Hey, everyone. Hope this post finds you all well! A few days ago, PM_ME_YOUR_FOUCAULTS opened a comm request thread to name the community formerly known as The Dredge Tank. Now that it's been about 4 days and the votes seem pretty steady, we're rea-
"STOP THE COUNT!!!"
"Mr. President, she's talking."
As I was saying, we're ready to call the vote. Nobody's been happy with counterpropaganda, and we've heard you loud and clear. I'm excited to announce that Slop. is now open for all the posts you'd have previously posted to The Dredge Tank.
El Chisme continues to remain the new space for posts that would have been at home in The Dunk Tank.
In case anyone's confused about this, I'm gonna give a really quick explanation so everyone's on the same page with what's going on with the Tanks. The names of The Dunk Tank and The Dredge Tank have racist origins. The moderators of those communities agreed that the names of these communities should be changed. Unfortunately, while Lemmy allows the display names of communities to be changed, it does not currently allow the actual comm names to be changed. In order to change the names of these communities, we would have to shut them down and re-open new comms under new names. The mods of the dunk tank and dredge tank requested the name c/gossip. While there are some legitimate arguments being made relating to misogynistic societal perceptions of that word, the mods include women and enbies who disagree and specifically requested this name. I feel that this situation parallels the initial pushback that was experienced with disabled in which users voiced concerns that this name could be ableist, but the moderators of that community are themselves disabled and specifically requested that comm name, verbatim. Along with this name change, the mods felt that slightly expanding the scope of the community and simultaneously lowering the bar for the previous Rule 8 would allow users to post about more minor public figures as well as more major ones. This was seen as an expansion of the community's role, allowing posts to the new Dredge Tank replacement (counterpropaganda) to become a little more focused. We communicated this poorly, but the intention was to have users offer a sentence or two countering the reactionary take shown in the screenshot. Given how things spiraled from there, we've taken a step back from changing any of the rules during the switchover from The Dredge tank to Slop. We're trying to take time to let everyone breathe without changing too many things too quickly, but we also want to actually make sure people can get back to posting. Hopefully you're all okay with this pacing, lemme know below.
EDIT: thanks to @niph@hexbear.net for pointing out that this post didn't include the descriptions of the comms.
Where am I supposed to post...?
Slop is for what the old dredge_tank was like. Roast anonymous reactionaries to your heart's content!
Gossip for an informal discussion regarding people with power / notable / tools of power
Counterprop for a formalized discussion regarding reactionary people no matter how powerful/notable.
In upcoming admin updates:
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I'll post some analysis of mistakes and missteps that were made in recent days, including some of the context that led up to those errors.
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I'll offer a clearer and more complete explanation and description of the ongoing site culture issues that have been previously mentioned. These were poorly communicated before, but I'll do my best to explain both the issues at hand as well as the importance of dealing with them.
The last few days have been really confusing and frustrating for a lot of people and a lot has happened. This is not an appropriate place to reopen, re-litigate, or rehash the struggle session. I will not be debating either the struggle session or the subjects of the upcoming admin update posts here. Please refrain from doing so as well.
"Folks, we're feeding the fish their slop, they're tremendously hungry, incredibly famished. And look: I get to feed them. They say: Mr President, please feed the koi fish, its din din time, and it is! I get to do the little shaka-shaka with the can, and they're happy, they're eating -they're eating- out of the palm of my hand, and they're getting so big and so strong. Look at all these koi fish! I bet they won't have any issues finding -finding- a special someone. And it's wonderful, it's great. Greydon Carter could never be a tremendously effective keeper of fish. His party is not so hot, and all of his betta fishes are dying! But Lyudmila's letting me feed them, and I'm doing a tremendously great job, and a looot better than what Sleepy Joe would do!"
Why Gossip instead of the dunk tank?
Because there was ample evidence of the dunk tank, as a term, being an abhorrently racist term that killed people, whereas gossip is a tool that has been vital to marginalized communities demonized by the patriarchy over time. The site has recently committed to addressing the issue of misogyny on the site and lemmy at large. The moderators of the gossip community are dedicated to reclaiming Gossip as a means by which a group of marginalized people can commiserate over those that wield the power which oppresses them or are willing tools of it.
The scholar Silvia Federici, in her Feminist and Marxist interpretation of the Witch Hunts of the early modern period in Europe, analyses how the term gossip was used as a misogynist, oppressive tool against women. Federici recounts that by the sixteenth century in modern England, gossip, a term that had been commonly used during the Middle Ages to indicate a close female friend, turned into a denigrating term signifying idle talk.
