as a pronoun meaning anything other than that it replaces traditional pronouns and makes them happy. Does it matter if they think they’re a dragon, or a tiger? No. It doesn’t matter. If the cognitive dissonance of using a word in an unconventional way is so high that you simply can’t do it, that’s okay. You have multiple options at that point.
One, you can ignore the request, and accept the consequences as they come. Fair or not, those consequences are known.
Two, you can use them anyway, and roll your eyes while you do it. Nobody will know you’re rolling your eyes.
Three, you can use them anyway, and complain about it, which may also have consequences, depending on how you complain.
Four, you can block the individual and never interact with them again, thus preventing cognitive dissonance entirely.
Five, you can choose to just not interact with them at all.
Six, you choose to not interact, but complain about it elsewhere, with possible consequences (as these posts have shown).
There’s even other options, but they’re absurdist stuff like juggling oranges while singing “I’m a little teapot”. So, you know, only entertaining to me.
Now, that’s separate from anything else, I’m only talking about the idea that one has to share a belief to be able to use someone’s pronouns. Like, my pronouns are he/him, they/them, and I’ll accept any gender neutral neopronouns as well. But I’ll accept she/her in a pinch, though I may correct those if it’s relevant. It’s why I never list my pronouns, I’m cool with almost anything, up to and including “that asshole”. That’s not even a joke, I’m fine being referred to that way as a replacement for a pronoun, or in general.
You don’t have to agree with my belief that I’m not obligated to behave in the way a pronoun implies to use any of those. You don’t have to agree with my belief that by accepting almost any pronoun that I improve myself by challenging my own concepts of gender in order to use he/him, or any of the rest.
So, why would you have to believe in anything at all to use any pronoun? You aren’t expected to log off and tell your roommate or whatever, “jeez, this cat I was talking to was a real weirdo, he’s just nuts” and you aren’t expected to log off and tell the same person “I was talking to this cat from blahaj and drag sure did annoy me” you can use any pronoun you want when you aren’t in the presence of the person requesting an individual pronoun, or any neopronouns, or a xenopronoun.
You don’t need to believe anything except that the person, the human being with their own life and needs and pains, is made a little happier by the use of it. That’s it. That’s all you have to believe.
Regardless of one’s view on xenopronouns in specific, or neopronouns one general, the claim hasn’t been that dragon is a gender.
[heavy sigh]
Drag’s gender is dragon rider
I’m speaking in the general, with dragon as the example used because drag is largely the focus of contention.
The next paragraph, “The rule, and the argument behind it, is about pronouns. And it isn’t really about the pronouns themselves, as much as it is about who gets to decide when someone is deserving of being respected as an individual.” covers that. I was addressing the rule, and blahaj, not drag.
It hasn’t been blahaj policy that I’ve seen that dragon is a gender, only that you have to treat people’s pronouns and genders with respect.
It’s one of those where we don’t have to agree, we just have to be nice.
Or have the admins specifically addressed the issue as a declarative, and I missed it? I do miss things ;)
It hasn’t been blahaj policy that I’ve seen that dragon is a gender, only that you have to treat people’s pronouns and genders with respect.
https://lemmy.world/pictrs/image/8b47330e-fe59-466e-aef5-b529ed0b05a5.jpeg
I could go further back to the whole kerfluffle this stems from, where there are more examples, but honestly, I don’t feel like digging that shit up.
Ehhh, what that screenshot shows is admins deciding that you didn’t treat pronouns with respect.
Obviously, you disagree with their assessment. I do too, really, though I have seen their argument about it somewhere to and down the various threads.
That is a different thing.
I definitely get why you don’t think it’s different, but, looking at it from this side of the screen, that’s not a statement of policy, it’s a reaction to their interpretation of what you said.
Against my better judgement, I went into Blahaj back around the time of The Event.
Gender was always meant to help identify where in the spectrum of sex one is. Whether that be male, female, both, neither, slightly female, etc. Y’all are free to say your gender is goth, or as one user on Lemmy is becoming infamous for, Dragon; but you’ll likely not be taken seriously, and ultimately you’ll be setting back both progression for oppressed minorities as well as already existing accomplishments. PS: op should say what neopronouns are for those who may not know.
Removed: Gatekeeping
If gender means anything then some things are not gender. That’s not “gatekeeping.” It’s a tautology. A word with no meaning is meaningless.
Removed: Gatekeeping
Just as I don’t acknowledge “dragonfucker” as a gender I don’t acknowledge “god” as a gender type. There’s a person around here who insists that they’re a god and that they’re pronouns need to be capitalized. No one is a god. And no one gets to go around demanding that they’re a god and that they should be acknowledged as one. I mostly linger here on blah as a habit really. If I eventually get banned so be it. I have my line in the sand for what will make me leave but until that happens I’ll keep lingering like a fart.
Removed, no note
Trans women are women. Nobody is a dragon. Dragons aren’t real.
