Discussion
Calling on fediverse moderators: if you see a post that kind of, sort of borders on racism, but you're not really too sure: yep, you're definitely dealing with a racist.
Learn about dog whistles. And microaggressions. Get a Black person on your moderation team.
None of the redesigns and user experience tweaks will matter if we can't make this place welcoming to everyone.
#fediverse #FediMeta #FediAdmins #MastoAdmins #racism #BlackFedi #BlackMastodon
@stefan@stefanbohacek.online
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Get a Black person on your moderation team.
on the one hand, yes, on the other hand I don't want to demand anything from a community that's ALREADY having a bad time on fedi, is that really okay??
@stefan@stefanbohacek.online
oh I missed those, ty!!
do you think racists should not be federated with, or is this just for mods policing their own servers?
a welcoming fedi allows for all people (even racists), just like the web does. it just protects people from being harassed by them (tagged by them in ways they clearly don't want to be). from being forced to see racist content. like we do with blocking spammers and their domains.
we all have family members whose views honestly expressed here, would be called hateful etc.
@wjmaggos "a welcoming fedi allows for all people (even racists)"
Paradox of tolerance? Come on.
the Nazi bar analogy only applies when the presence of the Nazis drives out other voices. this doesn't happen on the web, where there are plenty of hateful sites. the same is true of the fedi thanks to decentralization and no algos (as long as we moderate for unwanted replies etc).
I want a universal fedi and we all know lots of normies and journos who'd not be welcome here because they don't adhere to a left orthodoxy. so to post moderate takes, they use X and get fascist propaganda.
@wjmaggos I really don't have more to add here.
You asked:
"do you think racists should not be federated with"
My answer is: Yes, I do.
@stefan I blocked a popular OSS dev after he posted enough things that made me think "wait, does he know this is an antisemitic dogwhistle?" that the question was answered to my satisfaction. The last straw was when he reposted a political cartoon showing Alex Karp manipulating Trump on puppet strings.
And I know how the conversation would go if I called him on it. "Oh, so you're defending Palantir?" "So you're defending Israel?" etc.
I reported him too but I doubt anything came of it.
They'd rather go after people who say we should destroy data centers than racists on social media.
@stefan I will add: moderators' responsibility is to their *own* users. If users on other instances are bothering your users, but you're not sure ... just block 'em
@ricci Yes, very good addition, thank you!
@stefan I think this is one of the things that people misunderstand about moderating something like the Fediverse and moderating a centralized platform: as a moderator on my instance, I do *not* have to give any remote user (or instance) the "benefit of the doubt". Our house, or rules, if our folks don't want you here, you don't get to come here. This is not kicking you off the Fediverse, the bar can be as low as we want.
My own users, is where it gets more tricky. But, on a server that's not gigantic, the mods can *know* their users, give reports a lot more individual attention, talk to users to see if their behavior is unintentional and/or can be corrected, and just generally use a much more human-centered process
Racism is a system, not just an individual choice by people racialized as white.
https://techpolicy.press/the-whiteness-of-mastodon
And before I get called out: sure, people can word things awkwardly, lack nuance, etc, etc.
But we're beyond the point of giving people the benefit of the doubt. Especially if there is a pattern of "just asking questions".
Being a fediverse moderator is typically an unpaid and often a thankless job.
But if you can't deal with difficult situations, maybe better to just step aside.
Quite a bit of racist harassment happens in posts that moderators literally cannot see (for instance, DMs), and that is often done intentionally. What you're saying is good, but it isn't enough. There could be some technical solutions that would make this kind of invisible abuse harder to do.
I don't know about "get a Black person on your moderation team." That's a great if someone wants to be a moderator (and it can be rewarding!), but you also can't dump the duty of fighting racism in their laps.
@EverydayMoggie Oh no, absolutely not suggesting Black people should be held responsible to clean up this place. And definitely not for free. I'd say, offer this as a paid position to anyone who might be interested.
But I 100% agree, this is something white people need to fix. This is our problem.
Is it just me? There is sometimes such a big disconnect between how we feel about the fediverse and how it actually is.
Every poll I've seen about alt text suggests we all use it.
But then you look at results posted by @AltTextHealthCheck.
So many seem to agree that racism and mansplaining and gatekeeping are bad.
Can anyone say any of this has actually improved over the past few years?
Or have we collectively just driven enough marginalized people away that we don't see the complaints as often?
@stefan @AltTextHealthCheck everyone is driven away until it becomes an echo chamber.
@stefan@stefanbohacek.online @AltTextHealthCheck@mastodon.social I think it is the second one - they left.
@unsafelyhotboots This is my big fear. I personally don't feel confident saying: Yep, fediverse is now more welcoming. Come try it again!
Not saying it isn't! But I just don't think I'd know.
And seeing that reply controls, which, yeah, I know, hard to implement in the fediverse, we all know. But "months or years away" is just not good enough.
This is the one thing that's the bare minimum to make this place just a tiny bit more safe until we get the culture here under control.
And *that* is months or years away.
No further comment.
it reminds me of a real life situation in my country. According to statistics collected and processed at local, national govt and UN level, UK has third safest roads in all of Europe and a high position globally.
I have a special interest in transport so study things like this closely - over the years I've been a pedestrian, cyclist and driver on these roads.
I believe the figures - but reality I see on the ground is a lot of vulnerable road users (cyclists, lone women or those transporting kids) have simply been intimidated off streets (especially later at night), and spaces are still dominated by groups of males and by cars, and its only a whole load of CCTV surveillance that puts a lid on at least some more reckless behaviour...
@stefan well first we don't let anything like the twitter come near us, and second I am down for openly inviting lots more black folks to join. Like overtly say "there's a few black folks here who are lonely, come help them build a community". The fact it would spite the assholes is frosting on the cake.
@SomeVeganCheeseIsOk I get what you mean here, but I'm not too sure about the framing.
"come help them build a community"
Why would anyone accept the invitation and sign up to do the work, especially coming from non-Black people, when all their Black friends who did try it here ran away with awful experience?
I think we (specifically white people) need to clean this place up first and foremost, so that people who are already here feel confident to tell their friends to give it another try.
@stefan @SomeVeganCheeseIsOk Not that I want to stray too far from my lane, but the current posts from Black people here are that they report racism and get told that it's not to worry, nevermind, we know better. Why would they even stay, nevermind do any more work.
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