Lemmy.world Hexbear Statement

Update:
The comments from this post will not be removed as to preserve the discussion around the announcement. Any continued discussions outside of this thread that violate server rules will be removed. We feel that everyone that has an opinion, and wanted to vent, has been heard.

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Original post:
Yesterday, we received information about the planned federation by Hexbear. The announcement thread can be found here: https://www.hexbear.net/post/280770. After reviewing the thread and the comments, it became evident that allowing Hexbear to federate would violate our rules.

Our code of conduct and server rules can be found here.

The announcement included several concerning statements, as highlighted below:

“Please try to keep the dirtbag lib-dunking to hexbear itself. Do not follow the Chapo Rules of Posting, instead try to engage utilizing informed rhetoric with sources to dismantle western propaganda. Posting the western atrocity propaganda and pig poop balls is hilarious but will pretty quickly get you banned and if enough of us do it defederated.”
“The West's role in the world, through organizations such as NATO, the IMF, and the World Bank - among many others - are deeply harmful to the billions of people living both inside and outside of their imperial core.”
“These organizations constitute the modern imperial order, with the United States at its heart - we are not fooled by the term "rules-based international order." It is in the Left's interest for these organizations to be demolished. When and how this will occur, and what precisely comes after, is the cause of great debate and discussion on this site, but it is necessary for a better world.”

The rhetoric and goal of Hexbar are clear based on their announcement: to "dismantle western propaganda" and "demolish organizations such as NATO” shows that Hexbar has no intention of "respecting the rules of the community instance in which they are posting/commenting.” It’s to push their beliefs and ideology.

In addition, several comments from a Hexbear admin, demonstrate that instance rules will not be respected.

Here are some examples:

“I can assure you there will be no lemmygrad brigades, that energy would be better funneled into the current war against liberalism on the wider fediverse.”

“All loyal, honest, active and upright Communists must unite to oppose the liberal tendencies shown by certain people among us, and set them on the right path. This is one of the tasks on our ideological front.”

Overall community comments:

To clarify, for those who have inquired about why Hexbear versus Lemmygrad, it should be noted that we are currently exploring the possibility of defederating from Lemmygrad as well based on similar comments Hexbear has made.

Defederation should only be considered as a last resort. However, based on their comments and behavior, no positive outcomes can be expected.

We made the decision to preemptively defederate from Hexbear for these reasons. While we understand that not everyone may agree with our decision, we believe it is important to prioritize the best interests of our community.

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1K comments

I have lurked here for a long time, but I just don't understand the logic here. I read the statement that was linked here, and it just seemed like they were saying that they should be respectful and follow our rules? ... Isn't dismantling propaganda... through "informed rhetoric" a good thing? Why are NATO, the IMF or World Bank automatically good? ... Aren't we just creating a bubble by preemptively blocking a large lemmy instance just because we don't like their political speech? As far as I can tell they aren't promoting racism or bigotry. Has lemmy.world preemptively banned nazi or right-wing instances?
- Has lemmy.world preemptively banned nazi or right-wing instances?
  
  no. it was an ordeal for them to ban the nazis over at exploding heads.
  
  exploding-heads also got an admin statement full of actual evidence showing how posters there were being racist. Hexbear only gets this frankly extremely poorly written and thinly argued diatribe with no actual substance.
  
  I think the issue is, for some, showing Hexbear's rules makes it self-evident. Unless you think an instance formed with the goal of pushing themselves into other instances isn't an issue.
  
  Basically, any instance that has such open contempt for other instances in its rules, and has to tell its users don't fuck around and get us defederated but please do go into other instances and spread the gospel...can you not see why that wouldn't be welcomed? It shouldn't need to be spelled out.
  
  YOU ARE NOT QUOTING OUR RULES: hexbear.net/code_of_conduct Those are our rules
  
  Concerning.
  
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  Im an evil tankie out to control the other instances, you caught me!?!?!? Only thing I’ve come to do is ask your admins to be consistent and say this is for ideological reasons. Are you going to call the other .world commenters with concerns tankies too lol
  
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  If they support the promotion leftist propaganda?
  
