Lemmy.world Hexbear Statement

Update:
The comments from this post will not be removed as to preserve the discussion around the announcement. Any continued discussions outside of this thread that violate server rules will be removed. We feel that everyone that has an opinion, and wanted to vent, has been heard.

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Original post:
Yesterday, we received information about the planned federation by Hexbear. The announcement thread can be found here: www.hexbear.net/post/280770. After reviewing the thread and the comments, it became evident that allowing Hexbear to federate would violate our rules.

Our code of conduct and server rules can be found here.

The announcement included several concerning statements, as highlighted below:

  • “Please try to keep the dirtbag lib-dunking to hexbear itself. Do not follow the Chapo Rules of Posting, instead try to engage utilizing informed rhetoric with sources to dismantle western propaganda. Posting the western atrocity propaganda and pig poop balls is hilarious but will pretty quickly get you banned and if enough of us do it defederated.”
  • “The West’s role in the world, through organizations such as NATO, the IMF, and the World Bank - among many others - are deeply harmful to the billions of people living both inside and outside of their imperial core.”
  • “These organizations constitute the modern imperial order, with the United States at its heart - we are not fooled by the term “rules-based international order.” It is in the Left’s interest for these organizations to be demolished. When and how this will occur, and what precisely comes after, is the cause of great debate and discussion on this site, but it is necessary for a better world.”

The rhetoric and goal of Hexbar are clear based on their announcement: to “dismantle western propaganda” and "demolish organizations such as NATO” shows that Hexbar has no intention of "respecting the rules of the community instance in which they are posting/commenting.” It’s to push their beliefs and ideology.

In addition, several comments from a Hexbear admin, demonstrate that instance rules will not be respected.

Here are some examples:

“I can assure you there will be no lemmygrad brigades, that energy would be better funneled into the current war against liberalism on the wider fediverse.”

“All loyal, honest, active and upright Communists must unite to oppose the liberal tendencies shown by certain people among us, and set them on the right path. This is one of the tasks on our ideological front.”

Overall community comments:

To clarify, for those who have inquired about why Hexbear versus Lemmygrad, it should be noted that we are currently exploring the possibility of defederating from Lemmygrad as well based on similar comments Hexbear has made.

Defederation should only be considered as a last resort. However, based on their comments and behavior, no positive outcomes can be expected.

We made the decision to preemptively defederate from Hexbear for these reasons. While we understand that not everyone may agree with our decision, we believe it is important to prioritize the best interests of our community.

amihan,

deleted_by_author

    •
    Blamemeta,

    I mean, I haven’t been banned yet, and theres plenty of tankies floating around. Lemmy.world is pretty lax as I can tell.

    southsamurai,
    @southsamurai@sh.itjust.works avatar

    You must not have seen the post in question.

    The entire thing was directly, openly planning to go to other instances and intentionally disrupt them. Idgaf what their beliefs are, you get defederated for that. It’s bullshit.

    Seriously, go wade through the comments over there. They’re gederating specifically to fuck up everyone else.

    iridaniotter,
    @iridaniotter@lemmygrad.ml avatar

    Please read and respect the rules of the community instance in which you are posting/commenting. Please try to keep the dirtbag lib-dunking to hexbear itself. Do not follow the Chapo Rules of Posting, instead try to engage utilizing informed rhetoric

    You have been proven wrong by quotes and logic!

    Pandantic,
    @Pandantic@lemmy.world avatar

    Literally a commenter on one of the linked posts:

    yeah lol. I might start farming up a few accounts at the new non-overloaded instances that are popping up. Don’t need to register at beehaw itself to bug their libs. maybe somewhere has open registration

    Edit to say: I support the defederation.

    iridaniotter,
    @iridaniotter@lemmygrad.ml avatar

    This single user’s plan does even involve using Hexbear. Lemmy.world would have to defederate from all other instances to prevent this person from trolling.

    Pandantic,
    @Pandantic@lemmy.world avatar

    Did you look at the posts? It’s all over the comments! Would you like some more examples for your edification?