During the Middle Ages, sociality among women prevailed, most activities were performed collectively, and a tight-knit community emerged. In the sixteenth century, with the destruction of the guilds, industrialisation, the emergence of capitalism, and, coincidentally (or not so coincidentally) the violent Witch Hunts, women started to be excluded from society leading to a feminisation of poverty.
The Witch Hunts demonised most interactions amongst women. Women were surveilled, marginalised and feared. Friendships amongst women became an object of suspicion, denounced, and understood as subversive. Women were portrayed as scolds, too domineering of their husbands, witches, and worse… Gossipers! And thus, the harmless stereotype of women as innate gossipers emerged.
I use the word harmless sarcastically for many reasons. An obvious one is that a torture instrument was designed with the sole intention of punishing those women involved in gossiping.
description of torture
This instrument called the scold’s/witch’s/gossip bridle was an iron muzzle that locked onto the women’s head and mouth, pressing their tongue down to prevent them from speaking.
Furthermore, the term gossip has been used to not only destroy traditional female practices, collective relations and systems of knowledge but also erode women’s rights and devalue women’s labour. Today, it continues to be used to reinforce the gender binary, infantilise certain actors, and construct certain conversations as worthless.
Gossip is a tool used by women and other marginalised people to share information that other systems often won’t consider. Gossip keeps our communities together, it keeps us safe, it equips us with important knowledge. The personal is political. Our intimacies are political. To gossip is a subversive act, an anti-capitalist act, and a feminist act. Let’s reclaim this act, get together and gossip! After all, what do we have to lose? We are all witches in their eyes anyway.
I hope this comment will be my sole involvement in all of this, but this doesn't explain why specifically choose the word 'gossip' - which you yourself point out has a history of being used to humiliate women - and not any less controversial option, aside from 'the moderators are dedicated to reclaiming the word'. You also seem to be conflating engagement in the activity and using the word as a name for the activity.
I don't think that this is a good time for the mod team to stand their ground on this issue, as opposed to, for example, holding a vote on whether or not people are okay with the name.
Yeah I think it's weird that they're trying to reclaim gossip, but aren't taking the same stance on the dunk tank. To clarify: the dunk tank could be viewed in a poetic justice sort of way. It's a device that was created to oppress and now the oppressed are turning it back on the oppressors, putting the powerful into a tool of disempowerment of their own creation.
Idk if anyone else sees it the same way but like, no one was using the dunk tank to be racist against black people I think. Not that I'm against renaming it either btw
I'm certain that I read in some statement, I don't recall where, that the term gossip was chosen specifically because it was frivolous, to emphasize the frivolousness of the posts there. Now it's said that this is all about reclaiming the term for marginalized people?
It isn't either one reason or the other, there were multiple people desiring gossip for different reasons, and the full reasoning was not adequately communicated. We are currently working to overhaul both the decision-making and communication process to prevent this from occurring in the future
But aren’t those two reasons contradictory? It honestly just seems from the outside like “gossip” was chosen because the mods felt that tank posts about celebs were becoming frivolous rage bait, and wanted to give a dismissive label to that kind of content, didn’t foresee the misogyny issue, and are now taking the reclamation line because they refuse to admit they were wrong.
To be honest I have some sympathy for the stance that the million “Musk is stupid” posts per day were frivolous, but you need to realise that the majority of complaints are (and have been throughout this debacle) about
- Poor communication of reasons behind decisions
- Seemingly capricious, arbitrary, and impulsive mod actions
- The perception that admins/mods want to impose changes to site culture based on personal preference and not the needs/wants of the user base
It’s about the way issues have been handled more than the content of the problem. The arguments about the content of the problem are easily comprehended and have been politely discussed by everyone. The continued insistence on imposing a generally unpopular decision is contributing to the impression of (3).
Having said all that I do want to say thank you to both admins in this thread for making massive improvements and an effort to communicate better. I think your most recent formulation of the intended content of the new comms works well and should be pinned somewhere more prominent than in Nth level replies.
I think your most recent formulation of the intended content of the new comms works well and should be pinned somewhere more prominent than in Nth level replies.
OH MY GOSH! I just knew I was missing something when I made the post, but I couldn't figure it out. Sorry, been really scrambling lately to make this right, and I need to pace myself a little so mistakes like this don't happen! Ok, back to the start of this comment, and then I'll go add the description of the communities to the main post
But aren’t those two reasons contradictory?
Multiple different people had different motivations for endorsing the proposal.
honestly just seems from the outside like “gossip” was chosen because the mods felt that tank posts about celebs were becoming frivolous rage bait, and wanted to give a dismissive label to that kind of content, didn’t foresee the misogyny issue, and are now taking the reclamation line because they refuse to admit they were wrong.
