Skip Navigation
Remote View
yepowertrippinbastards Ye Power Trippin' Bastards @lemmy.dbzer0.com
inv3r5ion @lemmy.dbzer0.com

got banned from all of blahaj because of "gatekeeping" on another instance

likely in response to my comments on the beehaw post, which i linked to (hopefully im doing this right?). apparently, calling people you dont know for the first time "they/them" before being told their pronouns is "misgendering". absurd. this kind of attitude threatens the larger LGBTQ community and is partially why cishets hate us after we won so much progress back in the 00s and 10s.

im a queer person. im neurodivergent. this shit is so goddamn fucking annoying, especially as an older queer who got physically assaulted on a near daily basis for being queer in the 90s. the kids today get their panties in a twist over being supposedly "misgendered" by someone calling them gender neutral pronouns before being corrected. narcissistic victimhood bullshit.

anyways, now banned from one of my favorite instances. meanwhile in the US theyre planning on hunting us. but yeah, lets ban fellow queers over their view that people who get mad about being "misgendered" when they arent (cis people are also referred to as "they/them" before further context in a conversation with a stranger) are just attention seeking brats that threaten the larger movement. its so obvious to me that the brats who find reason to be offended over innocent pronoun use never faced real adversity, like getting repeatedly physically beaten.

edit - the best part of all of this is i faced no moderation from beehaw and all of my comments are +1 or higher. power tripping oversensitive neurodivergent hating bastard of a mod over at blahaj IMO.

edit 2 - did this wrong. heres a link to the post i think got me banned from blahaj and a screenshot about it https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/37659465

Edit 3 - apparently I did nothing wrong until I made my thoughts known about how the pronoun police fucked over the larger LGBTQ community as our rights are backsliding in America. Yall are gonna whine about being misgendered to the concentration camp guards at the rate we’re going. God forbid I be angry that while queers were busy fighting over pronouns our adversaries stuffed the courts, stuffed the school boards, couped the government, and are installing a fascist dictatorship. When I say that these fucking toddlers are going to learn what real oppression tastes like, that’s what I mean. It’s not that I want us to be hurt or oppressed (as the dog piling idiots have interpreted), it’s that the younger generation is weak as hell and lost the fucking plot in the fight for our rights. I grew up getting beaten in the streets for being queer only for these kids to claim their pronouns not being mind-read is oppression!

247 comments

  • OP has revealed their true colours in their comments in the threads here. Fucking LGB alliance bullshit. If you wanna divide the queer community like this you are absolutely gatekeeping at best and straight up transphobic in all likelihood. I on the other hand will continue to love and support every single facet of the 2SLGBTQIA+ spectrum without calling something I don't experience or understand "attention seeking brats".

    "Never faced real adversity" Jesus Christ fuck you. If being denied the opportunity to marry officially is adversity then being denied your EXISTENCE officially is also fucking adversity. This is textbook gate keeping and ladder pulling. You fought for gay/lesbian/bisexual rights and you got somewhere with it and now that transgender and genderqueer people who don't have their rights are asking for support you call them whiny piss babies.

    I'm trying my absolute best to bee nice as per my instance, but no. From the bottom of my autistic, transgender, lesbian heart - fuck you.

    And here's the kicker. I could not be more opposed to you right now. BUT I will still fight for you and accept you as part of the queer community.

    Stop trying to hide behind your queerness or neurodivergence and take ownership of your bigotry and try to address it.

    Do not bother replying to me, OP, I will not read it. But I hope you grow.

    YDI

  • I'm gonna ignore all of this and talk to you directly as an autistic to an autistic. There are so many times I asked a friend of mine "Hey, I forgot mutual friend X's gender, what were their pronouns again" but what they heard was "Oh no the trans-genders and the pronouns are so confusing, they should stick with what on their birth certificate" and then I wake up the next day with no friends because that friend told all their friends I was being a transphobe.

    Now, let's think about this from their perspective. If you saw a friend of yours being a bigot to another one of your friends, would you still hang out with them? I wouldn't. If I heard one of my friends was homophobic or transphobic or racist or any other kind of bigot, I would instantly block and shun them. I do not want bigots of any kind around me or my friends. There is a reason that cults practice shunning, and that is because it fucking works.

    Continuing this, lets say our hypothetical ex-friend had been accused of being transphobic to one of your trans friends. What would they need to do to be either forgiven or absolved of guilt? Even if they were in fact transphobic, they can admit they are wrong. And if the accusation was wrong, what proof would you need? What sort of behavior would you need to see from them to forgive them?

    I am positive that you as an elder queer have had many, many, many experiences where someone you thought you could trust turned out to be a homophobe. It really hurts. After a while, you start only seeing the worst in people.

    As an autistic, it was really rough learning what would come across as a microaggression. Can't ask to be reminded of the pronouns, because it might be interpreted as passive-aggressive transphobic whinging about pronouns. When I do fuck up, I can't give the big apology that I think misgendering someone deserves because my autistic RBF will make it come across as sarcastic. You just have to quickly correct yourself and move on without drawing attention to it. It feels like blowing a red light and hitting someone because I was just plopped behind the wheel of a car without being taught how to drive.

