Apologies. I haven't been on the discord (I hate discord, I hate their privacy policy, I hate the format, etc) so maybe I'm lacking some important context. I also understand rules may not be finalized at this point, in which case please accept this as humble feedback.
I also apologize for the length of the post but I feel it is necessary to fully unpack things here.
I just read the code of conduct and am wondering what is going on with that as it seems very, very strict, more so than even subs like /r/communism on reddit were with regards to rudeness which is kind of strange for a place that took its namesake from and often had culture of the so-called "dirtbag left".
Not that I condone ableism or any other form of bigotry (those who use the r-word are not allies, should be called out at minimum IMO, and I am not a friend of stupidpol) but this policy would seem to prevent so much as yelling at another user as was EXTREMELY common on CTH on reddit.
I would say responses of "shut the fuck up liberal" have been a part of CTH culture yet according to code of conduct:
We will exclude you from interaction if you >>insult, demean<< or harass anyone.
This is very broad. Particularly the words insult and demean. Is calling someone an ableist term "st*pid" for example an example of an insult that warrants a ban by the mods? This would make the moderation practices again more extreme than almost any left sub, most of them had bots that just removed but didn't ban users for such words, which is understandable given the culture we live in is steeped in them and many people struggle to fully free themselves of using them and it is in my opinion counter-productive to growth to punish people for this. I would also worry such a broad rule could lead to selective enforcement which would allow mods to ban people for other petty reasons and use this broad rule as an excuse.
Is liberal an insult? Are people no longer allowed the liberal running joke or more serious accusation/insult towards other users (again another very long-time CTH tradition). What determines what the difference between an insult and a genuine appraisal/critique of a user's ideology or the ideology of their statement?
What about imperialist? I would certainly consider that an insult as it is a very bad thing to be, yet it also accurately describes the opinions of some people but some would consider that appraisal to be subjective in certain cases.
Of more interest to me though is this:
Remarks that violate the Chapo standards of conduct, including hateful, hurtful, oppressive, or exclusionary remarks, are not allowed. >>Cursing is allowed, but never targeting another user<< and never in a hateful manner.)
The bolded part. Would this mean if someone replied to someone else with "shut the fuck up liberal" a curse, directed at another user (and including an insult as per above rule) they would be subject to sanction? For that matter would a reply of "fuck you" also merit action? I ask because I've encountered enough bad faith people that it is very tempting to include such things in my replies at times (bad faith based upon very obvious cherry picking, misreading, distortion of statements, etc) and I have seen many people including mods of CTH on reddit say as much in the past.
One last thing, is factional conflict between users still allowed (I of course expect the mods to remain above it in official actions/bans/sanctions)? That is would it be against the rules to say make a post or comment that mocks Trots? Or soc-dems? Or any other tendency? Again this was not uncommon on the sub and it remained healthy despite this (and despite my often ire at the shit-posts directed at MLs).
I'm not trying to rules lawyer here or cause some sort of ordeal, maybe they were just written overly broad to cover edge cases but I just wanted some clarity so I and others don't go about acting as we did on CTH for its entire existence and get surprise actioned for it.
I also understand it is early on yet and maybe the rules are a rough draft so this is my feedback.
I will say rules that are overly strict to the point of policing tone can drive people away from anti-capitalist leftism and similar strict rules have caused splits in left groups so it worries me. I know one thing that bugged a lot of people on CTH and was a source of constant complaint were bans from mainstream reddit subs for the nebulous "incivility" of calling people out too strongly over something they rightly feel passionate about. Anyone who spent any time there can attest to the amount of people griping about bans over that particular rule, prioritizing civility fetishism over moral outrage over heinous actions/opinions/etc.
I feel instead of making rules against that, rules against reactionary politics and behavior as well as bigotry (misogyny, racism, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, etc) are more useful while allowing passionate discussion that can get heated. I don't think the point should be to create this grey-colored safe space without the slightest chance of getting your feelings hurt, rather I think the point should be exclusion of bigotry against marginalized groups and the defense of those groups. And the exclusion of reactionary politics and the defense of anti-capitalist, "leftist" if you will politics. But maybe the people running this place feel otherwise in which case let me and anyone else reading this thread know as I'm sure there are others here who have not been on discord and are out of the loop.
