I donāt like it, but Iām not there to moderate communities. What I care about is my instance rules being adhered to. This is why I point out that anyone is free to start their own community and moderate it as they see fit.
There is no universal way to moderate a community, you are going to piss someone off no matter how you do it. If I got personally involved, then all communities would be my communities - thatās really not good, nor feasible.
I canāt help it, I keep getting drawn back in. I was curious about what your TOS actually are, and as it happens the content you say you are helpless to moderate actually does violate your siteās terms of service. Under āContent Restrictionsā, it forbids āFalse information.ā
From your number 2 community, top of the front page, not even far down:
āEl Salvador Blocks Sen. Van Hollenās Visit with Deported Illegal Alienā - He wasnāt deported (since thatās a legal process, which was not followed in this case), and also, he had legal status in the US.
āYoung people are now overwhelmingly Republicanā - The underlying survey reported that there is a selected age range (18-21) and a selected question (who you support in the 2026 congressional election) which you can select to eke out a 12-point lead for the Republican answer to the question. However, the young people who consider themselves liberal outnumber the self-identified conservatives by 16 points overall. There are other questions (Trumpās favorability rating) which show an even more marked liberal shift in young people overall. The headline is only true if you adopt laughably specific or wrong definitions of all three of the phrases āyoung peopleā, āoverwhelminglyā, and āRepublicanā. Otherwise, it is objectively false. The self-identified party ID actually was collected (for purposes of weighting), but for some reason it is not published what the breakdown was. Iād be curious to see it.
Again: This is why people donāt like your conduct here. Having a political viewpoint is fine. Iām fine with conservative people. When someone starts objectively lying to prop up their views, people will start to view them as malicious and someone whoās taking a āoh ho I canāt get involvedā attitude to giving them a platform as also malicious. When itās not just objectively untrue, but also engineered to produce dangerous or deadly results in the real world, thatās where people will simply not want it around. Pretty firmly.
Sorry if it seems like Iām just trying to argue with you. Again, you seem like you at least deserve the benefit of the doubt and complete explanation, since nothing youāre saying seems crazy or obviously malicious, like you think this is good instance-admin philosophy. Iām taking time to present the alternative view. If you were hosting a conservative community, but also making it clear that open and deliberate propaganda was not welcome, then I think youād be fine. But, of course, such a community would be a nightmare to try to define and police in practice, and if the effort was at all successful, then all the āconservativesā of the modern US variety wouldnāt want to be there. Which is exactly the problem.
I am not helpless to moderate, I donāt want to moderate communities. Are you suggesting that I should be an authoritarian admin? I offer an instance where people, such as yourself, can start their own communities and run them as they like.
Both of those are links to external articles. These links are posted on content aggregator platforms for the purpose of debate. Some people will agree with them, others, like you, will argue against them. That is fine, and not a violation of any rules.
Both of those are links to external articles. These links are posted on content aggregator platforms for the purpose of debate. Some people will agree with them, others, like you, will argue against them. That is fine, and not a violation of any rules.
Yeah, but you set the rules. You explained, just now, that you just donāt feel like itās proper to tell people how to moderate. Thatās fine. I would suggest that you stop blaming āthe rulesā for this decision. Thatās why I got confused, I thought you were doing the lemmy.world thing of treating āthe rulesā as something you were required somehow to obey. If you just donāt want to police this stuff off your instance, then fine, I get that. Just own up to it being your decision (as youāve now done, so now I get it). You make the rules. Youāve decided how to make them.
Are you suggesting that I should be an authoritarian admin? I offer an instance where people, such as yourself, can start their own communities and run them as they like.
Maybe an analogy would help.
If you go to a city, and itās a authoritarian police state, thatās bad. Thatās lemmy.ml. The admins just tell people what viewpoints they can and canāt have, ban people at the drop of a hat, itās just a stupid endeavor. Donāt do that.
If you go to a city, and itās totally lawless and the police donāt do shit, thatās also bad. You can get shot, there are muggings and assaults constantly, your car will get broken into. Most people on Lemmy, I think, would prefer not to go to that neighborhood. Put a pin in that.
If you go to a city, and the police are just kind of weird, you get hassled for jaywalking or asked for ID for random reasons, but then other things clearly seem criminal and the police donāt care, thatās bad. Thatās lemmy.world. The moderation isnāt exactly āauthoritarianā but it isnāt competent either. Major crimes get handled, itās not unsafe, but things arenāt real well-organized.
