Hello users of hexbear the mod team wanted to make this post as the past couple weeks of federation have been quite eventful.
First off, I want to apologize to any hardship, stress, discomfort, alienation, or any negativity users have experienced as a result of federation. I want to especially extend apologies to marginalized comrades and those that have voiced their disapproval, disagreement, or concern about federation.
Second, in every vote based discussion we have had on federation, the votes for federation and votes for federation with large instances have trended to be near-overwhelming majorities. In the spirit of operating the site in accordance with the desires of most users, we have gone with these decisions.
Third, I want to remind everyone that you are able to set your default feed in your user settings. This is an important tool, as setting your feed to Local prevents posts from federated instances from showing on your feed. You may further curate your feed by setting it to Subscribed, and ensuring that you are only subscribed to communities you wish to see posts from. The Subscribed feed allows you to for example unsubscribe from the_dunk_tank while subscribing to all the other hexbear communities, preventing you from seeing federated instance posts as well as the_dunk_tank posts mentioning other federated instances.
We are now federated with two instances with more than 200 daily active users:
lemmy.ml
lemm.ee
Forth, I wish to remind everyone that there is a pinned post in the hexbear community that allows users to nominate a federated instance for defederation, it can be found here: https://hexbear.net/post/277518
In closing, we would like to state that this post is also a space for Hexbear users to comment on how federation has been for them.
As we are in one of those weeks when decades happen on this site, your feedback is crucial to us in deciding the direction of this forum. As such, we ask of you two questions:
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What are your thoughts on the Fediverse, and how has your experience changed through federation?
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What would you like to be done going forward, in an ideal situation?
Once this feedback is collected, we will sift through the answers to find the most popular measures advocated for, as well as the overtones of the experiences submitted, and plan what is to be done accordingly.
Other instance users, if you comment on this thread, you will be banned from hexbear and your comment will be removed.
While mistakes have been made the in federation, they were made democratically, and the admin team has continued to be based
The biggest lesson for me has been if an instances' admin sucks, federation with them will also suck. Should stay the course for now, now that shitjustshit has been defedded
Also the
meme somehow never stops being funny to me or funny to post at some one in a hostile mannerThat one admin's "my Estonian heritagerino makes me an authority on USSR bad akshully" gave me
vibes and is why I will always cast a lemmeeee.eeeee hate vote. Also many of their posters are trashMore ok with Lemmy.ml a friend there first told me about this site and he was correct I would like
Federation with other good and small instances is good
In fairness, Hexbear's party line has always been that Hexbear is not a substitute for real organising and activism. It's a place to shitpost, at most a place for agitprop.
Looking back it's remarkable how much site culture has changed over the years. In the first year we had a bunch of AMAs and effortposts seem to have been much more common than now. The discussion was lively as well. The site culture changed around the time one of the many lifeboat communities got onboarded, and again when there was that whole accusation of the admin, and again with the whole drama about name changes and whatever. Why should we say that that change was good and this change is bad? Back then some users were against the change as well, and others were for it.
I wasn't aware about the early history of the website. I mostly thought it was even more struggle sessions (I peeped at the actual outdoor cats struggle session, and it was absolutely deranged. People were issuing death threats on each other lol).
And I still think it's funny how the news megathread is completely unaffected by federation. As long as the best part of the site is still trucking along, I guess I'm happy enough no matter what happens to the rest of the site.
And I still think it's funny how the news megathread is completely unaffected by federation. As long as the best part of the site is still trucking along, I guess I'm happy enough no matter what happens to the rest of the site.
There was one specific user whose reaction to being dunked on for western lib geopolitics takes was to start a crusade to get the news mega discontinued. They hop user accounts and are probably using a new one now, but fortunately if they are they have dropped their obsession with the newsmega being patsocs or whatever other fever dream they'd cooked up.
I just got done reading the Romanov thread, and you somehow got flack from both the "killing little Alexei is good aktually" and "killing little Alexei is bad aktually" crowd lol. If anything, it was the non-Hexbear user who was reasonable since they didn't know the context of the picture and changed their mind when they understood what the context was. Meanwhile, a bunch of 2020ers were just going at it against you. It makes me feel they already have beef with each other from some feud 2 years ago because they could just be arguing with each other instead of both arguing their perspective sides with you.
