Code of Conduct

Last updated: June 21st, 2023

Community Rules

General Rules

• We are committed to providing a friendly, safe and welcoming environment for all, regardless of gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, disability, personal appearance, body size, race, ethnicity, age, religion, nationality, or other similar characteristic.

• Do not use homophobic, transphobic, racist, sexist, ableist, and other reactionary aliases or other nicknames. "Ironic" prejudice is just prejudice.

• Please "remember the human" and be kind to your fellow leftists.

• Respect that people have differences of opinion and that every leftist has a place in our community. Discussing differences in theory is fine and encouraged, just don't make it personal. Remember: Sectarianism is liberalism.

• Do not publish, comment, message, or post personally identifiable information about other users. We also strongly discourage posting any personally identifiable information about yourself.

• We will ban you if you insult, demean or harass anyone. That is not welcome behavior. This is distinctly different than ribbing or grilling someone.

• Private harassment is also unacceptable. No matter who you are, if you feel you have been or are being harassed or made uncomfortable by a community member, please contact one of the comm mod's or any of the sitemod team immediately. Whether you're a regular user or a newcomer, we care about making this community a safe place for you and we've got your back.

• Likewise any spamming, trolling, flaming, baiting or other attention-stealing behavior is not welcome and will be banned.

• We are a platform that welcomes anyone who wants to be here in good faith. With that said, we are also an intentionally leftist platform; conservative and reactionary ideologies will not be tolerated here.

• We do not platform fascists and refuse to engage in any form of debate with them on this platform. If you don't understand why engaging in debates with fascists is a terrible idea, go ask in one of the communities and/or use a search engine.

• Direct calls to violence that target specific identifiable living individuals are not permitted on Hexbear.net. You can express your anger over landlords, slaveowners, etc, but try to phrase it in a way that focuses on the institution they represent. This policy also applies to any specific organizational bodies and groups (eg the DNC).

• Don't post anything illegal under the laws of the USA, the UK, or your country of residence, or encourage others to break the law. Don't confess to crimes online.

• Hexbear is not a mental health service. Posts/ comments about an active mental health crisis will be removed when they are brought to our attention. Our mod team is not equipped to provide mental healthcare, others can be harmed/triggered and trolls weaponize these events. If you’re having an emergency, you can find a directory of hotline numbers here.

• Moderators of individual communities may require additional rules ontop of this code of conduct.

• We reserve the right to ban users and remove content for reasons not listed in this code of conduct at a moderator's discretion. Trying to "technically" be just within the bounds of acceptable behavior will likely still result in a ban if its consistent behavior. Rule-policing is still policing, ACAB.

• Any pictures of food containing animal products, including but not limited to meat, cheese, or egg, must be tagged nsfw along with food discussion content warnings (CW: Food).

• Animal Liberation is essential to any leftist movement, including platforms like Hexbear. Volunteers, comments, and posts, should not be anti-vegan, although users and volunteers are not required to be vegan.

• Any discussions may be opted out of by disengaging.

• Direct links to reactionary sources are not permitted; use an archiver tool like https://archive.today instead.

Airbud Double Negative Rule

You may still be banned from the site even if there is no rule saying you can't do something. We reserve the right to remove individuals as needed.

Content warnings

A content warning (CW) should be before the content and spoiler both the warning itself and the content (the following example does not contain extreme content):

::: spoiler Mushrooms I cut up hella mushrooms and then ate them all raw :::

Topics that _must_ be CW'd

• Violence towards self such as self-harm and suicide
• Violence towards animals or humans such as corpses and carnist products and especially ||abuse, gore, and sexual violence
• Traumatic societal harms such as transphobia, sexual and gender oppression, fatphobia and lookism, ableism, sanism, racism, ageism and other bigotry
• Other common triggers such as discussion of weight and calories, ableist slurs, abortion, NSFW, rape and sexual assault, police brutality, ethnic cleansing and genocide, etc.

Do not abbreviate your CWs. Not everyone knows what the abbreviation stands for.

Be aware of your own enjoyment of the site.

• If you find yourself no longer having fun, do something else. There are many different comms on Hexbear, and many different ways to shitpost and have fun.
• If the site as a whole is just not cutting it for you, take a break. We'll still be here when you get back. Nothing should compel you to stay.
• The site is deliberately designed to be a relaxing sort of fun rather than an addictive one. We do not want you to remain on Hexbear if remaining on the site is no longer fun for you.
• If you find yourself logging into the site while not really wanting to, or while knowing that you shouldn't, please contact a moderator and we can provide a ban.
• If we ultimately determine that a user has become toxic and is fixated on complaining about the site, we will ban them. We are always open to feedback and suggestions, but if we notice someone that constantly posts / comments about how much they dislike everything then it's probably better for them to find somewhere else to spend their time. The rest of the community has a right to a positive environment.

Be kind to the staff.

Hexbear staff, devs, mods, and admins are people just like you. We appreciate your kindness, understanding and patience just as much as you appreciate ours.

Help the mods avoid burnout

• Moderators on Hexbear are volunteers with limited time. They're chosen to help cover across timezones, but 24/7 mod coverage isn't guaranteed.
• If something happens when there isn't a mod to deal with it at the moment, use the report button beneath each comment or post and a moderator will pick up the problem when they next log on.
• Content remaining up on the site is not an endorsement of that content by the mod team, it very likely was either not reported or hasn't been seen yet.

