You can be banned from lemmy.blahaj.zone for calling out transphobia
You can be banned from lemmy.blahaj.zone for calling out transphobia
I recently made a new account on lemmy.blahaj.zone, because I’ve been harassed and doxxed on my old account and I wanted a fresh start with a more lighthearted online identity that I could be more open about my gender identity on. I’d heard blahaj zone was good for trans people, so I made my account there. And yeah, autism@lemmy.world removed my post discussing neuronormativism from a queer perspective, but I hoped maybe “the trans instance” would be friendlier to trans people.
A couple days after making my account, I saw someone on Blahaj engaging in the tired old cliche of “I hate politics, there’s no politics on my social media and I want to keep it that way!” Well we’ve all heard the joke that the two races are white and political, the two genders are male and political, and the two sexualities are straight and political. Hatred of politics is a transphobic, sexist, and racist trope. And having sufferred harassment and abuse from people inside the queer community who “hated politics” and saw trans or nonbinary or xenogender identities as political, I knew this kind of speech was going to make bigots feel comfortable saying they also hate politics, and they think us trans people are it.
So, I responded to the transphobia. I started out by attempting to educate them on what politics actually means. But I was interrupted by the Blahaj admin Ada, who told me that politics is “anything I disagree with”, and that indeed politics isn’t welcome on Blahaj. This language was deeply triggering of my past issues dealing with abuse, and I knew from past experience this sort of thing is said by people who are getting ready to say some enbyphobic or racist hate speech. It is especially common for white queer people to talk this way to BIPOC queer people. I tried to reason with Ada, explained the history of the cliche, the trauma it’s caused many trans people, and the consequences this kind of speech will have on the community here, making us all less safe.
Ada wasn’t having it. She minimised my concerns by reducing them to my personal trauma while ignoring my wider concerns for others’ safety, and weaponised my PTSD to paint my opinions as invalid because I am mentally ill. She said she owns Blahaj, and she gets to do whatever she wants with it, and nobody is allowed to express a differing opinion, even one that protects trans people, because that’s politics. At the time I thought her concern was me speaking directly to transphobes and making them feel uncomfortable by calling out their actions, so I said I’d just report it instead, and she banned my account.
This behaviour protects transphobes, WILL lead to trans and BIPOC people being harassed on this instance, attacks and gaslights victims of trauma (my concerns can’t be valid because I have a mental illness), and forces out any trans person with a commitment to safety for the community.
The thread where all this happened: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/comment/2143969
I think the issue was more about forcing intense discourse on people who aren't interested in having that conversation at that moment.
You werent banned for calling out transphobia, you were banned because you were being pedantic and argumentative. Plus you were on a new account so everything all together made it look like you were trolling.
I think if you had stopped after one or two comments it would be fine. My rule is generally to point out something if I feel it needs to be said, then maybe give one more clarifying response, then let it go.
Another choice would be to make a separate post somewhere discussing the neuances of 'disliking politics' -- then people who comment on it clearly want to have that discussion and are opting in.
It seems like the situation triggered you, and sometimes the most productive choice is to step back from the conversation and move on.
Sorry you got banned, i hope you find a new comfy home on lemmy!
I just wanted to thank you for giving actionable advice to them and having a pleasant tone.
Of course :) might as well try and be helpful
By the way:
A Hexbear admin also gets involved and sends a message to the mods of c/196 demanding the removal of the sub-Lemmy’s banner, because it contains “fuck tankies”, arguing that tankies is a slur.
This is blatantly false. Our mod did not "demand" that they remove the banner, they asked politely, not expecting much to come of it, and absolutely nobody ever called "tankie" a slur. What actually happened is that after Moss posted this message to make fun of it, she used a word derived from "liberal" and "r----d," and when someone criticized it she removed their comment, with modlog listing the reason as "imagine being this braindead." When we pushed back on it, Ada scolded her about it but did not remove her as a mod. Since our mods and community had been making changes to better accommodate blahaj (they didn't mention that we stayed out of their second thread once they actually requested that, or that the lemm.ee admin gave us permission to comment on their thread), we decided at that point that the effort wasn't worth it.
Come to Hexbear! We love our trans and neurodivergent comrades, we're super political all the time, and we have way thicker skin
Come to Hexbear! We love our trans neurodivergent comrades, we're super political all the time, and we have way thicker skin
Yes, this.
I came to hexbear and I’m already banned, what gives? https://hexbear.net/u/PM_ME_FAT_ENBIES
Your offer is enticing. I still have concerns. I've heard rumours that hexbear is welcoming to genocide apologia. Are these rumours true?
No, although we are skeptical about certain claims of genocide. There's a big difference between denying well-documented genocides like the Holocaust, vs being skeptical when a source starts making claims without evidence. Generally I like to think we do a decent job of investigating sources and considering multiple perspectives from around the world. You're welcome to ask about any specific cases.
I'm gonna be upfront because you seem like someone who would respect that, so here are some of our positions that might get labelled that way:
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Many of the more egregious claims about Chinese Uighurs can be traced back to one guy, Adrian Zenz, who used some very questionable methodology to arrive at his claims. We'll push back against any claims that rely only on his word, and some people call this genocide denial, but we don't believe in taking dubious evidence as credible just to avoid being accused of that.
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During the war in Ukraine, Russia has transported war orphans to families in Russia, which some people have labelled as genocide because they'll be raised culturally Russian instead of culturally Ukrainian. I don't think the term is appropriate, because imo getting orphans to safety is the priority over preserving culture. Opinions about the war differ, and the whole situation is very fucked, but every war produces orphans and not every war is a genocide.