As one of the women who both endorsed and approved the proposal, my support was based on reclamation. Reclamation of the word gossip is very well-supported in even mainstream feminist circles to the point that I honestly thought it was common knowledge. Gossip has been badly maligned by patriarchy, but we have taken the word back because it's important. I wanted to create a more positive and fun vibe that would be less alienating insular in order to bring more leftist women and queer people to the site. A good example of the energy I'm hoping to give a leftist perspective on Hexbear can be viewed on r/fauxmoi, a gossip space on Reddit where I've seen some surprisingly good takes and even occasional leftist analysis. My secondary intention was that hexbears with unexamined biases and internalized misogyny might examine these, around the word gossip itself, perception of gossip as an inherently feminine activity, and the acknowledgement that dunking on Elon in the_dunk_tank is the same activity as celebrity gossip.
Poor communication of reasons behind decisions
Seemingly capricious, arbitrary, and impulsive mod actions
I'm really sorry about these. If I could undo them, I would. I suddenly needed to take a mental health break from site administration due to some personal life events last week, so I wasn't able to be the one communicate our changes. I had to come back early from that break to help communicate this better after it went poorly. I'm sorry I wasn't here communicating to you all.
TC69 definitely shouldn't have been "put into the driver's seat of a moving car," so to speak. She should have come back as a user or honorary admin without moderation tasks for a while to get reacclimated to the changes between when she left and now. Alaskaball's bit of fighting with their own account is really funny in a vacuum, but it was very poorly timed. They should have made it clear they were doing a bit instead of leaving everyone (including other admins) unaware and horrified, especially considering the state of the admin threads at that point.
The perception that admins/mods want to impose changes to site culture based on personal preference and not the needs/wants of the user base.
The mods and admins have always been in charge of steering the direction of the site. Current motivations are to reduce some of the negativity and toxicity on the site and to become a more inclusive and comfy space for women, people of color and ethnic minorities, and queer people.
I'm gonna go add the explanation of the comms to the post. Thanks again for the reminder!
Different mods had different reasoning for desiring the name. Both things can be true at once
Gossip is a bad name for the comm. It will mostly have content thst is in no way gossip and it isn't a play on words, just the wrong word. It seems to me that the most likely impacts would be for people to post less and for mods to have to do more work as dunk content that was supposed to go there gets posted other places.
I will admit that I did not know all this about the history of the word gossip.
But while I respect the goal of reclaiming terms in general, as a woman I really dislike the name nonetheless. It might be my own internalized stuff, but having spent a lifetime listening to gossiping being ridiculed and having had to actively distance mysels from it to be taken seriously, I feel like if this reclaiming was to be done, it should be done by women only first.
Also gossiping and the dunk tank just vibe very differently for me. Gossiping isn't nearly always an act of condemnation, it is often just social knowledge transfer and socializing. The tank was crearly something very different. If gossip is most often understood as an activity that women do then making a place like the tank be gossip makes gossip look bad, I hope this makes sense.
I think a gossip comm should be used to verify rumors and information that people are uncertain of. I think having it as a comm is important, and just treating it as a replacement for dunk tank does a disservice to what role it could serve, while inaccurately describing the niche it's trying to fill.
This is what gossip is, yeah.
I grew up in a very small rural village community and the gossip around there was always community chatter. But I have to add that it was often very damaging to for example marginalized communities as well. And a tool for bullies. So I am not entirely sure if it is a term that should be reclaimed because of the way gossiping has worked in the real world at least in the protestant west.
But, like, "Gossip" is not what people did in the dunk tank- they dunked on people. We should definitely have a name that doesn't have racist origins, but it should accurately describe what people use the com for.
i support the name gossip. it's like a reclamation of the term. healthy gossip is vital to social bonding, especially in marginalised communities, and i think its exactly what the slop people want actually is. and tbh if men feel uncomfortable "gossiping" or participating in a community called gossip, they might need to reflect and self crit. you can whine about celebrities all u want, but ultimately it's still a form of gossip, and u might as well accept that. and accept that u are participating in an activitiy stereotyed as feminine, and maybe that's a good thing.