See, it's that bullshit ex-couple awkward energy once again. You're like the mutual friend of an ex-couple, and instead of talking/arguing with each other, you're the punching bag. I'm not saying that they legitimately have beef with each other, but just that the awkward energy is there.
The desire to dunk is definitely a defining characteristic of this community. I avoid struggle sessions but I still get into weird arguments, usually when I see someone saying they don't understand x conservative idea, so I try to explain it with the intention that we should understand our opponents. Then the person I'm trying to explain it to puffs up thinking they've got a chud and just keep trying to make me justify the belief I keep telling them I don't agree with.
imaginary blood in the water, us hexbear shorks can't resist
one of the largest issues with the site as I see it is that our "dunking" culture and moderation policies just inherently makes this space less inclusive.
Post from three years ago from the ND modteam about this before they got burnt out: https://hexbear.net/post/77324?scrollToComments=false
they tried to make moderation changes, were sided against constantly when ND users got banned for tiny social mistakes, and that part of the site history is largely ignored, and swept under the rug.
there was a post a few weeks ago titled something like "ableism is not as bad as other forms of discrimination".
While I took a year or so long break from the site, it's clear to me that actively wanting to make the site more inclusive and a safe space mostly died with that modteam, because not much seems to have changed.
If the site wants to be inclusive, more posts and comments should be taken in good faith, and site policy should change to make it clear that constant aggressive arguing or assumptions of bad faith is not how we should engage here.
I named this account "badtakeshaver" bc i thought i would be constantly be dogpiled on ngl
I'm new and it's a bummer to hear about this; I'd love for there to be a super active ND community here
That's unfortunate that it seems like there wasn't a whole lot of support outside of the old mods (at least from what I gather). Maybe it's high time to start posting, and I guess at the moment it could just be moderated through reporting/education? I'm really struggling with my stuff rn and it would be great to vent with people who get it 😭
Things ain't what they used to be, but they also are
Why should I live in history, huh? Fuck, I don't wanna know anything anymore. This is a forum where nothing is solved.
Someone once told me hexbear is a flat circle, and everything we've ever posted - or will post - we're gonna post over and over and over again. And that little mod and that poster they gonna be in that thread, again and again and again, forever.
I think federation has in a lot of ways brought the best of us forward. We aren't just repeating talking points, we're sourcing them and checking them.
I agree with this 100%. I've learned a lot and just form people posting stuff when trying to educate the libs that come in here. It's even given me even more motivation to read theory and even branch out and read more types.
Your writing is also really good it was a nice read :)
Yeah being your own worst critic can be really hard I get it. I hope you do start again though!
Give me a few minutes I gotta find a way to make your post into a struggle sesh
I do find it interesting how quick people are to romanticise how nice and chill 'old' Hexbear was. To be honest I found it much less chill, every day you'd see fighting over minor shit, even excluding struggle sessions. People argued, felt excluded, and left the site for the over many things, minor or major; I left the site for six months because of an argument I got into with multiple users (and I was also at fault) about an obscure TV show. I'm not saying oldbear was awful, it was very cool in many ways, but I would argue federation gives us a better sense of proportionality.
It's fundamentally made the site a worse place
There's been comments here and there about pipelines and what are we doing if we're not spreading the word? I have some thoughts on that:
It's okay to take breaks
- There are absolutely ways to utilize our knowledge to help libs along the pipeline from wherever they're at to where we want them to be, but we don't always have to be on. We spent three years here working through struggle sessions in our own space, but unintentionally creating a great space for leftists to talk together and engage without always needing to be on the defensive all the time. Things get hostile and shitty sometimes, yeah, but I see long comment threads where people are having a healthy back and forth, walking away from it actually getting something out of it. On this site there's an understanding that the users here are mostly good faith and as trustworthy as internet strangers can be. We can recharge here, shitpost, and talk a bit about our irl work here too (vaguely, at least). It's important to have spaces where we can do this. We can fight it out everywhere else online - hell, we can fight it out on the fediverse in general when we're up for it. The feeling of always needing to be productive or doing shit is capitalist productivity brainworms. It's okay to take breaks.
