First a call-out of fatphobia (https://hexbear.net/post/4189552) that ended up proving its point, then the stuff about "he/hims" (https://hexbear.net/post/4187781) ". Apparently a mod got banned!?
I am not very active and I never look at the megathreads, the number of comments in them scare me away from them. Is that where it's happening? I feel confused about what this community is like now.
I, uh, don't really know what my point is. Maybe someone can explain what the state of the site is? Especially on the he/hims thing. Maybe that's the main point of this post.
I feel sad for people that got hurt by this.
What are the specific changes you suggest?
We have book clubs and theory discussions going back years. Each book club gets dwindling participation as the book goes on, that is on the users. We cannot hand hold a person into reading.
The mod onboarding is the same as it's been for years, any active users older than a month that hasn't been sitebanned is eligible after submitting an application. Some community mods choose to appoint more with the understanding they are vouchers for them.
We have a Matrix space where site decisions are proposed, discussed and voted on. We used to have a community, but it was repeatedly targeted and served only to concentrate and amplify site meta drama.
When a notable about of users with intersectioned identities speak out that there is a site culture problem with regard to racism, misogyny, and now fat phobia we are taking action as another admin commented.
Your analogy with an organization makes sense, except an org doesn't have people trying to bust through the literal door to scream slurs and project porn/gore on the walls.
As an addition, I would like to say that the people who have been patiently explaining and discussing the anti-x topics are saying that some users are neither listening to them nor engaging with the reading groups. As such, they are feeling drained and that their emotional labour is not being appreciated and in fact actively argued against.
These are people I know are involved with irl orgs, and in such a situation, how would you handle a new member who is not listening to senior organization members nor engaging in any reading? I would say that that person would be kicked out as they aren't meeting the org half way.
Will there be mistakes in this? Of course we are only human, and there could be improvements on the appeal process. Which I would welcome a specific recommendation on that matter with the caveat that on-site appeals have been tried and were a net detriment.
The difference here is that anyone is welcome back under a new username, unless they repeat the same thing that got them banned.
Happy to see your response to this comment. I gotta couple of three things
And when an equal notable amount of users with intersectioned identities respond that they don't agree, what then?
This is acknowledged as well.
The people that don't agree and have considered leaving the site are welcome to message me with their specific concerns as the others have or if they have already left I'm happy to hear their concerns through an intermediary.