It's a long standing expectation that we don't talk politics or religion "on the air" in amateur radio.
But, we're not "on the air" when we use mastodon.radio.
And we have content warnings which are well established on the fediverse.
I'm proposing we update the rules of mastodon.radio to clarify that:
Political, religious, and similar discussions are allowed but must be behind a content warning, e.g. "UK politics" or "religion Christian".
What do I call "political"? Let me try my hand at a definition.
The ancient Greek "πόλις" "polis" is to me the archetype of human community. So a "political" statement is any pertaining a human community. Directly or indirectly.
A warm welcome to a newcomer is a nice friendly gesture, but also a political statement: This community is open to you.
A background to "please add alt texts to your images" is political: This community cares for those who cannot easily view pictures.
During the cold war, #hamradio could communicate across the iron curtain. We did well to leave the battle of the systems out of our East-West conversations. The ITU RR still restrict content of international hamradio conversations.
But there are no rules in force banning politics from national hamradio traffic, not in Germany.
Good!
I occasionally mention climate, human rights, and such on our waves. I will challenge right-wing extremist utterances I witness.
@arnie_dxer fair question, I think it's probably a great example of an edge case!
I'd like to think people will use their judgement and tend towards using a CW if unsure. I like to think of them more like an email subject line, and your feed of interesting reception reports could work very well in this way.
E.g.
"SWL on HF: Vatican City"
"Online TV streaming: North Korea"
@arnie_dxer true, although you do already use hashtags!
I think if you're just reporting that a certain transmission exists you're OK without a CW.
But if you're sharing the content, and it's political or religious that would be a good toot to CW.
Add comment