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We're critical of Double Genocide Theory, the idea that Soviet actions in WWII constituted a genocide on the same level of the Holocaust, a theory which has been criticized by many Jewish historians as trivializing the Holocaust. That doesn't mean Soviet actions are above criticism, but we don't like when people equate them with the Nazis.
I think that covers the main things people criticize us for. Like I said you're welcome to pick our brains and judge for yourself what you think of us. We don't have any animosity against any ethnic group and racism is not tolerated.
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you're currently posting on a "non-political" federation which inherently supports genocide for the reasons you've listed in your post (ie: they privilege white queer people over everyone else) but sure we're all genocidal maniacs here.
I came to hexbear and I'm already banned, what gives? https://hexbear.net/u/PM_ME_FAT_ENBIES
Hating politics is not transphobic.
I don't believe that's what they were saying. They were saying that transphobes often use the phrase to shut down conversation about their transphobic comments. That doesn't mean anyone who uses the phrase is a transphobe using it for that purpose.
Trans people are political, whether we want to be or not. When we start adopting this "hating politics" language, we implicitly accept the mechanisms that oppress us and make transphobia easier for other people. Hating politics is transphobic.
That place is an absolute clown show, and not at all a safe haven for trans people. I can't say I'm surprised, considering its
Vaushite r/196 roots. They even went so far to hurtfully accuse us Hexbear queers of being fake queers, just because we have different political opinions. On Hexbear we have a zero tolerance policy for transphobia.90% of the active users on that instance are refugees from r/196 so no surprise that it has turned to shit.
Leave it to vaushites to ruin literally anything they come in contact with.
Be advised: I recognize this person joining and speedrunning Ban% in safespaces for several months now. This is at least my 4th sighting of them. They will antagonize the userbase in record time by blatant disregard of netiquette and basic human decency. They will cite any of their vast repertoire of mental conditions or minority membership cards as justification when called out on bad behavior - whatever is convenient at the time. Conversation to them is a game that must be won at all cost and people with even slightly differing opinions are seen as enemies that need to be defeated (and also humiliated) Their strategy is generally to single out one member and harass them with wall of text posts.
Do not engage. Do not educate - dozens have tried and failed. Just identify the pattern and ban permanently, before they can do any lasting damage to your community.
You found another dronegender person on the fediverse? Where? Can I meet them? I have a lot of trouble finding people of my gender so any help would be appreciated
Wow. I just had a very similar conversation with someone at work and they got so angry when I talked about education funding that they had to go home.
Brain worms.
I've read through a lot of your discussions on both accounts and you seem to not only be generally quite hostile but it you are abusing and devaluing words like transphobic and ableist by applying them to anything you can't relate to
I haven't put a ton of thought into it, but I think I agree that it's at very least (Giving the biggest benefit of the doubt) unsupportive of minority groups to label their concerns as 'political' and shut down the conversation on that ground.
But I also get not wanting every bit of content in your feed picked over with a fine-toothed comb for micro-aggressions, and have all the comment sections be for/anti-X wars. Its tiring.
As it is also tiring to just BE everyday as part of an oppressed group.
idk, at first thought, the best solution seems like everyone should just carve out a drama-free safe-zone among your closest friends, and/or a small community of people very similar to you. But that's hard, at least for me.
I belong to a few minority groups, and even within each of those, there are aspects of myself that make me feel unwelcome in many of those safespaces. For instance, in hispanic groups... I don't speak spanish. I was at a concert last night, and one of the bands called out in spanish something to the effect of "where are my hispanic people" which I only was able to decipher with my miniscule understanding of spanish (highschool class) and the context of a bunch of hispanics yelling out in response. I'm just like... oh yeah, not me I guess.
So yeah, politics is near impossible to escape. But it would be nice to take a fucking breath free of the weight of all the problems in the world, in my life.
idk, everything is fucked. Well, idk, dad jokes seem cool.
PS. What's with the term BIPOC? What was wrong with POC? POC felt like we were in this all together... BIPOC feels like it prioritizes black people over other people of color.
guess I put a little more thought into it over the course of writing this, which took for fucking ever bc of ADHD and social anxiety. I'm looking at every word, wondering how it could be misconstrued or misunderstood, or hell correctly understood as proof that I'm a massive bigot asshole. sigh post
Your analysis is all well and good and there's a whole lot of content I agree with there, but you are changing the subject. The subject was the meaning of the word political, not whether people have the right to avoid reading controversy. Everyone on both sides of this issue actually agrees that people have the right to avoid reading controversy. I spent the original thread telling Ada that I wanted to be free from reading controversial takes like "politics is anything I disagree with", and Ada spent the thread telling me that she wanted Abigail to be free from reading controversial takes like "politics is group decision making". We both had the same goal: protect people from controversy. The disagreement was simply the meaning of the word political. Ada wanted an echo chamber where everyone agrees that politics is "anything I disagree with", and I wanted a safe space where we don't say transphobic things like that. Which, I am aware, is functionally the same as an echo chamber but I don't know how else to phrase that
People that hate communists tend to also be people who hate LGBTQ+, liberals fit this category (like blahaj 196 with its huge "anti-tankie" banner) they are just better at smiling and covering up their hatred of you.
Not sure I buy that take, since communists hate tankies too. Blahaj is transphobic, but it seems to me they're on the same side as communists when it comes to attitudes towards auth apologists