I wasn't going to relitigate this, because I'm tired boss, but I still have to say, even translated to another language, I still don't agree with renaming it to gossip or any equivalent. In addition, this:
While there are some legitimate arguments being made relating to misogynistic societal perceptions of that word, the mods include women and enbies who disagree and specifically requested this name. I feel that this situation parallels the initial pushback that was experienced with disabled in which users voiced concerns that this name could be ableist, but the moderators of that community are themselves disabled and specifically requested that comm name, verbatim.
is exactly why this should have been put to a vote. Why do their voices and preferences matter more than mine? Especially considering at least one of the mods has already admitted they don't even like the thing they're in charge of? Not to mention that, whether intentionally or not, all users are relegated again to some mass of people, while the mods get the nuance of being part of these minority groups - why isn't it noted that the 'legitimate arguments' were also coming from women and enby users? And this parallel you're trying to draw comes off as essentially 'anybody arguing against this is clearly not informed or from the minority group affected', again whether you intend it to or not. Not to mention, if you accept them as legitimate arguments, why are they being cast aside for the personal preference of a handful of mods?
I really think yall have a lot of learning to do.
Editting to add: the more I think on this, the more this whole thing is baffling. We're seriously going to replace 'dunk tank' because of it's racial connotations, and we're going to rename it some variation of 'gossip' in spite of it's sexist connotations. What are we doing here?
Especially considering at least one of the mods has already admitted they don't even like the thing they're in charge of?
sometimes you need to hate something to save it
I'm with you. I'm not a fan of the gossip name but it's not something I'd want to fight for myself. That doesn't change that it IS something that many women/femmes do want say in though, and while I think Lyudmila has done a much much better job at moderating this it still feels kinda like the post is falling short.
However, I know Carcosa DID mention creating a Matrix chat where there can be a lot more user participation. Idk where the comment is, but hopefully they are just taking one step at a time and will address these issues one by one once the admin/mods have their feet beneath them
preach!
i know that the mod team means it well and i am thankful for the volunteer work they put into this place, but they seem to be overlooking the potential harm and negative connotations associated with using a term that has sexist or misogynistic roots, even if some of its supporters are women or genderqueer individuals.
"gossip" is a bad name. misogynistic overtones aside, it's just a terrible name. surely, we can think of something better.
Honestly, the main reason why I don't like /c/gossip is because the gossipers and the gossipee have to be socially connected. The information passed on between the two gossipers is also supposed to be relatively unknown.
If I'm talking shit about our shitty boss with a fellow coworker, that's gossip.
If I'm talking shit about a professor with a fellow classmate who has never met the professor before, that counts as gossip if the classmate has a good chance of taking a course taught by the professor.
If I'm talking shit about Elon Musk with a fellow shitposter, that's just talking shit about a random (famous) person. That isn't gossip.
To me, /c/gossip sounds more like a drama comm for current struggle sessions or infighting between lemmy instances. So, the entire 4(?) day struggle session or the 1000+ brigadeTM of some random lemm.ee post would fit right in. "Spill the tea, sis" doesn't apply to famous people because they're, well, famous.
It just doesn’t do a good job of describing the intended content of the comm. “Gossip” generally means interesting stories about celebrities’ lives, and isn’t really precise enough imo. Having a comm called “gossip” that is entirely full of dunks would probably contribute to the perception of a toxic site culture rather than detract.
Ohhhh, they meant "celebrity gossip" instead of normal gossip. They should just call it celebrity_gossip or something. The name would be less confusing.
But even then celebrity gossip is like "Is this royal pregnant??
" and not "Elon Musk is a union-busting fascist!!"I want to say the frivolous, tabloid type celebrity gossip wasn't always the norm but now I'm doubting whether or not I'm remembering correctly.
I mean it certainly was for duration of my life. Princess Diane, Michael Jackson, Britney Spears, Lindsay Lohan, Michael Schumacher etc. all had these really intrusive and disgusting stories plastered everywhere about them.
that is just leftist flavored gossip, yall are arguing semantics like it doesn't make you misogynist somehow
See, I saw it as an attempt at Hexbear's r/Fauxmoi (who are for some reason extremely pro Palestine for an apolitical celebrity gossip subreddit, not that I'm complaining)
who are for some reason extremely pro Palestine for an apolitical celebrity gossip subreddit, not that I'm complaining.
Except when it came to the democratic party and Kamala Harris. Then it's all "vote blue no matter who!", and anyone who called Harris out for being a genocidal monster got hundreds of downvotes.
That place is poisoned by identity politics, and simply used Palestine as their flavour of the month issue to hate on any celeb or politician they disliked.
they were also very heavily anti-depp and got regularly invaded by other subs for it
Oh yeah that's right, they were able to see through Depp's PR campaign unlike the rest of the mainstream internet.
Agreed (and I agree with your comment above as well), another reason why it’s just not a good name.
