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
Nice to see that so many people agree!
Still, not seeing any moderators publicly coming out and committing to doing better.
So what's the solution then? More servers where the admins will take their responsibilities more seriously?
I don't know. Maybe.
@stefan Another possible angle from which to address the problem: there's a mismatch and not much overlap between the skills needed to run a server vs the skills needed to be a good, anti-racist moderator of said server. Maybe a pool of mods or consultants able to help admins? An admin collective offering services to would-be admins or mods? Recurring anti-racism trainings? Such things are happening all the time, among people who've never heard of mastodon. Online and off.
@SallyStrange I really like the idea of crowdfunding anti-racism workshops!
These can be provided for free to moderators and admins, and experts in the field will get compensated for their time.
Going to brainstorm about this a bit more.
@stefan absolutely! I for one would kick in. I've attended a few such workshops, and I'm acquainted with a few folks IRL who teach them. I'm sure there are more like me.
more servers sounds more fediverse anyway ;)
maybe word it a little differently. “get a black person on your moderation team” smells a lot like, “as long as you have a token black person you qualify to say the n word.” @stefan
@stefan@stefanbohacek.online
>
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.
@stefan @wjmaggos@liberal.city It’s even worse than the paradox of tolerance, because that would involve equal moderation; that is, no moderation.
He’s arguing that you -should- moderate trolls but -not- racists because racists can be nice.
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 Fellow White People, the racists among us are liars and play us as well as their victims.
To them, they're always the 'Victim', and I don't know about you but if there's one thing that winds this white guy up it's 'White Victimhood', whiny-ass clown fucks making this place toxic to Black People, who needs them?!
@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.
@stefan I'll give you a reverse call out (a shout out?) on this particular issue: if someone is speaking awkwardly or misses the subtext of something and truly meant nothing racist by it, pointing it out isn't going to hurt them.
Racism will drive someone out; being made aware of how one's language might further racism when one didn't mean to will not.
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