this post was submitted on 16 Apr 2025
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I get it. There's some real jerks around here. Whether they're constantly argumentative, downright rude, always acting in bad faith, just plain trolls, overly opinionated on every subject, have the social skills of a Nausicaan, or whatever - the Fediverse is growing, and it's bound to attract toxicity in one way or another.

This post is mostly a PSA for anyone who's feeling like leaving because they're tired of dealing with things like that. I've been there several times myself, I know exactly how you feel, and I'm tired of seeing good people harassed off the platform.

Just remember that blocking is a very powerful way to stay in control of your experience. Be it a set of users, me specifically, a list of keywords, a whole community, or an entire instance: if it's causing you nothing but stress, hit that block button and see if that improves your experience here. Unlike the alien site, there is no limit to the number of entities you can block; you're in control.

Another thing to keep in mind is different instances have different vibes, and the experience can totally differ depending on the instance's moderation and federation policy.

In conclusion, your experience here can be what you make of it; don't be afraid to just block the parts that stress you out. You're not "creating an echo chamber" as everyone likes to say (often in bad faith) -- you're just taking care of yourself.

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[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 1 points 1 month ago

have the social skills of a Nausicaan

Play Domjot?

[–] ComfortablyDumb@lemmy.ca 14 points 1 month ago (2 children)

The biggest toxicity comes from the tank triad. I have blocked them and now it is peaceful.

[–] Trashbones@lemmy.sdf.org 5 points 1 month ago (1 children)
[–] TORFdot0@lemmy.world 12 points 1 month ago (8 children)

Lemmy.ml Lemmygrad Hexbear

Basically the 3 far left instances that will enforce the discourse to be Marxist and anti-west.

Most instances are defederated from the latter two but not the first because that instance is run by the main Lemmy devs (who are communists)

[–] ComfortablyDumb@lemmy.ca 14 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Not even communists. I have had communists as friends during my grad and undergrad. Tank triad are a worser kind. They actively hinders any discussion against China. Tianenmen? Never happened. Mao's genocide? western propaganda. Chinese imperialism in Tibet? China reclaiming its historical boundaries. Basically China and USSR can never do anything wrong. If they did, its western propaganda.

Also why cant they defederate from lemmy.ml? That should be technically possible as the code is open source and can be fetched easily to run an instance?

[–] TORFdot0@lemmy.world 7 points 1 month ago

Anyone can defederate from .ml but they have a lot of users being the dev run site, so many don’t. Or at least that’s the reason lemmy.world has given in the past about why they have don’t federate with hexbear and lemmygrad but still do with ml

[–] catloaf@lemm.ee 3 points 1 month ago (1 children)

And not in a productive way, either. Once in a while I see a couple hexbear users in a thread, so I'm guessing crossposts happen. But their comments are mostly just name-calling and shitting on liberals.

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[–] ptz@dubvee.org 14 points 1 month ago (1 children)

That's like the "install uBlock Origin" first step as far as I'm concerned lol.

[–] ComfortablyDumb@lemmy.ca 9 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Yup. Learned it the hard way. My first account was with lemmy.ml and it got banned because of criticizing China. I consider myself leftist and the amount of censorship the tank triad do to ensure China numba wan is mind numbing.

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[–] HubertManne@piefed.social 10 points 1 month ago

Im a big believer in block. I think its better for people to peruse all and block communities they are uninterested in and you should totally block users you don't like. To me it should be like real life. Don't hang with folks you don't like. My hope for the fediverse is instances that only remove things to stay out of legal trouble and communities that only block things that are unrelated. I want all the big tools to be at the user level. Bottom up.

[–] dumples@midwest.social 3 points 1 month ago

I have blocked a few communities which I have really enjoyed. I think there is definitely a different but freeing experience to be in charge of curating your experience instead of algorithms doing it for you. It's more work but the freedom is nice but making the constant choice feels hard.

[–] SARGE@startrek.website 19 points 1 month ago (3 children)

I know for a fact I'm opinionated, and don't have problems sharing them.

Please, by all means, block me if you think seeing my comments is adversely affecting you. I'd rather be ignored by someone than make their day worse (unless they're actively trying to make others miserable, but that's a separate discussion)

The fediverse has definitely gotten a little less hostile after blocking a few things.

And remember you can jump ship to another instance at any time! I've hopped a few times but for now my instance is filling my needs without much drama that I am aware of.

[–] gigachad@sh.itjust.works 6 points 1 month ago

I quickly went over your comment history of the last 30 days and you have almost no downvotes. You are a wholesome person and I'm glad you are here!

[–] ptz@dubvee.org 6 points 1 month ago

I think it's less about having strong opinions and more with how those are expressed. But either way, you're here with a good attitude, and that's appreciated.

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[–] Corgana@startrek.website 12 points 1 month ago

Additional PSA to admins not running a "universal free speech" instance- if you see someone someone being obnoxious it's probably annoying your users just as much as is is you. Don't put the onus fully on users to curate their experience. The Fediverse needs our adults in the room!

[–] ocean@lemmy.selfhostcat.com 2 points 1 month ago

What I read to do is to call them out, report them, then block them. They need to know they’re being mean.

[–] homesweethomeMrL@lemmy.world 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Block users and instances (although blocking instances just blocks the topic posts from that instance, not all the users from that instance).

[–] reseller_pledge609@lemmy.dbzer0.com 2 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Wish instance blocking actually blocked properly. But the main devs know everyone would block the tanky triad immediately and they'd have no one to troll.

[–] OpenStars@piefed.social 7 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Instance blocking works on:

  1. PieFed
  2. the Lemmy apps Sync and Connect
  3. instance admins who can choose to defederate
  4. someone willing to go deep and make a custom web browser filter (presumably like Ublock Origin I would guess)

Nothing else works.

[–] Derpenheim@lemmy.zip 3 points 1 month ago

Thank you! I try to exercise caution for myself of am I just off put by this or is this truly uncessary behavior, and I'm glad the option to judge for myself is available.

[–] NuXCOM_90Percent@lemmy.zip 4 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Yes and no.

I am a big fan of block buttons and use them quite liberally (if someone responds to me in a manner that makes it clear they have no intention of having a conversation? I never see them ever again).

But the problem is that it only blocks it for the user who blocks them. So harassment is still a thing and now even fewer people are likely to flag it for moderation (to the extent that works).

There is obviously room for abuse but I am a firm believer that any block feature must be bidirectional. If user A blocks user B then A and B can no longer see each other or interact. Which would be a fundamental lemmy feature which makes things difficult.

But "just block them" is good for people who are annoying. Not for people who are abusive. And while the latter isn't SUPER common on lemmy, there are still a good number of people who respond to the simplest of things with "Fuck you you fucking moron and you should go kill yourself"

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