  Lmao y’all don’t normally go mask off like this. Scratch a liberal ig
  
  (Psst you’re supposed to say “Tankies aren’t really leftists!!!”)
- Yea implying that we don't have propaganda and narratives on our side of the wall is naive
  
  If we want the truth then an open discussion is the path. There will be arguments in bad faith, sure. But that's not limited to "them". It's a human discussion thing.
- I read the statement that was linked here, and it just seemed like they were saying that they should be respectful and follow our rules?
  
  Read through some of the first set of links if you haven't. The same admin who's trying to gently suggest they don't troll is talking about how their instance won't brigade lemmygrad because the energy is better focused on the wider war against liberalism in the fediverse. It calls into question exactly how real that suggestion is vs. just a pro-forma attempt to head off this exact result with a toothless suggestion they know no one is going to follow.
  
  That’s my take on it too. It’s a token post saying to do it, but we’re going to denounce you if you’re called out.
- "informed rethoric" will be some of the most piss poor arguments you have ever seen in your life.
  
  That doesn't necessarily mean the arguments are made in bad faith.
  
  No, but it's still free speech, meaning nobody is forced to listen. In this case the "persons" are lemmy instances. If you talk shit, others will walk away (defederate).
  
  Poor arguments does not equal talking shit. And I would prefer to decide for myself who I do/don't listen to. It's the admins' right to ban instances as they see fit, but I don't see a good reason to do so preemptively. I'd rather include opinions/ideologies I don't agree with than shut them out (as long as they follow the rules, to which Hexbear didn't even get the chance).
  
  And I would prefer to decide for myself who I do/don’t listen to.
  
  You can, by spinning up a personal one-man instance and making an account on it, then federating with whoever you want.
  
  Short of that, you're always going to be beholden to someone. The fact you can even do that is more than is possible on mainstream social media.
  
  I know, I never said otherwise. I just expressed my opinion on the matter. Telling me to go start my own instance if I disagree is kinda proving my point.
  
  What I'm saying is that you will never be able to decide for yourself who you do/don't listen to, even on Lemmy. There will always be mods and there will always be admins wherever you go, unless you just head off by yourself and spin something up, and even then the mods and admins on the communities of the other instances you follow will be able to remove content on their instance.
  
  Just because there are impurities in your fresh water line, it doesn't mean that you necessarily have to connect it to a literal cesspit.
  
  Facts. I just disagree with the admins' approach to this particular issue.
- Granted I only see the cherry picked statements in the post, but these things do not speak from a place of neutrality or at the very least openness. When all those things being bad is stated as close to fact, and them being against western propaganda,. They seem, to me, much less like a place that wants no propaganda and discussion of world organizations, and instead it sounds like a place that wants all of it gone and no place for western/left supportive discussion (which can be labeled propaganda, which may be a negative outlook on my side but any other site saying they do not want propaganda of one side usually isn't very happy about arguments in favor of said side even when said thing is a fact or at least relevant to the discussion)
  
  There were also comments very much critical of federation here because of some political joke posts. If shit post tier jokes on political figures aren't ok things will work out. because it's a Chinese communist it's about, I'm also extremely sceptical of ho well.
  
  With that said, I'm not completely against the federation, but it would require the mods to be vigilant and see if the federation doesn't harm the general community over time. That might be a lot to ask for, since I do not know how much time and effort they already put into this already.
- This would be a lot more believable if your account wasn't just 6 hours old.
  
  Probably doesn't want to be brigaded. I've had random posts and comments downvoted by neckbeards for no reason. To the point that people in that community (LotR) were replying to me in surprise.
  
  shut up troll
- Because for these people "informed rhetoric" means quoting russian propaganda websites and repeating keywords to sound informed. They're no different than flatearthers once you do some research, however. Unlike flatearthers, tho, these guys are trying to undermine progress so they are a lot more harmful
  
  I hear the accusation thrown around about russian propaganda all the time, and it seems so spurious to me. It seems like a conspiracy theory unto itself. It is thought-terminating. Back when I used to go on reddit, I would get called a bot occasionally myself. It is something people throw out there so they don't have to entertain any sort of cognitive dissonance. Like, if information is exposing a truth, but you don't like source, that does not necessarily mean that it is untrue. Im sorry. That is a logical fallacy itself. it also ignores that the US, and US business entities in particular, are much more powerful and influential... I remember reading that US congress spend $300 billion to "counter the malign influence of the CCP" ... that is close to what China spent on its military alone in 2022... The US also has a history of buying journalists and waging large internet influence campaigns, among other things... but I haven't seen people calling other people shills or bots for repeated US-talking points... just looking it up now: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird
  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Earnest_Voice
  https://cyberscoop.com/meta-blames-u-s-military-for-information-operation/
  https://theprint.in/tech/60-80-of-twitter-accounts-posting-on-russia-ukraine-war-bots-90-pro-ukraine-finds-new-study/1114878/
  
  american propaganda is strong on the internet.
  