Removed: Gatekeeping
No, I mean I’m no longer going to be on Blahaj, and those are the communities I’ll miss. Hence “but… well, Blahaj isn’t for me, since I don’t acknowledge ‘dragonfucker’ as a gender.”
Removed: Gatekeeping (that one’s literally me)
A lot of people say a lot of things, who cares? I don’t think it’s an unfair line to draw at all. We draw it at what’s real and what’s not. Gender as a spectrum is real. We know this. We also know that the person posting comments on Lemmy isn’t a fucking dragon because dragons aren’t real. Line drawn.
Removed: Gatekeeping
Neopronouns are fine, but not all neopronouns are part of gender identity. Not all identity expressions are gender related. The entire spectrum of gender has a biological basis, and anything which doesn’t have a biological basis is an expression of identity, which is also valid, but not always related to gender. Like, no one can get a medical cocktail to transform into a dragon or cat. Please don’t confuse gender identity with other types of identity expressions.
Removed: Transmed stuff
All of that points pretty firmly to disagreement with dragon as a gender as gatekeeping, not a matter of respecting pronouns.
If I were a Blahaj user, I’d be posting about defederation from db0. The transphobia needs to end.
“They can’t be power tripping mods because they are queer!”
No, that is stupid.
Proposing a very specific limit on posts referring mod/admin actions taken against users on LBZ that directly fall afoul of their instance rules regarding very specific gatekeeping might have some value. The subject has been hashed and re-hashed too fucking much. Their rules are their rules, breaking those rules on the instance is clear YDI. Breaking those rules elsewhere and having action taken against you is arguably PTB. I’m in favor of the idea of putting that on wax.
Purging previous discussion is no good, and even the proposal, coming from a community mod as it does, rubs me the wrong way. It shouldn’t, because you have just as much right to propose a change as any other community member, but it puts me on edge.
There is value in what’s been said already, even if some of it is highly disagreeable. Suggesting removal of that record for any reason invites future discussion of the same, IMO. Not everyone who will ever be a member of this community is a member now. If we’re going to consider making a rule about this whole mess, best to leave the roadmap that led us here intact.
Potential yes to a well-defined rule of specific, narrow scope. Hard, hard no to retroactive application of that rule.
I just want to clarify. The only people getting banned for remote comments are people who knowingly and explicitly gatekeep other folks identity in response to this topic coming up. They are banned so that they don’t start appearing in blahaj communities with the very people they’re invalidating.
To me, there’s no difference. If someone’s response to this topic coming up is to double down on gatekeeping, it doesn’t make them any less harmful just because they did it outside of a blåhaj community.
We’re about to be genocided but yeah let’s make a safe space for fantasy fucking neo pronouns and non human identities. Yeah. You really got your eye on the ball when it comes to the safety of queer people while supporting those who make a mockery of us. 🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄🙄
Preparing for and discussing impending genocide is not mutually exclusive to respecting neopronouns, this motte-bailey doesnt make sense and you are being extremely hateful in all of these comments. you will likely say you dont care, but it matters. im not sure this expression of panic and fear is helping anyone, though the degree of fear is completely understandable and warranted.
Fantasy identities aren’t queer and actively harm queer people.
I appreciate your willingness to respond and engage on the subject. I understand your position, and that it makes sense to you. I personally feel that there is a degree of overreach involved when action is taken based on behavior that happens outside of an instance, but I also acknowledge that defederation is a more severe version of the same action. That causes a bit of cognitive dissonance for me, which makes me wonder if I’m viewing it all wrong.
For now, I still believe that your method is beyond what I consider to be a reasonable exercise of authority. That’s not a slight on you; I have always gotten the impression that all of your actions are taken with the intent of doing what you believe is best for your instance. Our philosophies just differ somewhat when it comes to exercise of authority. I find you and db0 to be the most intellectually honest of the larger instance admins with regards to how you go about the business of adminning, for whatever that’s worth.
Thanks again for engaging, I hope everyone else sees that you do your best to be consistent to your instance values.
I understand your position, and that it makes sense to you. I personally feel that there is a degree of overreach involved when action is taken based on behavior that happens outside of an instance
Let me challenge that. The issue isn’t where they gatekeep, it’s the fact that they do it at all. People willing to explicitly and deliberately undermine gender diverse folk when these conversations come up are a problem if our users can just stumble across them. It doesn’t matter where the user is posting, if they’re not banned, their content can and will be seen by blahaj users.
And trying to escape that shit is why so many of us have left twitter, reddit, tumblr and other centralised social media sites that just don’t give a shit about transphobia. The users here come here precisely because that shit is stomped out when it’s found.
Giving people a free pass because they post outside of blahaj communities just makes the overall experience similar to a mini reddit or twitter or facebook. Individual users have to each encounter the bigot, and then block them. Each of them exposed to the bigotry first.