    ImOnADiet,

    you and I have very different defnitions of “all over the comments” if you actually scroll through the hexbear federation post there’s no comments like that, .world admin is just using comments from threads over 2 months ago, or stuff that I’m not even sure what the complaint is about. like this one www.hexbear.net/comment/3648500, lemmy.world doesn’t ban users for breaking other instance’s rules, I know this because y’all come troll in lemmygrad 24/7 and I literally never see your admins ban them

    amihan, (edited )

    deleted_by_author

    •
    southsamurai,
    @southsamurai@sh.itjust.works avatar

    Yeah, but there’s a giant comment section openly declaring the intent to ignore the fuck out of that.

    While the admins there aren’t responsible for their users actions, they haven’t taken any steps beyond that single line to make a stand against the planned actions either. They could have removed those comments, made further announcements, something, anything. So that sentence is no more than an “oh no, anything but that. Anyway…” situation.

    Conversely, while they aren’t responsible for their user’s actions, any other instance preventing their user’s actions is not only acceptable, it should be expected.

    This is exactly when defederation should be used

    ImOnADiet,

    could you point to the “giant comment section”? I’m going through the thread sorted by old and I haven’t seen anything like that for the first 100 comments, the vast majority of comments are just inside jokes and the like

    SovereignState,

    Source: straight up lies.

    skullgiver,
    @skullgiver@popplesburger.hilciferous.nl avatar

    deleted_by_author

    •
    Caoldence222,

    Looking at the front page things aren’t as bad as the federation rules seem to imply, but on the other hand that’s just what the post-moderation popular vote is like.

    you can read the modlog and see what is removed, or sort by new if you want to see less popular posts. It’s not incredibly inflammatory stuff

    It’s a pretty isolated community, so yeah, they may be hostile to outsiders coming into their communities, but people that aren’t starting political slapfights are generally treated fine

    Historical_General,

    Yeah, it seems like we’re now losing out on 20k people to interact with which seems a shame.

    iridaniotter, (edited )
    @iridaniotter@lemmygrad.ml avatar

    You are being illogical. You claim that Hexbear will not respect instance rules, yet the linked post on Hexbear has their admins explicitly begging their users to respect other servers’ rules. The truth is that you do not want a large quantity of users with heterodox opinions mingling with your own. This is why you block Hexbear but not the smaller Lemmygrad. Instead, I suggest you add to your Code of Conduct that lemmy.world is an anti-communist server and will not tolerate Marxist-Leninists. That way you will no longer be hypocritical, and you will probably also make a lot of your users happy!

    edit: I see I am being downvoted - clearly by Leninists angry that I suggest a divorce! However, your emotions will not silence my pure logic!

    Pandantic,
    @Pandantic@lemmy.world avatar

    I don’t think it’s the opinions, I think it’s the users’ literal stated plans to harass users of other instances.

    iridaniotter,
    @iridaniotter@lemmygrad.ml avatar

    Users can be banned, and if it’s a persistent and draining issue for admins after a couple weeks then defederation would actually be understandable.

    NewDark,

    Being in favor or support of the status quo is also pushing an ideology.

    hamid,

    deleted_by_author

    •
    ohmyiv,
    @ohmyiv@lemmy.world avatar

    Then go back to hexbear. The best thing about the fediverse is having a choice if you don’t like the way an instance is run.

    hamid, (edited )

    deleted_by_author

    •
    ohmyiv,
    @ohmyiv@lemmy.world avatar

    Sorry you feel the need to be a jerk in response

    You’re clearly not able to be an adult about things. If you’re taking as me being a jerk, you’re wrong. I’ll say it again, the best thing about the fediverse is being able to choose where we want. Take it as you want, but if you can take a stance, so can I and definitely the admins.

    hamid, (edited )

    deleted_by_author

    •
    ohmyiv,
    @ohmyiv@lemmy.world avatar

    Stop with the aggression and projection. You started with name calling and being hostile. I just reminded you of an option. You’re the one being aggressive. You need to get a grip.

    d4rknusw1ld,

    Find an instance to federate with it.

    hamid, (edited )

    deleted_by_author

    •
    d4rknusw1ld,

    Because you have that option that’s why. You don’t like it? Find somewhere else. This isn’t Reddit where you’re stuck by the hands of the mods and admins.