Obviously I'm against reactionaries and bigotry (I really liked MTC's sidebar rules actually and thought they were quite inclusive of naming bad behaviors disallowed without being overly broad) but I'm also worried about overly censorious impulses in what are inherently political spaces that include political discussion of a heated nature.
I will admit to the fact I was not an infrequent user of strong language such as the above on reddit. However I avoided oppressive language and I invite anyone to go over my reddit history for the past two years (preferably using a deletion site because most of it was lost with CTH) and see how many even minor ableist terms there are (almost none). I would never consider my behavior as to have been overly abusive or oppressive, not to anyone who wasn't expressing reactionary tendencies, imperialist tendencies, etc that either need to be kept in check by banning such people (not the most ideal, they don't get a chance to learn) or by calling them out with strong language that conveys the moral outrage I and I think everyone should feel towards certain positively cruel positions or spouting of very harmful capitalist/imperialist propaganda.
We're aiming to replicate the broad tent nature of CTH here, along with the good-natured ribbing that came along with it.
We're also aiming to learn from the mistakes r/CTH made from a moderation perspective, including inactive lead mods, lack of enforcement around issues of toxicity and harassment, etc. Insulting people because you disagree with them is never a good look (and there's a difference between calling someone a lib and calling someone a cop because you disagree with them on a theoretical issue). Chuds and other bad actors will become obvious. Good faith users should be treated with respect.
I'll chime in that one issue I think was kind of under-addressed on CTH was a kind of feeling of male-space-ness. There was a certain amount of hornyness that got I think to the point of being othering feeling to women, I'm not talking the amusing garfield porn posts so much as thirst-posting in comments which I think at times got gross and misogynistic and wasn't excusable even when directed towards reactionary women. Believe me I understand there was room for improvement with CTH.
I just worry about becoming too puritan. As a communist I'm called to attempt to meet the masses where they are not necessarily where I'd like them to be. That doesn't meant having to tolerate fascism or open bigotry but it also means trying not to venture too far off into ideals and recognizing people's everyday frustrations and struggles as well as where they are as a result of the dominant culture that may lead to less than ideal behavior that isn't necessarily as I said bigoted or exclusionary to marginalized groups.
I can't know someone else's struggles. I can only empathize with the person who was homeless at 20 because of a landlord who shouts expletives and insults at someone defending landlords, I can empathize with their righteous rage. You may say it's counterproductive and maybe to a degree it isn't the most sophisticated approach to changing minds, it's no Socratic method, but I can understand why and my first instinct is not to punish them. I think the best counter to such is to have people who are willing to do more than just say "shut the fuck up liberal", people who are willing to engage with them and post explainers and links. However on CTH vanishingly few people did that, I know I did it at times where I could when I had the time or when I had explainers prepared but it often resulted in frustration from the person's intransigence and nothing being accomplished (proper Socratic persuasion while more effective that debate point/counter-point after all is a very time-consuming, heavy investment process not well adapted for mass forums unless you have dozens and dozens of people with the time, patience, knowledge and resources).
I suppose time will tell but know that liberalism is a creeping disease, it gnaws and eats at the edges of acceptable behavior, begging people to go just a little further to the right, a little more back into the liberal tent and reject theory. I've seen it happen, places like LSC, the creepy growing tolerance for growing amounts of liberalism, the weariness of the moderators to address it after being overwhelmed by it until it was overrun and any and every leftist was being regularly downvoted into oblivion by those people who were in such a number a purge was simply not possible. I therefore salute everyone who takes up that burden.
Thanks for trying to clarify a bit.
Also, unrelated but I would love if someone found a way to fix Lemmy's issue where the comment you are typing frequently closes and gets lost if someone posts a new comment and the page updates. Not your department I figure but ahhhhh!
I agree with you on the "male space-ness" part. That was something I had in mind when I typed my response, but you put it better than I could. Thanks for the feedback. It is much appreciated.
deleted by creator
deleted by creator
AMAB