I know it was originally a spin off of the chapotraphouse subreddit but I don't know much else. Is it it still affiliated with the podcast? How has it grown etc? Why was the subreddit closed etc.

Give me the lore, baby

  • Awoo [she/her]
    ·
    edit-2
    11 months ago

    Alright I'll have a go.

    The CTH subreddit got quarantined. Partly for being a leftist subreddit that was revolutionary and blasting off in popularity, and partly because it was run like a crack house and its userbase behaved like that's exactly what it was. This was hilarious and partially responsible for its popularity, but also not so good when it comes to placating admins. This of course gave them pretty easy excuses to come down on it.

    The quarantine didn't work however, quarantines on reddit are supposed to kill subreddits. They're supposed to stop growing and they're supposed to go into a decline spiral that leads to them eventually just fizzling out. For CTH this was not occurring, it continued to grow albeit at a slower pace. Only a ban could stop it.

    Many reasons are given for the ban, "slave owners should be killed" is the main one. I don't think it matters too much what the exact reason was because they wanted to do it and would have found anything to excuse it.

    The ban came unexpectedly and the subreddit was not prepared. A very hasty lifeboat was set up on discord which turned into a shit show for various reasons because discord always turns into a shitshow.

    Then Chapo.Chat was born. Eventually people decided to rename it Hexbear because association with the podcast was hurting initiatives to reach out to people, many of which didn't want to be associated with the podcast. Thus the name Hexbear was born, which worked out really because Chapo.Chat already used Hexbear as its logo, very little change was necessary.

    The site started out pretty much just like r/CTH, utter chaos and a lot of emotions that probably could have led to it being closed down if various people weren't convinced to just continue the long march and pushing on. It mellowed out considerably over time.

    The name Hexbear itself literally just comes from the "Look at this dope ass bear" meme that was extremely popular on the subreddit.

    Show

        • a_blanqui_slate [none/use name, any]
          ·
          11 months ago

          It just happened to be the active meme when the ban happened. If we had been banned a week later we would have ended up with a different name.

          Yep

          tbh I still hate the name of this website and I've never found the idea that we were increasing our credibility by changing it to be convincing.

          I think it was a aspirations grandeur thing; for a while there was this notion among some of the admins that this could be the place for internet leftisms, and so they didn't want to be hitched to the chapo wagon if they wanted to eclipse the pod.

          • Mardoniush [she/her]
            ·
            11 months ago

            In fairness, we are one of the larger explicitly revolutionary sites. Not that that's saying much.

          • SerLava [he/him]
            ·
            11 months ago

            There was also outreach happening and people kept being like "Chapo trap house?? no"

              • SerLava [he/him]
                ·
                edit-2
                11 months ago

                チャポ?メキシコの麻薬王みたいな?

            • autismdragon [he/him, comrade/them]
              ·
              11 months ago

              Yeah there's a lot of animosity towards the pod that isnt just the shitlib and radlib stuff that we usually write it off as. Like honestly as someone who actually listened to it regularly for awhile (I dont anymore) I find most of the accusations against it absurd. But when you try to defend it you can get some pretty strong emotional reactions from people. Do I think its based mostly on misinformation? Other than the fact that the boys are basically just on the more radical side of socdem, and the messy stuff with Vergil, yeah I do. They did engage in edgy ableism at times though. But things like the Cosby photo or the idea that the boys are transphobic are obviously dumb.

              Ive also encountered people with an animosity towards the old chapo sub on the accusation that they engaged in various forms of bigotry, especially transphobia. I've tried telling those people that that was NEVER my experience with the old sub, talked about the trans cuities threads and stuff, and how Hexbear is even better because it is RADICALLY anti-trasnphobia. But that attitude exists out there regardless and its hard to counteract because once someone feels that way about something you're seen as defending reactionaries when you try to change their perspective.

              • TreadOnMe [none/use name]
                ·
                edit-2
                11 months ago

                People typically don't read anything and never bother to actually learn, especially on the internet. That's why the Chapo Posting Method came about. Because anybody can come in and claim anything they want, but you are the loser if you correct them like a nerd. Just shit on them instead, while they become the nerd. It doesn't matter, they haven't actually read anything and are obviously wrong, so who gives a fuck.

                We'll see how this translates in federation. We are not really a crack house anymore.

        • mittens [he/him]
          ·
          11 months ago

          tbh I still hate the name of this website and I've never found the idea that we were increasing our credibility by changing it to be convincing.

          I never minded it too much, but ReBr0 mercilessly mocked us for it, in between bouts of canvassing for Beto

            • WoofWoof91 [comrade/them]
              ·
              edit-2
              11 months ago

              he turned up here soon after the site got up and running

              i think he got banned within a few hours lmao

              found a post lol https://hexbear.net/post/95082

              • autismdragon [he/him, comrade/them]
                ·
                11 months ago

                Who was he accusing of being a pedophile/would be pederast in his final comments? Richardnixon's part of the convo is deleted as is the original post so idk wtf is going on lol./

                • Pseudoplatanus22 [he/him]
                  ·
                  11 months ago

                  That may have been when some guys from the cumtown forums (I think, or maybe a chan board) made some posts pretending to be a girl who had supposedly been groomed by an old admin (or mod, I can't remember) called Beatnik. They were one of the oldest users, and were active on the old sub too. The accusations were never backed up with any evidence, but Beatnik deleted all his posts both here and on Reddit anyway, and was never seen again.

                  • autismdragon [he/him, comrade/them]
                    ·
                    11 months ago

                    A yeah, I remember the Beatnik situation. I assumed it was about him or Quill, both of which were unsubstantiated situations.

                  • RangeFourHarry [they/them]
                    ·
                    11 months ago

                    Wait, it was fuckin cumtown posters? Lol I’d thought it was like a 4chan thing or the silver-legion

                    • Pseudoplatanus22 [he/him]
                      ·
                      11 months ago

                      I'm not sure now, but for some reason I thought it was. I'm sure they've fucked with us before. I've been going through the archives (one of the good things about being on the modern Lemmy architecture) and I've seen a few posts mentioning the Silver Legion in relation to the Beatnik situation. It seems strange that we'd make a big joke out of them if their "reckoning" or whatever actually involved doxxing one of our members and accusing him of being a paedophile, making him leave permanently.

        • Slanderous [none/use name]
          ·
          11 months ago

          The real answer is that people refused to go with the superior lib.rehab choice because some random poster thought that was demeaning. Then the skerry posting started

        • mar_k [he/him]
          ·
          11 months ago

          It just happened to be the active meme when the ban happened

          Wasn't it chapo.chat for the first several months?

          • lmaozedong
            ·
            edit-2
            11 months ago

            deleted by creator

      • mittens [he/him]
        ·
        11 months ago

        basically sequestered to sorting by new lmao

    • Hotspur21 [he/him]
      ·
      11 months ago

      God that bear really is dope. Been a while since I’ve seen it