    There’s a difference between ideology and Russian bot farms spreading garbage.

    hamid,

    deleted_by_author

    •
    d4rknusw1ld,

    The only one being aggressive is you. I’m just explaining how this works.

    Mereo,

    That’s the beauty of the Fediverse. Read this page: lemmy.world/legal. If you don’t agree with it, feel free to find an instance that suits your need.

    hamid, (edited )

    deleted_by_author

    •
    ttmrichter,

    You could have done nothing.

    The irony! It burns! The goggles do nothing!

    d4rknusw1ld,

    Then next time you do the same just downvote the post and move on.

    ImOnADiet,

    Also, you linked a post from a year ago, from a user who hasn’t even posted in a year? are you serious?

    ImOnADiet,

    wait, so it really is just ideological? Like, y’all don’t ban users who come into lemmygrad to specifically troll communists on ideological grounds, but when hexbear tells its users to engage in good faith you defed them? what the hell?

    Edit: Like honestly this is kinda gross, they specifcally try and smooth things out and make things easier for your admins so you don’t have to deal with a flood of hexbear users spamming PPB everywhere and you just use it as evidence to defederate lol

    MarxMadness,

    Tells their users to follow the rules = it’s a ruse, they’re trolls

    Tells their users to troll = see, they’re trolls!

    Says nothing = they aren’t even trying to stop their users from trolling

    This is what we call an unfalsifiable orthodoxy.

    GONADS125,

    This is entirely reasonable to me. I don’t believe there is any good reason to federate with instances that are intending to astroturf, censore dissenting information, and peddle propoganda. You can see their vote brigading in a post on c/fediverse discussing this situation.

    Federating with such instances does more harm than good, providing an audience for propoganda aimed at fomenting extreme perspectives thru deviant misinformation and content/narrative control.

    Creating those kind of fringe echo-chamer instances is how we end up with toxic and extreme groups like SRS and incels or the donald (on reddit). They can even start out as satire and then quickly devolve into toxic hate.

    The argument that we want a diverse fediverse doesn’t mean that we should federate with toxic instances with bad intentions. That’s not the kind of diversity that we should be promoting. That’s the kind of toxic userbase that should be quarantined…

    Starlet, (edited )

    “Echo-chambers are bad, and that’s why I support defederating with instances that I disagree with”

    EDIT: The reason Hexbear disabled downvotes is because we want people to talk to each other rather than downvote and move on.

    What did I say that was wrong?

    SovereignState,

    Absolutely nothing. Hypocrites simply cannot stand being reminded of what they are.

    GONADS125, (edited )

    What you said wrong was provide a false equivalent.

    Protecting users from toxic instances is not a bad thing, and is not counterintuitive to producing a healthy and diverse fediverse.

    Whereas lemmy.world allows criticism of all governments and governing styles. The only anti-free speech instance in this discussion is hexbear.

    MaungaHikoi,

    Sorry brother, the hive mind detected wrongthink and you have been punished for it.

    Angry_Maple,
    @Angry_Maple@sh.itjust.works avatar

    You summed a lot of their points up into one blunt sentence, which also implies that you were not actually looking for discussion here.

    Comments like this are almost like a different flavour of a downvote.

    Your comment had no counter arguments, no questions, no sources or reasonings, no related points, but instead it’s just a very shortened “quote” of what you were responding to.

    Your comment also didn’t really actually add anything to the discussion other than showing that you think of that person’s comment negatively, just like a downvote would have shown.

    Irony, imo.

    Starlet,

    I think the point I was making was obvious. You’re just being obtuse on purpose.

    To spell it out:

    Hexbear is going out of its way to avoid becoming an echo chamber by federating with liberal instances. Blocking Hexbear is obviously more echo chamber-like than allowing it, and opposing echo chambers is clearly a nonsense reason to defederate.