And I appreciate that some queer folk want that experience. And that’s the power of federation. They can be on an instance that doesn’t react the way blahaj does. But many folk don’t want to see that shit at all. They don’t want to stumble across gatekeepers and bigots and people willing to actively deny them their own identity. And that’s what blocking folk at the instance level does. They don’t need to see the shit first before they can block it. Much of it is gone before it ever crosses folks feeds.
There is no power tripping in this approach. It is a very considered and deliberate approach that lets us avoid defederation of whole instances. Folk who don’t want that experience are welcome to host their user accounts on other instances, whilst still joining in with our communities. Or host accounts on our instance and other instances like many folk do.
There is no plan to control what people see here. Just an approach that gives a vulnerable community the option of a relatively bigotry free feed.
Thanks again for engaging
Right back at you :)
The way I see it, is that the rules and aim of the instance are all written out pretty fucking clearly and people on a platform dominated by longform text don’t really have an excuse for not being able to comprehend it. Like seriously, I had been using Lemmy for two days when I checked out Blåhaj, and I feel like I understood then already because it’s not hard and English is my native language.
So that said, when I see people complaining about it, I think they’re either fucking stupid, or they’re probably these ‘free speech’ people that want the right to go around insulting everyone without consequences (while doing the most epic pearl clutching the moment anyone insults them).
As far as I’m concerned, moderators and admins doing exactly what is clearly fucking written in the description and rules is not power abuse.
I was banned as a queer person for saying that the genderless pronoun “they/them” does not undermine someone’s gender and is just using English as intended.
They’re out to fucking brunch while we’re about to be genocided im america. It’s disgusting having this level of trolling run a queer space. There needs to be an alternative queer space where free speech is tolerated.
And yeah, I’m mad as hell about it and not backing down. These petulant children who run queer spaces these days put us all at risk when they protect trolling neopronouns and non human identities and kick actual queers out. For “gatekeeping”. Fuck blahaj.
Someone was banned yesterday who didn’t even participate in the instance.
So that said, when I see people complaining about it, I think they’re either fucking stupid, or they’re probably these ‘free speech’ people that want the right to go around insulting everyone without consequences (while doing the most epic pearl clutching the moment anyone insults them).
I was accused of being a transphobe on a comm that wasn’t even in Blahaj. I defended myself. For that, I was banned. Another poster, a trans user, made a comment. For that, they were dogpiled by Blahaj defenders, called a fascist and a transphobe, and then banned. Now Blahaj defenders want this to not be discussed under any circumstances.
Who here wants the right to go around insulting everyone without consequences?
Who here wants the right to go around insulting everyone without consequences?
Haven’t you figured out by now that’s the strawman argument of any queer person who wants to feel oppression and be offended?
Now Blahaj defenders want this to not be discussed under any circumstances.
I don’t think they’re saying you can’t discuss it, or they’re going to ban or defederate you for trying to talk about it, or anything like that. They’re just saying that, now that the issue has been discussed a bunch of times in this community with nothing getting accomplished other than a big productive-conclusion-free food fight, they’d like to (or they are proposing to) prohibit future repetitions of the exact same food fight. I think this is one of the rare times when “you can still talk about it, you just can’t do it here anymore” has a good amount of validity.
And like I say, I think the users are much more the issue here than the moderation. I think “how do we manage to get along on the fediverse” may be a better way to approach it than “don’t you agree that the mods of blahaj are terrible.”
Who here wants the right to go around insulting everyone without consequences?
That’s sort of what I’m saying. A lot of people on lemmy do want to have that right, and it’s not super-important (apparently) within the consensus culture to say they’re not allowed to. The boundaries of what’s acceptable behavior are often in very weird places, to me.
I don’t think they’re saying you can’t discuss it, or they’re going to ban or defederate you for trying to talk about it, or anything like that.
Proposal from OP, one of the mods (who, in fairness to them, is very hard put on by all this pointless fucking drama that they get to get hit with without even being involved)
that we no longer accept posts about this topic in this community; and
we also remove previous posts on this topic from the community.
One of the most upvoted replies:
I agree, this community should be a place to discuss mod abuse, not bellyache over transphobia and hate speech being censored or being banned from it. Such discourse makes this community extremely toxic and unusable to vulnerable groups, it also creates inherent bias here favoring alt-right shitheads.
They’re just saying that, now that the issue has been discussed a bunch of times in this community with nothing getting accomplished other than a big productive-conclusion-free food fight, they’d like to (or they are proposing to) prohibit future repetitions of the exact same food fight.
The reason why it is production-free is because Blahaj defenders swarm the comm every time it happens. If the position is “Users are sabotaging discussions they don’t want to happen, so we should just not have those discussions”, then all you’ve done is reward toxic behavior.
Blahaj defenders swarm the comm every time it happens
Banned users like yourself also flood the thread every time. I don’t see how that’s any different.
Banned users like yourself also flood the thread every time. I don’t see how that’s any different.
What, all three of us? Clearly we’re mass downvoting Blahaj defenders and mass-upvoting our Banned Comrades™. Hell, I was only added to that banned list the other day.