This was a space where marginalized comrades felt safe
- There were wreckers here, but they were dealt with quickly. They really weren't overwhelming. We've introduced so many new bigots to our userbase and it's showed. Trans comrades have been harassed in DMs. We've been constantly told we're not truly queer for what we believe. Looking at the comments in the bigger posts recently about the Biden admin's bullshit and other trans related posts, the uptick in bigotry we've had to deal with is noticeable and queer users have said as much. This of course will carry over to vulnerable spaces like !mentalhealth@hexbear.net and !mutual_aid@hexbear.net as well when so many new eyes are now watching our site and can easily interact. There was the ability to be vulnerable about things like gender identity and personal struggles, that now have to be reconsidered when we see people from the fediverse coming in and talking shit. I guess we could all get over it and toughen up, but this was a space where marginalized comrades felt safe. Why are we abandoning that for dunks?
To answer question 2:
It doesn't have to be complete defederation. We have real comrades at lemmygrad. There may be small instances that can have real solidarity with us as well. There's a path here that, imo, would give us the benefits of federation and connecting with more people, while also upholding what we worked hard to establish on this site.I hope this gets some thought and consideration.
and the easy response is it's just the internet, go touch grass
if that were a viable option, I'd do that. but I come to hexbear to get a break from the bullshit outside - I encounter plenty of people who threaten my right to exist when I walk out the door.
Exactly this. This is a community I feel safe in and even living in a liberal enclave in the U.S. It’s scary out there. Hope you’re doing well, comrade.
Working a food not bombs table (or whatever organization of your choice) for ONE WEEKEND will change the world more than all the posting in the history of r/chapotraphouse, in the history of hexbear, in the history of lemmy... Forever, in perpetuity.
C'mon. It would take at least 2-3 weekends
It is tbh I wouldn’t be a communist if not for posting so it’s just another tool in the tool kit
Working a food not bombs table (or whatever organization of your choice) for ONE WEEKEND will change the world more than all the posting in the history of r/chapotraphouse, in the history of hexbear, in the history of lemmy... Forever, in perpetuity.
Unironically it was hanging out in chapo.chat after the subreddit ban that got me motivated to do more organizing in my free time and I've been doing some sort of tabling or support of that almost weekly for years since. I value hexbear as place for comradely discussion it was actually not good for my mental health (but very good for my "engagement") to be having transphobic shit showing up in place where it's normally been a respite from that.
I respect the work done to get us to this point, and I look forward to whatever solutions that we decide on.
This is kind of the issue. The site can't be both a safe space and a place to 'spread the word', and users are split between wanting either. The points you make are fair, but I think the two goals are mutually exclusive.
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The fediverse is mostly an insufferable reddit clone that I barely interact with outside of .ml. However, I think r/chapotraphouse was at its best when a reddit liberal/reactionary inadvertently wandered in and became the glizzy in the middle of a raccoon pack. The real core of the forum's subculture, which I think the success of c/The_Dunk_Tank shows, is the dada feeding frenzy when we attack a glizzy and we need a steady supply of them which the occasional wrecker doesn't provide. I think federation is a good thing in this regard. We're destined for that same antagonistic relationship r/chapotraphouse had because you can't put the raccoons in a business meeting and expect us to act professional, but there's a productive role in being the glizzy hunters of the wider emerging movement away from legacy social media. Our dumpster is empty and most other instances are full of treats.
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Maintain our standards, maybe reconsider user participation in external meta threads. It's throwing fuel on the fire but those people are usually prime glizzies. There should be some kind of rebuttal. Also let me make c/DPRSashatown so I don't have to make an account on another instance which allows community creation.
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We kind of need some kind of federation, the last few months before federation and getting onto the upstream Lemmy codebase were dire. So many pointless internal arguments, people nipping at each other for no reason, and activity wasn't great. Every time a long term user hit the
button, it was like a fifth of the website died. Federation has bred some much needed life into hexbear.Federating with shit just works in hindsight was a mistake, I honestly thought it was just one racist nutjob on the "meanwhile on the grad" community, I didn't expect half their instance to defend the racism of photoshopping a Chinese man's skin yellow. Had I known that would happen, I'd never vote for federating with them
As for future federation, we should probably communicate with the other instances admin team first before federating.
We kind of need some kind of federation, the last few months before federation and getting onto the upstream Lemmy codebase were dire. So many pointless internal arguments, people nipping at each other for no reason, and activity wasn't great. Every time a long term user hit the button, it was like a fifth of the website died. Federation has bred some much needed life into hexbear.