It was mostly women pushing for the new name in the mod chat. As a dude I'm going to follow Mao's advice and not speak on the subject.
its not beyond the gender issue, its just fine for the intended content of gathering around comrades to snicker at dumb things. Dude you need to self crit for misogyny
While there are some legitimate arguments being made relating to misogynistic societal perceptions of that word, the mods include women and enbies who disagree and specifically requested this name. I feel that this situation parallels the initial pushback that was experienced with disabled in which users voiced concerns that this name could be ableist, but the moderators of that community are themselves disabled and specifically requested that comm name, verbatim.
am i fuckin reading this correctly??? only because some of the people were women and/or enbies, their decisions are now supposed to be the pinnacle of wisdom and uncontestable?
i know that the mods are meaning no harm, i had nothing but positive experiences with them before this whole debacle started, and OP in particular has genuinely been really great at clearing up the current situation, thank you for that, BUT BEING PART OF A MINORITY GROUP DOESN'T ABSOLVE YOU OF BEING WRONG AND JUST REALLY INSENSITIVE IN THIS PARTICULAR SITUATION! all this is a little bit similar to certain trans people stating that they are okay with the t-slur being used on the internet, and while im sure nobody harbors this kind of sentiment in here, i hope this shows what harmful pitfalls this "im Part of a minority group, therefore im right"-thinking can bring.
so to reiterate from my removed thread:
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The term "gossip" has a long history of being weaponized against women, particularly in ways that diminish their voices and portray them as trivial, unimportant, or malicious when engaging in communication or expressing themselves. This cultural baggage doesn’t disappear just because a few people choose to reclaim or adopt the term in a specific context. By using it, the forum risks perpetuating a stereotype that affects gender and sexual minorities who are already marginalized, especially when used as the name of a community meant to serve them.
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some folks from marginalized groups, might want to take back words that have been thrown at them, but it’s a pretty complex thing to do. reclaiming those words means being really aware of how it affects others, especially in places that aim to be welcoming. just picking up a term because some people in the community are cool with it doesn’t really consider the real damage that word might still do to others in that same group. like, using the word "gossip" might give off the vibe that this place isn’t really serious about tackling the bigger issues of sexism that are still out there in society.
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hexbear communities should be all about making sure everyone feels respected and supported, especially those who have often been overlooked. using a word like "gossip" might accidentally push away folks who think it's disrespectful or plays into negative stereotypes about them. Even if some people who identify as women or genderqueer, might not see the term the same way, their views can really depend on their own experiences and privileges.
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one of the key things to building a welcoming space is to watch the words we use, since some can hurt people, even if we don't mean to. just because some folks in the group are cool with certain words doesn’t mean they’re okay for everyone. If we want our community to feel safe and inclusive, we need to think about how our words affect everyone and steer clear of terms that can be harmful.
tldr: it is great that racist terms like
the_x_tankare being purged from the site, but it is absolutely not great that potentially sexist terms are being used as a substitute.In all of this, not once have we gotten an explanation of why it HAS to be gossip, or why gossip doesn't have the connotations that we keep arguing it does. The most we get is 'we don't think it's that bad'. You'd think that if there was such a strong case for it despite all the protest against it, it would be easy to put together a comment explaining the logic, but not once has that happened, and at this point I don't think we're going to be told.
In all honesty, it's starting to feel less like they don't think it has the baggage it does, and instead they're fully aware but just really, really want to call it that anyway, everyone else's feelings be damned. I don't want to be cynical, but absent literally any explanation what am I supposed to think?
Thank you for the comment
Every community that has been made the past couple years has had the name chosen by the people moderating it.
Just because "gossip" can be used in an offensive and condescending way, does not make it so.
Women talking to each other is an important part of how we keep communities safe.
Women mods of the community specifically asked for the community name as they felt it best represented the types of posts welcome there.
You are more than welcome to make a !commrequest@hexbear.net post suggesting better names for a community
I'm sorry but a racist game that killed and maimed people for years has no redeemable qualities.
Gossip has been used to protect communities and has a recent misogynistic association.
There were people concerned about !disabled@hexbear.net name yet the disabled mods that wanted the community specifically chose the name.
Through all that's happened, I've been repeatedly encouraged by how quickly and nearly unanimously the whole community agreed that the tank names needed to be changed. The dunk tank had been around for years, but once the harm was pointed out, it was time to for it to go.
Seeing the staunch defense of the name "gossip" when quite a few people immediately say they find it offensive makes me think that was a special case, and not the sign of the strength of the community I had hoped it was.
Because there was ample evidence of the dunk tank being an abhorrently racist term that killed people where as gossip is a tool that has been vital to marginilized communities demonized by the patrirarchy over time. The site has recently commited to addressing the issue of misogyny on the site and lemmy at large.