If you go to a city, and itās just normal, you can walk around and go to shops, but if you break in someoneās car the police come and arrest you, thatās good. IDK, maybe I am going to trigger some Lemmy people by implying that the police are ever a beneficial presence, but thatās how I see it. Thatās how I think most good instances aspire to be. I would define that as lemm.ee, sh.itjust.works, that sort of place. You can start a conservative community, you can be a conservative person or moderator. It is fine. You have freedom. But also, part of that freedom is being protected against certain conduct. It happens that, for some reason, the people with modern-US-conservative views cannot manage over the long term to avoid doing that type of conduct, and so eventually they inevitably tend to get banned and have to find new places.
Iām saying that your instance sounds like itās too much along the lines of the second city. Itās just that no one wants to deal with that shit. Again, it has nothing to do with the viewpoint, at least on reasonable instances. Itās just that after the 200th post of something that is just made-up nonsense in service of racism or the murder of democracy, or the 200th time someone attacks you for made-up reasons and then is hostile and randomly evasive about any type of fact-based discussion about it, people start to recognize the signs. The people with that behavior have outstayed their welcome. And, for whatever reason, modern US conservatives seem to self-select themselves into this weird little bubble where they just like to tell each other outlandish lies, agree with each other, misrepresent themselves to āwinā discussions, and attack anyone who tries to talk with them. Actually, that all applies also to a lot of the far-left Lemmy instances also, which is why I donāt fuck with them either.
I actually donāt like that conservative views get objected to constantly, and any conservative community just gets laughed at and dunked on. Itās not balanced. I have some conservative views. Not many but a few. One example is that I think, in general in the modern day in the US, the police are fine. Not always (and there are other parts of the system that need a ton of work) but most of the time. I regularly get downvoted to oblivion from time to time when that comes up. Thatās fine, it doesnāt bother me. No one that I can remember has ever censored me for it. I do actually get moderated sometimes when I am a cockhead, but as far as I can remember thatās never actually overlapped with me saying any conservative view.
The issue is not viewpoint. The issue is conduct. Posting laughably incorrect racist propaganda and promoting it, for some reason, seems to overlap with a way of interacting with other users that eventually gets people banned. For some reason. You may not intending to welcome that conduct by welcoming the laughable racist propaganda, but (a) itās weird that you want to go to bat to make a safe place for people to make communities of that stuff and then expect any other people to want to interact with that place (b) I think you should realize that itās going to come along with some conduct which you definitely donāt want either.
I am not blaming the rules, I am saying they arenāt breaking them.
As an admin, I donāt want to be an authoritarian. That is a choice that I am making purposefully. I could choose to ban whatever I dislike, but this whole Lemmy thing canāt work if every admin just inserts their political viewpoint into everything.
It is not up to me to decide what makes a good conservative, or democrat, or socialist, or car enthusiast, or whatever else. If someone wants to create a community where only content that praises Cthulhu is allowed, then that is their prerogative. All I care about is that they stick to my instance rules.
Everyone is equally welcome here. If you think that this particular Conservative community is biased or too heavily moderated, then you can always start your own - in fact I encourage you to. You could run a conservative community on HC and moderate it however you want. What I will not do is ban other people for you.
I donāt like it, but Iām not there to moderate communities. What I care about is my instance rules being adhered to. This is why I point out that anyone is free to start their own community and moderate it as they see fit.
There is no universal way to moderate a community, you are going to piss someone off no matter how you do it. If I got personally involved, then all communities would be my communities - thatās really not good, nor feasible.
I canāt help it, I keep getting drawn back in. I was curious about what your TOS actually are, and as it happens the content you say you are helpless to moderate actually does violate your siteās terms of service. Under āContent Restrictionsā, it forbids āFalse information.ā
From your number 2 community, top of the front page, not even far down:
Again: This is why people donāt like your conduct here. Having a political viewpoint is fine. Iām fine with conservative people. When someone starts objectively lying to prop up their views, people will start to view them as malicious and someone whoās taking a āoh ho I canāt get involvedā attitude to giving them a platform as also malicious. When itās not just objectively untrue, but also engineered to produce dangerous or deadly results in the real world, thatās where people will simply not want it around. Pretty firmly.
Sorry if it seems like Iām just trying to argue with you. Again, you seem like you at least deserve the benefit of the doubt and complete explanation, since nothing youāre saying seems crazy or obviously malicious, like you think this is good instance-admin philosophy. Iām taking time to present the alternative view. If you were hosting a conservative community, but also making it clear that open and deliberate propaganda was not welcome, then I think youād be fine. But, of course, such a community would be a nightmare to try to define and police in practice, and if the effort was at all successful, then all the āconservativesā of the modern US variety wouldnāt want to be there. Which is exactly the problem.
I am not helpless to moderate, I donāt want to moderate communities. Are you suggesting that I should be an authoritarian admin? I offer an instance where people, such as yourself, can start their own communities and run them as they like.