This is my opinion as well. Prefederation era Hexbear sucked for various reasons that you've outlined. People were all low-key resentful with one another. It had the same energy as an ex-couple forced to work on a school project or forced to be coworkers. I remember so much cringey vagueposting because mods would delete any comment that mentioned people's usernames as "meta," so you had people vagueposting and letting that resentment stew. It was just awkward in general. Federation injected fresh blood and provided a pressure valve for that pent-up resentment to be blown on some hapless Ledditor.
Yeah in the lead up to federation we had the bidet struggle session, rock stacking discourse, people saying hunger is not real, bringing back years old arguments just for the purpose of stirring the pot (outdoor cats, sex work and veganism are the three I can remember right now), and every second thread just turned into people moaning about how alienated and lonely they are, while yapping and vague posting nasty stuff towards other users.
I love our lemmygrad comrades and those cool posters on lemmy.ml and lemm.ee that I've seen. Otherwise, it's just been shitlibs spiling jice.
Yeah, I haven't noticed much activity from the hobby instances except the TTRPG one, but that's probably my personal blinders and how active we are.
I got here because of the brief federation and subsequent defederation with blahaj. Seeing the good takes here, and the rabid lib anticommunist reaction there, drove me hither. However, I probably would not have bothered making yet another account without the defederation.
I've seen others suggest an airlock instance to allow dunking for those who want to without releasing the radlibs and transphobes on hexbear itself, and that sounds like a good idea to me.
When I unknowingly click on another instance's post and read their comments, I can immediately tell. Hexbear is the cool kids table.
Well, it seems like every time we federate with a sizable instance, there's a roughly week-long period of strife and then usually defederation. It's quite disruptive, led to several complaints about the vibes being off, and has also led to nasty harassment of our users. We should probably not bother trying to federate with other large instances. And we really ought to thoroughly examine the vibes of an instance before federation.
I think lemmy.ml and lemm.ee are manageable now that things have calmed down. We should just add small/hobbyist instances as they pop up from now on.
I was excited for federation mainly because it would mean new content. The slop trough was pretty dry beforehand tbh. Unfortunately in reality the new content kinda sucks and I end up filtering by local, but there are also less posts there now, like activity is being diluted into other instances.
Reading brain dead takes in hb threads is excruciating and also not something I missed, like, at all. Being a communist irl is fucking hard to be honest, it’s really difficult to find spaces where I can just be myself. It’s one of the nicest things about this place, the core set of common beliefs. Folks I think generally have been correct in the assessment that it’s basically like inviting redditors into our space. The bad outweighs the good. And imo just a single instance of a trans comrade being harassed in DM is sufficient justification for defederation.
All of that said I think it’s good that we are on the new code base, and it’s been really cool to hang with lemmygrad and the occasional simpatico users from other instances. So it definitely has potential to be a positive, we just did too much too soon. The idea I’ve seen floated of engaging with admins of other communities up front is a really good one and what I would recommend as the path forward.
As an adult, I had zero interest in getting into silly internet slapfights with reddit-brained dumdums from the word go.
After 3 years of posting on chapohexbearchat it was interesting to read posts from users from clearly different site cultures intermingling with our own. Not the racist/sexist/homophobic/transphobic posts though, those were grating.
I'd like to see federation continue, just with more quality control
interesting to see the different conceptions of what the purpose of hexbear is. i saw a group of people commenting in the sh.itjust.sucks thread that seemed to think that federation was the point of hexbear in the first place, in order to proselytize to libs and connect with lost comrades. before federation, i was under the impression that the main purpose of hexbear was for internal support and providing a safe place for a variety of people who might not have another safe place on the internet.
i am wondering if the mods have an idea about which hexbear is, and if so, what is it? or do the mods see their role as enforcing the general will of the community through voting on federation, etc.?
imo i understand why some people latched onto federation as an opportunity to build socialism but i think maybe the phrase "posting is praxis" seeped a little too deeply into some people's minds. if you ask me the purpose of hexbear, it's a place for us to support each other, not a home base from which to battle others. but that's just my opinion, the other perspective isn't necessarily invalid.
i think the fediverse sucks and is full of the exact redditors i use this site to avoid. i would like to stop doing federation because it sucks
agrees