Other Rules

• Never be afraid or unsure about seeking mod intervention. Never think "Someone else will report that" - they won't. - Problems tend to get bigger over time until we receive a flood of complaints all at once about someone who's been doing toxic things for months or days on end. We cannot see everything. We rely on your reports.
• Lying about moderator interactions (eg saying you were banned or warned for no reason when you were really banned for sectarianism) damages trust in the moderators and makes it less likely that others will come forward with reports about other users, allowing wreckers to fly under the radar and making the site less safe for everyone. Lying about moderator interactions, in any capacity, will lead to a permanent ban without warning.

Interacting with Developers and other Staff

• Don't act like staff or devs if you're not staff or devs. Don't speak for the staff or try to act on their behalf. Do not make commitments or speak for the labor of the dev team. Guessing at how a mod or admin would respond to a given situation is a good way to start people speculating wildly about mods intentions and trying to interpret the meaning of things that we have not actually said. The mods can speak for themselves.

• Hexbear is an open-source project of volunteers. This means that development of new features and bug fixes happens gradually as folks find time to pitch in. If you feel strongly about prioritizing a feature or bug, please visit !hexbear to learn how to get started with contributing to development.

• We are always looking for software feedback and suggestions, but please be courteous when doing so. Posts demanding new features or insulting the dev team for not building something "fast enough" will be removed and violates the Code of Conduct. We have zero tolerance for abusive behavior directed towards developers.

Moderation

These are the policies for upholding our community's standards of conduct. If you feel that a thread needs moderation, please contact the Hexbear moderation team and/or report the content.

1. Remarks that violate the Hexbear standards of conduct, including hateful, hurtful, oppressive, or exclusionary remarks, are not allowed.
2. Remarks that moderators find inappropriate, whether listed in the code of conduct or not, are also not allowed.
3. Moderators may first respond to such remarks by removing the offending content. If the content is bad enough, the moderate might immediately ban.
4. If the warning is unheeded, the user may be banned.
5. For bans and content removal, a mod may optionally leave a reasoning for why in the mod log. This is encouraged, but not required, particularly during spam brigades.
6. If the user comes back under a new account and continues to make trouble, they will be banned.
7. Moderators may choose at their discretion to un-ban the user if it was a first offense and they offer the offended party a genuine apology.
8. Complaints about bans at the comm level are not allowed.
9. Moderators are held to a higher standard than other community members. If a moderator creates an inappropriate situation, they should expect less leeway than others.
10. Egregious violations of our code of conduct or terms of service will result in an immediate ban.
11. Moderators of individual communities may have further rules in addition to this code of conduct. If those rules are more restrictive, they should be respected in that comm and its mods have every right to enforce them.

Tips for how to respond to moderation

If a mod has to take action on your post or comment, take their advice, quit doing the thing, and get on with your life. Do not:

• Carry on doing the same thing but in a slightly different way and then complain about how the rules aren't specific enough;
• Prattle on endlessly to other users about The Injustice Of It All;
• Grumble passive-aggressively about how you're no longer allowed to send people vore in the megathread;
• Try to rope the mod into a lengthy discussion about your interpretation of the rules, or how RandomUser once did the same thing that SomeGuy's done twenty times and RandomUser never got banned for it but they banned SomeGuy after the 19th time, etc;
• Something to remember: the full details of mod interventions are often not public information, and in the above scenario, it's extremely unlikely you would have known whether or not RandomUser was banned for the reason you think either way. We try to give as much context as possible in the mod log, but it's not always possible.
• Mods are not obligated to justify bans and build a "case" explaining the reasoning for a ban.

In the Hexbear community we strive to go the extra step to look out for each other. Don't just aim to be technically unimpeachable, try to be your best self. In particular, avoid flirting with offensive or sensitive issues, particularly if they're off-topic; this all too often leads to unnecessary fights, hurt feelings, and damaged trust; worse, it can drive people away from the community entirely.

If someone takes issue with something you said or did, resist the urge to be defensive. Just stop doing what it was they complained about and apologize. Even if you feel you were misinterpreted or unfairly accused, chances are good there was something you could've communicated better --- remember that it's your responsibility to make others comfortable. Everyone wants to get along and we are all here first and foremost because we want to shitpost in a leftist community. You will find that people will be eager to assume good intent and forgive as long as you earn their trust.

Closing

The enforcement policies listed above apply to all official Hexbear venues; including git repositories under our project and all comms under Hexbear.net. For other projects adopting the Rust Code of Conduct, please contact the maintainers of those projects for enforcement. If you wish to use this code of conduct for your own project, consider explicitly mentioning your moderation policy or making a copy with your own moderation policy so as to avoid confusion.

Adapted from the Rust Code of Conduct, which is based on the Node.js Policy on Trolling as well as the Contributor Covenant v1.3.0.

Hexbear reserves the right to update this Code of Conduct without prior notification or warning at any time. For major changes, we might post in announcements, but have no obligation to do so. Users should check back periodically to remain familiar with current conduct standards.

That last paragraph just means we can update the code of conduct and adapt as we go.