    CarlMarks,

    Hexbear disabled downvoting because it was being used by transphobes to bully trans users. They’d wait for a trans user to post and then pile on with downvotes so that their comments would always begin in the negative.

    lemmy.world can’t even be bothered to ban transphobes.

    theodewere,
    theodewere avatar

    sounds like something run by Russian intelligence

    iridaniotter,
    @iridaniotter@lemmygrad.ml avatar

    Indeed, they even use Moscow time!

    kenbw2,

    How dare people operate in that time zone! Russian civilians should all adopt western time and speak English! 🙄

    iridaniotter,
    @iridaniotter@lemmygrad.ml avatar

    Lol. The actual reason they use it is they needed a standard time and thought it would be the funniest one considering the Allegations™

    Shinhoshi,

    Source?

    jordanlund,

    Freedom of speech does not constitute an obligation to listen.

    Good for you!

    magnor,
    @magnor@lemmy.magnor.ovh avatar

    Now if only everyone would be so quick to defederate preemptively from Nazi instances.

    magnor,
    @magnor@lemmy.magnor.ovh avatar

    Not really no. I have a pretty extensive defed list on my instance if you want to check, but it’s not all Nazis (bots as well).

    masterairmagic,

    What gives you the right to constrain what other people see? Just go ahead and ban them yourself if they offend you so.

    I just created this new account because people like you see in themselves the right to constrain what I see.

    jordanlund,

    The people who own a lemmy instance have the right to associate (federate) with whatever other instances meet their guidelines.

    If you don’t agree, then you are free to join a different lemmy instance that is federated with objectionable material.

    You don’t have the right to demand that lemmy.one meets your standards. You don’t own it.

    If you find that no other instance federates with what you want, you’re free to make your own, with blackjack, and hookers.

    youtu.be/e35AQK014tI

    masterairmagic,

    that is exactly what I did. I would much rather not associate with people like you. You appear to be horrible people.

    My only regret is that I donated to this server.

    XiaoHei,

    THIS IS THE SOUND OF FREEDOM!

    thank you for speaking up too many woke users in here complaining

    SharkyAttack,

    What a great sentence, well said. I’m going to use that in the future.

    ghariksforge,

    For example I don’t want to listen to you. Go away. Defederate yourself.

    jordanlund,

    You totally have that ability… it’s under “Block User”.

    ghariksforge,

    That was my point.

    Docus,

    Congratulation. You are the first user i have blocked.

    eroc1990, (edited )
    @eroc1990@lemmy.parastor.net avatar

    Try telling that to the lemmyers (lemmings?) In this Technology thread that were clowning mastodon.art for blocking social.bbc for BBC’s history of transphobic rhetoric, considering there are a decent amount of transgender people (and other LGBTQIA+ identifying people) are members of their instance. Same situation, definitely not the same reaction.

    EDIT: It was in Technology on lemdro.id, not Fediverse. EDIT 2: Spelling

    Blamemeta,

    BBC is transphobic? Since when?

    Caoldence222,

    youtu.be/b4buJMMiwcg

    This video goes over one egregious instance (actually it turned into a bit of a saga, there were followups as well)

    eroc1990,
    @eroc1990@lemmy.parastor.net avatar

    I’m restating their reasoning. Not speaking firsthand on whether or not they are. Sorry, should have clarified.

    Carighan,
    @Carighan@lemmy.world avatar

    Yeah but there’s a big difference.

    As people right fully call out in that thread, defederation from the BBC without them having had a fediverse presence to do anything worth defederating with is wild. It’s the same broken argument as pre-emptively defederating from threads was, barring worries about sync-load or something.

    But in the case of Hexobear, they do have lots of content based upon which you can judge whether federation with the instance is worth the extra moderation effort for you as an admin or not. In this case the lemmy.world admins decided that it is not worth it, an defederated.

    However, importantly they had something to judge what working with the communities from the instance would be like. With BBC or Threads, no one had that. And while every instance admin is of course free to do whatever they want, they’re also making a really good point against the fediverse as a technological solution if they act that way.

    Consider that if it were a central site, defederating from tankybear is the equivalent of banning a community. The BBC/Threads thing is preemptively blocking a community from ever being created. There are very rare cases where the latter might be warranted, but it’s tough to imagine scenarios where it would have a meaningful reason.

    eroc1990,
    @eroc1990@lemmy.parastor.net avatar

    I don’t agree that there’s a big difference, though. Yes, one has much more of a base for their claims than the other, but both defeds are based largely on the personal opinions of the administrators of the instances, whether they’re politically motivated or rooted in the desire to not have to moderate and micromanage the content posted from that instance. In that way, both of these are the same decision made on the same grounds.