Both of those are links to external articles. These links are posted on content aggregator platforms for the purpose of debate. Some people will agree with them, others, like you, will argue against them. That is fine, and not a violation of any rules.
Yeah, but you set the rules. You explained, just now, that you just donāt feel like itās proper to tell people how to moderate. Thatās fine. I would suggest that you stop blaming āthe rulesā for this decision. Thatās why I got confused, I thought you were doing the lemmy.world thing of treating āthe rulesā as something you were required somehow to obey. If you just donāt want to police this stuff off your instance, then fine, I get that. Just own up to it being your decision (as youāve now done, so now I get it). You make the rules. Youāve decided how to make them.
Maybe an analogy would help.
If you go to a city, and itās a authoritarian police state, thatās bad. Thatās lemmy.ml. The admins just tell people what viewpoints they can and canāt have, ban people at the drop of a hat, itās just a stupid endeavor. Donāt do that.
If you go to a city, and itās totally lawless and the police donāt do shit, thatās also bad. You can get shot, there are muggings and assaults constantly, your car will get broken into. Most people on Lemmy, I think, would prefer not to go to that neighborhood. Put a pin in that.
If you go to a city, and the police are just kind of weird, you get hassled for jaywalking or asked for ID for random reasons, but then other things clearly seem criminal and the police donāt care, thatās bad. Thatās lemmy.world. The moderation isnāt exactly āauthoritarianā but it isnāt competent either. Major crimes get handled, itās not unsafe, but things arenāt real well-organized.
If you go to a city, and itās just normal, you can walk around and go to shops, but if you break in someoneās car the police come and arrest you, thatās good. IDK, maybe I am going to trigger some Lemmy people by implying that the police are ever a beneficial presence, but thatās how I see it. Thatās how I think most good instances aspire to be. I would define that as lemm.ee, sh.itjust.works, that sort of place. You can start a conservative community, you can be a conservative person or moderator. It is fine. You have freedom. But also, part of that freedom is being protected against certain conduct. It happens that, for some reason, the people with modern-US-conservative views cannot manage over the long term to avoid doing that type of conduct, and so eventually they inevitably tend to get banned and have to find new places.
Iām saying that your instance sounds like itās too much along the lines of the second city. Itās just that no one wants to deal with that shit. Again, it has nothing to do with the viewpoint, at least on reasonable instances. Itās just that after the 200th post of something that is just made-up nonsense in service of racism or the murder of democracy, or the 200th time someone attacks you for made-up reasons and then is hostile and randomly evasive about any type of fact-based discussion about it, people start to recognize the signs. The people with that behavior have outstayed their welcome. And, for whatever reason, modern US conservatives seem to self-select themselves into this weird little bubble where they just like to tell each other outlandish lies, agree with each other, misrepresent themselves to āwinā discussions, and attack anyone who tries to talk with them. Actually, that all applies also to a lot of the far-left Lemmy instances also, which is why I donāt fuck with them either.
I actually donāt like that conservative views get objected to constantly, and any conservative community just gets laughed at and dunked on. Itās not balanced. I have some conservative views. Not many but a few. One example is that I think, in general in the modern day in the US, the police are fine. Not always (and there are other parts of the system that need a ton of work) but most of the time. I regularly get downvoted to oblivion from time to time when that comes up. Thatās fine, it doesnāt bother me. No one that I can remember has ever censored me for it. I do actually get moderated sometimes when I am a cockhead, but as far as I can remember thatās never actually overlapped with me saying any conservative view.
The issue is not viewpoint. The issue is conduct. Posting laughably incorrect racist propaganda and promoting it, for some reason, seems to overlap with a way of interacting with other users that eventually gets people banned. For some reason. You may not intending to welcome that conduct by welcoming the laughable racist propaganda, but (a) itās weird that you want to go to bat to make a safe place for people to make communities of that stuff and then expect any other people to want to interact with that place (b) I think you should realize that itās going to come along with some conduct which you definitely donāt want either.
I am not blaming the rules, I am saying they arenāt breaking them.
As an admin, I donāt want to be an authoritarian. That is a choice that I am making purposefully. I could choose to ban whatever I dislike, but this whole Lemmy thing canāt work if every admin just inserts their political viewpoint into everything.
It is not up to me to decide what makes a good conservative, or democrat, or socialist, or car enthusiast, or whatever else. If someone wants to create a community where only content that praises Cthulhu is allowed, then that is their prerogative. All I care about is that they stick to my instance rules.
Everyone is equally welcome here. If you think that this particular Conservative community is biased or too heavily moderated, then you can always start your own - in fact I encourage you to. You could run a conservative community on HC and moderate it however you want. What I will not do is ban other people for you.
I feel like itās just repeating at this point. I tried.