  I'm speaking from experience after wasting countless hours trying to have actual conversations. Even tried direct messages but whenever I did that, it felt like I was speaking to a whole different person. They would clam up and be like "sorry, don't wanna talk about it" or something.
  
  Can't imagine why someone wouldn't want to have a DM conversation with a person who thinks they're worse than a flat earther
  
  Ah, but they feel fine presenting their views to a large passive audience?
  
  ...a forum post, where you might actually have something resembling a real discussion, is of course preferable to someone who thinks you're an idiot bothering you in your DMs.
  
  Good thing that never happens with the liberals here.
  
  You should see what happens over on the 'grad when we give liberals reading recommendations.
  
  "Fucking tankies, never willing to open their minds to new ideas."
  
  "Here's some new ideas!"
  
  "No."
  
  A liberal on Lemmygrad thinking he's got some new ideas to show the tankies is hilarious.
  
  ”Have you even read Xi's Wikipedia article?”
  
  Let me tell you about how calling a Chinese guy a yellow bear is the funniest thing ever and definitely not an unconsciously racist thought-terminating cliché.
  
  I guarantee you nobody thinks of it like that except those like you who are trying to undermine the actually funny reality that Xi does look like Winnie the Pooh. Chinese people are not fucking yellow anyway, they're pretty much the same color as "white" people.
  
  I guarantee you that it is blatantly rooted in orientalism and treating 1 billion Asian people as either agencyless victims or buffoonish idiots, and it's never questioned that crackers "joking" about him a yellow cartoon character would be a problem. This is a longstanding trope with roots in Western "race science".
  
  You can also find it in the ethnic rhetoric used against Russians at the moment - "savages", "hordes", "orcs", and the classic false trope of sending masses to die as an attritional strategy (the last one also being literally Nazi rhetoric). You also saw it in the anti-brown islamophobia after 9/12.
  
  When the US wants to target an enemy, they have very little trouble playing on the unquestioned racism of their audience. They often don't even think it's racism at the time - or even afterwards unless sufficiently embarrassed.
  
  Fuck off commie. You're barely better than a Nazi.
  
  "Here's some new ideas!"
  
  Hands you a Karl Marx book.
  
  Stupid fucking tankies.
  
  Hands you a Karl Marx book
  
  I mean, Marx is rarely ever actually recommended to people who are not already socialists of some flavor. His works are important and foundational, but more often than not we recommend more modern texts.
  
  You are speaking only to your ignorance and the hatred that keeps you from engaging with other ideas. I'd go so far as to say you're proving my point.
  
  There are more modern, digestible pieces of theory and historiography... hundreds upon hundreds of books and articles that would shatter your illusions in an instant if you ever bothered to touch them.
  
  In fact, for any lurkers (not the person I'm responding to, who will likely never pick up another book in their life) who still passively or actively support the U.S. or NATO or the other heads of empire, I recommend William Blum's Rogue State and Killing Hope. Both peer-reviewed. Intelligence officials have reviewed them and said "I don't like this book, but it's correct and well-sourced".
  
  If you refuse to even engage with the literature, then you are not good faith actors desiring conversation and freeze peach or whatever. You have an ideological agenda.
  
  Give me a question about communism, give me a question about imperialism -- I will answer to the best of my ability and will reference writings not from the 1800s. You know how I know more than just what Marx said? Because I read. Literacy is a gift and so many of y'all just proudly waste it.
  
  But quoting American propaganda is okay?
  
  Do you speak disingenuously on purpose? Or are you just an idiot?
  
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  Right, my bad, forgot to mention insults.
  
  You've done nothing but insult hundreds of people here. All without saying anything of actual substance.
  
  Are you sure we're the bots?
  
  Permanently Deleted
  
  Many things I don't agree with, are **not ** part of Russian propaganda... You're creating a strawman argument.
  
  Is the Russian propaganda in the room with us right now?

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