    Carighan,
    @Carighan@lemmy.world avatar

    but both defeds are based largely on the personal opinions of the administrators of the instances, whether they’re politically motivated or rooted in the desire to not have to moderate and micromanage the content posted from that instance

    Hrm, an understandable POV (even though I personally disagree). But then I would also say, what is the alternative? Since a large part of the Fediverse is about everyone running their own custom instance if they want, naturally they’re also the one to decide if that place goes down or behaves differently. I wouldn’t really know how to truly improve upon this.

    kplaceholder,
    @kplaceholder@lemmy.world avatar

    I usually support that sentiment, but it only applies when it is in your hands whether we listen or not. In this case, the admins singlehandedly decided that none of us can. This is pretty much a form of censorship IMO

    RaoulDook,

    The admins don’t control you. You can have an account anywhere else you want to. So unless you’re paying for the servers here, you can deal with the Terms of Service or not use it.

    jordanlund,

    As I said in another reply:

    The people who own a lemmy instance have the right to associate (federate) with whatever other instances meet their guidelines.

    If you don’t agree, then you are free to join a different lemmy instance that is federated with objectionable material.

    You don’t have the right to demand that lemmy.one meets your standards. You don’t own it.

    If you find that no other instance federates with what you want, you’re free to make your own, with blackjack, and hookers.

    youtu.be/e35AQK014tI

    tool,
    @tool@lemmy.world avatar

    Exactly. Freedom of speech != Freedom from social consequences

    RightHandOfIkaros,

    Well, in a truly “free” society, yes freedom of speech would constitute freedom from “social consequences.” However, the United States, and in fact, no Earth government, is a truly free society. There are rules and laws that exist, thus restricting freedoms. However, specifically regarding freedom of speech as it is mentioned in US law, it specifically is a protection for citizens from retaliation by the US government, and does not cover interactions between citizens.

    So I wouldn’t say “freedom of speech doesnt mean freedom from social consequences,” but rather “freedom of speech does not include a requirement that others listen.” There are laws with regards to how other citizens can respond, including laws against assault and libel and such. But there is no law that says anyone must to listen to what you have to say simply because you have the freedom to say it. Thats quite a preposterous idea.

    At least in the US, each citizen has the right to say what they choose within the constraints established by law, and to choose who they will listen to.

    Pandantic,
    @Pandantic@lemmy.world avatar

    Well, in a truly “free” society, yes freedom of speech would constitute freedom from “social consequences.”

    Just as people can refuse to listen, they also can refuse to interact with persons that say things that upset them. This is a social consequence, and one that would be still be present in a “truly free society”.

    RightHandOfIkaros,

    A truly free society would have no consequences, laws, or restraints on behaviour.

    You can see a very obvious reason why that would be very bad. Thus there is no society on Earth that is truly free. Restrictions exist to protect people, that is the nature of things.

    FlickOfTheBean,

    I think you’ve managed to define an oxymoron of a society.

    Society does not exist without consequences. That’s what laws/rules/agreements are necessitated on. As in, a society with no consequences is not a society. I’d go so far to say that society is a system of consequences.

    Even in a “lawless societies” hierarchies form, and then agreements turn to rules turn to defacto law.

    This is like saying “I can never truly be free because gravity binds me to the ground”. Like, ok, sure, but you had to define freedom in a non-standard way to get to that conclusion (I’m trying make this make sense, is it landing well?)

    Carighan,
    @Carighan@lemmy.world avatar

    Well, in a truly “free” society, yes freedom of speech would constitute freedom from “social consequences.”

    No? That would imply it’s not free, as the receivers aren’t free to act upon the given information freely?

    If the society is truly “free”, as in, absolutist free, then if someone said something you didn’t like, you could just punch them in the face without consequence. But that means the original speech had a consequence based on the social interaction with you!

    jeena,
    @jeena@jemmy.jeena.net avatar

    Their instance also seems to be offline.

    Shinhoshi,

    The URL is hexbear.net. They haven’t federated yet.

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