The scholar Silvia Federici, in her Feminist and Marxist interpretation of the Witch Hunts of the early modern period in Europe, analyses how the term gossip was used as a misogynist, oppressive tool against women. Federici recounts that by the sixteenth century in modern England, gossip, a term that had been commonly used during the Middle Ages to indicate a close female friend, turned into a denigrating term signifying idle talk.
During the Middle Ages, sociality among women prevailed, most activities were performed collectively, and a tight-knit community emerged. In the sixteenth century, with the destruction of the guilds, industrialisation, the emergence of capitalism, and, coincidentally (or not so coincidentally) the violent Witch Hunts, women started to be excluded from society leading to a feminisation of poverty.
The Witch Hunts demonised most interactions amongst women. Women were surveilled, marginalised and feared. Friendships amongst women became an object of suspicion, denounced, and understood as subversive. Women were portrayed as scolds, too domineering of their husbands, witches, and worse… Gossipers! And thus, the harmless stereotype of women as innate gossipers emerged.
I use the word harmless sarcastically for many reasons. An obvious one is that a torture instrument was designed with the sole intention of punishing those women involved in gossiping.
description of torture
This instrument called the scold’s/witch’s/gossip bridle was an iron muzzle that locked onto the women’s head and mouth, pressing their tongue down to prevent them from speaking.
Furthermore, the term gossip has been used to not only destroy traditional female practices, collective relations and systems of knowledge but also erode women’s rights and devalue women’s labour. Today, it continues to be used to reinforce the gender binary, infantilise certain actors, and construct certain conversations as worthless.
Gossip is a tool used by women and other marginalised people to share information that other systems often won’t consider. Gossip keeps our communities together, it keeps us safe, it equips us with important knowledge. The personal is political. Our intimacies are political. To gossip is a subversive act, an anti-capitalist act, and a feminist act. Let’s reclaim this act, get together and gossip! After all, what do we have to lose? We are all witches in their eyes anyway.
As your sources say gossip as a tool can protect women. Gossip as a term, or potentially as the name for a community, can be used to oppress women. While it would be great for this site to play a role in strengthening the tool and weakening the term, it shouldn't be taken as a given that the users who are affected by this are comfortable taking on the fight of reclaiming the word, or that they think this change is effective in doing so.
I appreciate how seriously you are taking the harm of the racist term. I don't appreciate how, at least from the outside, it looks like the position you are in of needing to defend the mods has led you to downplay the potential harm of misogyny to create a comparison.
You're just creating some made up relationship between two things when there is none. Some people disagreed about this, some people disagreed about that. They're the same.
Using Disabled for a comm name is a shit ton different than using Gossip.
It seems the real difference and what I keep hearing is that it's the mods choice on the names they choose. If they're name is steeped in bigotry so what the mods wanted it and who are you the community to go against the mods?
How is gossip steeped in bigotry? I would posit that a social concept that protected women was demonized by the patriarchy to reduce its effectiveness.
The comparison between dunk tanks and gossip is incorrect. Women have been hurt for gossiping in defense of their community. The dunk tank is literally a violent racist thing.
Where did I compare them? You're doing that, not me.
Many users have given you countless examples of how it's sexist and misogynistic and the mods and admins response is continuously been the community, many of whom are trans and not white, is behaving like cishet white men because the view of these select few mods is different than yours.
It's gross and toxic behavior. It would be so easy to just listen to your community.
While the general principle is the similar, the impact of "the dunk tank" on Black men in particular is so much worse than the connotations of gossip
There is also work to reclaim gossip as a gendered term owing to it's contribution to women's solidarity and safety - there's no similar attempt for "dunk tank" and I'm not aware of anything positive arising from brutalising people of colour for entertainment
I'm trying to thing of a similar phrase to dunk tank that's been decontextualised, I'll post again if I think of one
Thank you for replying.
Again, I'm trying not to be cynical, but that does sound like it just confirms that at the core of it the decision has been made by the mods and that's all there is to it. If so, I genuinely disagree on all levels with how this is being handled, but at least that is finally honest about what's going on - there is no real debate about it, it's just so.
To be honest, I'm not even really all that hung up on the literal thing that started all this anymore, I'm just stuck at the fact that this is just tacit recognition that it really doesn't matter how we feel, the mods will just overrule us. And while I appreciate the suggestion at the end of the comment, in light of that fact I really don't see how my voice is suddenly going to matter if/when I suggest names. There's no guarantee that anything I say, any attempt to hold people accountable, isn't just going to be met with 'well we disagree, so that's that'. It's genuinely disheartening.
