Fediverse

Sounds more like a Showerthought, but I'm going to allow it.

I have a couple of suggestions to add:

I was considering leaving the other site before the API fiasco because it felt like so many users approach engagement as rhetorical combat, that is, the point of discussion is to defeat the other person. Instead, think one of Covey's habits of highly-effective people: "Win-win, or no deal." Approach discussion on the Fediverse as a collaborative act, in which you're exchanging ideas with another person. Even if you disagree, you can both win by respectfully hearing out the other person. And if the other person won't collaborate? No deal! Just disengage.

Just like in intimate relationship, use "I" statements instead of "you" statements. Telling people who they are and what they believe is not only disrespectful, but probably wrong, often exaggerated or distorted for rhetorical combat purposes. People get angry when their identity gets poked at. One exception, of course, is when giving advice, like, stick to what you know, and share your thoughts and your reactions to a topic.

I started using Lemmy just recently. I haven't seen any sexism here so far. On reddit it's a matter of minutes until something sexist appears on my feed, or other hateful stuff. That's why I feel way more relaxed using Lemmy.

!lemmysilver

!lemmysilver

Lemmy is filled with too much hate, hopefully things can change

A lot of people dive in as if the entire fediverse has the same level of nerve as 4chan.

There are a lot of sensitive people here. The best thing I learned through my dealings with Mastodon is to be kind, and lurk before hitting that comment button.

The level of discord on the fediverse waxes and wanes depending where you are. There are conversations I'd never have here, that I'd gladly have elsewhere with no ill effects. The right words for the right group of people.

Lemmy has a well-known reputation as being a "Nazi bar". e.g. as mentioned in this example post in r/RedditAlternatives complaining about toxicity on Lemmy, here is one of the comments therein (not from OP but as part of the overall conversation):

If their experience is anything like mine, it’s populated by mostly far left wing Americans who were banned from Reddit for being too extreme. I disagreed with someone about a topical left wing American position and received death threats. In fact I’ve never received that many death threats on Reddit. Lemmy is extreme.

Even if the threats came from Hexbear or one of the lemmy.ml mods who are allowed to make death threats against users without any repercussions, "we" still expose "our" users to such content when we federate with those communities. i.e., for exactly the same reason that we defederate from instances that share CSAM, if we really, truly, genuinely don't like it when mods make death threats against users, then we need to put a stop to it - by defederating those instances that are known to do exactly that.

Otherwise we give our tacit approval, and moreover whenever we encourage people to join Lemmy instances, we willingly expose those people to this kind of content. Would you expose someone to CSAM, knowingly and without warning them first? Then why is it different when we can see the death threats, delivered by mods, who are not censured in any way, yet still encourage people to come here to Lemmy communities? Are we truly that desperate for content that we are so inconsiderate to them as to expose them to that without warning?

If you somehow have not heard of this yet and really don't know what I'm talking about, a lot of details are offered in Discuss.Online's (successful) Petition to defederate from hexbear.net, although that particular mod in question is from Lemmy.ml.

I notice tons and tons of hostility in comments. And I think it's from people jumping to the worst possible conclusion.

Great post.

To add to this, not resorting to calling others tankies or Russian bots when you have differing opinions, especially around politics.

Great post, as usual. Thank you for this!

One thing that has been concerning me lately is that the Fediverse is being treated as a refuge for people who get banned on Reddit or other social media. Sure, sometimes those bans are based on arbitrary power tripping nonsense. But people actually do get banned for being assholes, and so I've got some worry that this is distilling the population of the Fediverse in an unfortunate direction.