This is also not even touching the idea of 'this can be used in an offensive way, but I'm not using it offensively so you should't take it that way'. I'm sure I don't have to point out where else that exact argument pops up - not to draw direct parallels, just to point out this is pretty weak as a justification.
A post in that exact community was what determined the name of slop.
Anyone is welcome to submit a mod application.
For the first two years admins and sitemods made the decisions with occasional temp checks from the userbase.
I added mods to the decision making process and due to what happened we are working a way for users to also be involved with the process.
You are correct though that the people interested in creating, cultivating and moderating a community get the choice of what it is called. It has been that way the entire time the site has existed.
That being said we are trying to open up this process for transparency as well as user engagement.
In the least snappy way possible - I've been here and active for four years, I'm aware of the history of moderation on this site. I am aware anyone is welcome to submit a mod application, but that has nothing to do with what I'm saying. I'm not asking to be a mod, I fully recognise that it takes volunteer work to be done and that not everyone is willing to do it.
I am saying that each of these decisions, and the way that it seems that it doesn't matter how we, or hell how I feel as part of this community. From this comment all I can gleam is that the response is 'well, this community is not for you then'. Which seems counter to the whole renaming exercise to begin with, considering it's an attempt to make the space feel safer.
But again, so be it if this is how things are. Like I've said in another comment, I'm not going anywhere cos I don't have anywhere else like this, I'm stuck having to put my trust in the team, even if I feel shaky about it. This whole thing has just made me sad, I'm not gonna lie.
We recognize that what has been done is not working and are actively seeking to change the way future decisions are made.
If you have specific ideas for how things could be made better with regard to how site changes are made I would love to hear them.
All I'm really asking is for things to be more democratic. I know we joke about voting all the time, but genuinely it feels like the only way to truly avoid things like this happening is to open up the decision making process. I'm sure I'm not the first to suggest that, and I know it's not as simple as just 'make everything a vote', but as it stands right now it does feel very one-way, and it doubtless contributes to the way things spark up like this over and again. Obviously, even under a process like that things like this will still happen, where decisions are made that I don't agree with, but at least it would be transparent and in line with our ethos of good faith and open discussion. Everything so far has felt very closed - it's only now that it feels obvious that we're working from 'the mods want this to happen' backwards in order to find justifications for this particular change and wording.
And while we can repeat that 'mod applications are always open', it doesn't solve the inherent problem here - why should it be only for the mods to have all the say? And is it really good practice to join a mod team just to try and change the culture as a single, new mod? Yes, I agree that moderating is thankless work, and that in a lot of ways it does matter a lot what the people guiding the community feel about the direction of said community - but on the flip side, as someone who works full time and who isn't posting constantly, why should I count for less? I think we really need to put more time into recognising that this is a shared space, and that both sides of things are ultimately needed for a community.
It really does feel like at the centre of this is just a feeling of discontinuity between the mod base and the users, and the end result is feeling like there is no true recourse for someone who is 'only' a user in situations like this. We've opened and closed user union, we've opened and closed feedback - and whether intended or not, it does feel like the power is entirely one directional. I don't know if I can offer anything else, beyond the thanks I have for administrating and even getting this entire community started in the first place - I just want to say again that the reason I do feel so passionate about trying to resolve this is the fact that a space like Hexbear feels important, both to me and in the wider context. I don't want to be telling myself to just accept things here, I want to feel like when I try and contribute and explain my reasoning for or against anything here, that it feels like it's taken on-board by the people involved and considered for what it is.
BEING PART OF A MINORITY GROUP DOESN'T ABSOLVE YOU OF BEING WRONG
It does here on occasion. In my experience in the past, it can completely shield someone that should've absolutely been banned, but wasn't. In the situation I speak of, my opinion was invalidated because I'm white and they were a POC. I was completely unaware this individual was a POC to begin with, just that they were spewing toxic shit into the comm I was in and that I would ban in a heartbeat if they weren't a mod. I'm still extremely sour about it to this day because that person 100% should've been thrown out.
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Funny comment Bureaucrat but it could end up being misgendering. I think we should just not interact with that account and maybe report it instead
Misgendering is bad! But we can make a literal dogpile, which could be good. It could also be bad, since it might open us up to that stuff to others.
The mods of the dunk tank and dredge tank requested the name c/gossip. While there are some legitimate arguments being made relating to misogynistic societal perceptions of that word, the mods include women and enbies who disagree and specifically requested this name.
A few thoughts on this.
First of all, I don’t think this was intentional but using the phrase “women and enbies” in this context can come across as erasure of non-binary identity by implying that it’s akin to “woman lite” - I run a space for people of marginalised genders and this was one of the early lessons we learned, so just passing it on.
Secondly, that female and NB mods suggested a name does not absolve it of flaws or reduce the perception/propagation of misogynistic implications. The majority of people using or seeing the comm won’t know the backstory behind it, and valid concerns about how off-putting the name is shouldn’t be swept aside for these reasons.
but using the phrase “women and enbies” in this context can come across as erasure of non-binary identity by implying that it’s akin to “woman lite” - I run a space for people of marginalised genders and this was one of the early lessons we learned, so just passing it on.
I can't say this is something that would have occurred to me. I would have just figured it was a way to cover the categories of not-men. What's the preferred terminology?
There isn’t an elegant way of saying it but we use “people of marginalised genders” as an umbrella term. When talking about misogyny specifically I would probably say “femme people”.
I don't think "femme people" is a good descriptor. I'm a butch lesbian, does that mean I don't experience misogyny? Fem people might be better.
But there are plenty of victims of misogyny who still wouldn't be covered by that. Transmasc people, enbies who don't identify as fem, and masc-aligned people are all groups who are affected by misogyny but wouldn't be described as either femme or fem.
Calling it now, counterpropaganda and gossip/el chisme are going to die off and leave slop as a pre-rule 8 dunk tank.
Changing the names is necessary but it should have just been new names that clearly communicate the same intent or content, like The Septic Tank or Barbara Pit. Counterprop isn't going to get much but effort posts about actual propaganda, because the tanks have never focused on specifically countering posts, just mocking them. Gossip sounds like it would either be a celebrity comm or another c/Main, and I'm definitely going to keep forgetting which comm it's replacing. They're bad names that make the intents of the comms unclear and won't have the intended effect on site culture, they'll just change which comm the posts are on.
I agree. Keep counterprop, make it the new dunk tank, delete the"eL cHiSmE" bullshit because just changing the name to Spanish does nothing to get rid of the sexist issues of the replacement, and make slop the new dredge tank.
you better go back to your reddit wannabe hellsite before i make cujo look like a paws patrol episode
Mama, just killeda man puta ugn against ihs head pulled the trigger now hes dead mama uuuuuuhuuhu
Slop is cool by me, I don't really care about the name thing, it was how everything else went down after that is a real burr under my saddle, i don't think using the Spanish term for gossip really is better tho.
That being said, I didn't even know there was a vote and it's my weekend and I've been at least checking in on my phone here every hour or two today. I'm not unsubbed from anything so it seems odd it didn't show up on my feed ever. I also browse new
I ain't reading all this. You should have come to us bureaucrats for advice first smdh.
JK, love you all! But I'm too busy with the bureaucracy to read this now.
The bureaucracy is expanding to meet the expanding needs of the bureaucracy!!
As a newshog I like the word slop very much. I would like to suggest that slop be appended to every comm. Main slop. News slop. Neurodiverse slop. Slop slop. Gossip slop. and so onGossip just seems like a sucky name that isn't exactly what we do in the tanks, but whatever. I'm glad this is finally settled and the mods have followed through with the community feedback, it's finally time for our slop now
i really do think its literally commie gossip, which isn't a bad thing
I don't love keeping the name as gossip, nor do I think the parallel is very strong but that is a struggle session for another time. I'm just glad this is over.
I don't love keeping the name as gossip, nor do I think the parallel is very strong but that is a struggle session for another time.
I don't especially care either way but changing it later means killing and remaking the comm again.
Tbh it’s not like anything would really be lost by doing that. It’s been active for barely any time at all.
Right, I meant if we wait awhile rather than choosing the final name now.
For me it shows as "El Chisme". Am I being pranked?
Edit: Ohhh, thanks all!
c/gossip is the actual name of the comm, chisme is just Spanish for gossip and like a decal name for the comm
booooohoooo hoooo hoooo hoooo hoooo hoooo boooo hoooo hooo hoooo booo hoooo hooo
Look at the url.
The display name is distinct from the actual comm name.
Not retaining the tank part of the name is very short sighted. We're going to look back and wish we had tanks, comrades.
Vote below for c/tanks, for all your self-propelled artillery needs.
yes no maybeI was tempted to request a c/tanks in the middle of the ruckus but then I realised I don't collect pictures of tanks nor cool tank facts so I'd just be requesting other people do work to enable other people to do work for me to sit back and consume without contributing.
It is surprising that it doesn't already exist though.
That would be a funny bit, I feel like c/guns would cover tanks as well (kind of just a big gun)