    Your tantrum here was very cathartic for me, because it really is fucking terrible trying navigate a world full of traumatized people. I don't like accidentally triggering people. I want people to feel safe around me! But if I had thought I'd seen a person doing a microaggression, and then I saw them throwing a tantrum about how them getting shunned was because everyone else is a pee pee piss piss boy and this is why the cishets hate us, I would be inclined to think they were at least regressive, if not one of the republican gays who think that we need to chop off everything past the B in LGBTQ+.

    Just to be clear, I don't think you're transphobic. I have experienced the same sort of things as you. It's rough restraining myself from flailing around in response to being accused of stuff. It is humiliating to prostrate myself and beg forgiveness of things I know I did not do. But we live in a fucking society full of bigots and people traumatized by those fucking bigots, and these are the rituals that keep our corner of society even a little bit sane.

    • It seems more to me like the TQ wants to rid themselves of the LGB with their pronoun tirades and temper tantrums.

      And yeah, I have few real friends. Luckily none lost because of homophobia, but more so because I’m not fucking poly and I’m tired of everyone in the LGBTQ community (at least by me) seeming to be poly. (And they really like to claim “ethical” non monogamy when they’re full of shit about their so called “ethical” behavior) So I’ve been used and abused by quite a few of my fellow queers I thought were my friends but weren’t.

      I live in an extremely lonely rural area, but it’s better than living in a city and feeling just as lonely.

      I’ve come to a point in my life where I might as well reject the queer community since I’m already rejected by them.

      • It seems more to me like the TQ wants to rid themselves of the LGB with their pronoun tirades and temper tantrums.

        Woah, hey, what the fuck? Here I thought you were having a sincere overreaction but no, this is all just transphobia, and possibly homophobia. You're basically ranting about the whole community being non-monogamous? Sexually deviant?

        "Terminally online whiny piss babies"? You want to reject the community? You think they've all just had it easy? You live a "lonely rural life" and think you can talk about how people have had it easy? Paint the whole community red like that but it's okay if you say "(at least by me)"?

        Transgender people have had it easy?

        Absolutely not with this shit, I do not give you any more benefits of the doubt or good faith. You are hitting all the bigot talking points regardless of what you identify as.

        You do not get to divide the community at a time like this. Trying to stir shit up and turn LGB on TQ and vice versa, yeah, you need to GTFO.

      • It seems more to me like the TQ wants to rid themselves of the LGB with their pronoun tirades and temper tantrums.

        Oh... Wow. With all due politeness I request that you please cool it with this rhetoric. It is dangerous. The community needs to band together right now. I'm sympathetic for you but this makes you seem hostile and jaded.

      • Girl. Read your comment again. Please. It reads like a grandma in the nursing home ranting about how all the kids these days are all premarital hand-holding and being publicly indecent.

        Look, I'm poly. I'm in a monogamous relationship, but just because I'm not currenly performing poly-ness doesn't mean I don't think and see the world like a poly person. My wife-to-be isn't poly and I'm not gonna push her. I'm sorry that your friends seem to have pushed you, and I can sympathize since so many poly people seem to use it as a crutch for being a bad partner, but you don't get to be a dick about it.

        Back when I used to live in the rust belt, I had a lesbian coworker who was a big trump supporter as well as a born-again Christian who thinks that gay and trans people are all going to hell. She only does couple stuff with her wife (how she got a wife I will never know) behind closed doors because she doesn't want to "indoctrinate the children". That's our real enemy, if you can call it that: gay people oppressing themselves and dragging each other down with them.

        I was a daycare teacher for a while. You know what I do when a kid throws a temper tantrum? I leave them alone until they calm down, and then I treat them like the tantrum didn't happen. Sometimes they want to tell me what made them upset after, and we can fix it. Sometimes they just need it out of their system. I'm of the opinion that adults are just toddlers with manners. Let the tantrum happen, don't judge them for it, move tf on.

  • Damn, this is a trip

    This is both PTB and YDI.

    The blanket bans on a different instance is definitely overkill, which points right to a power trip. If it had been one or two, maybe it could be dismissed, but that many? Nah, that's fucking crazy.

    But you were being a dick all up and down that thread.

    Now, I want you to stop for a second. See what I just said? What are you thinking and feeling right this second, after reading it.

    Go back to the thread you linked. Reread what you wrote with whatever reaction you had to me saying you were being a dick in your mind. See all those places where you were projecting that anyone that might object to your pronoun usage were being lesser because of it? Yeah, you were essentially just saying they would be dicks, and that you were better than them.

    Now, it doesn't really matter whether point has any validity. It could have been relevant, but you were ranting all throughout the thread. When someone does that, they have to understand that it could come with consequences. That the consequences were far out of line is a separate issue.

    Now, fwiw, I actually partially agree with your premise, though the way you express it, and the details of your reasoning behind it are not good. Particularly the part about why "cishets hate us". I get why you might think that, but it simply doesn't match the words and actions of the bigots.

    Basically, you took a pet peeve, went on a rant and it was tangential to the actual post. I'm surprised the ban wasn't from beehaw, they tend to frown on that degree of venom from anyone.

    But, again, despite you deserving something for running around foaming at the mouth digitally, the blanket bans are way out of line too

  • You misunderstood the entire post it looks like.

    OP asks the question “what if I know or have been introduced to the person’s pronouns but forget?” This is visible in OP’s own admission: “I am terrible at remembering people’s pronouns.”

    Someone responded with slight misunderstanding or perhaps inclarity essentially saying “if you misgender someone you might seem bigoted.”

    Then instead of giving any good faith or asking for clarification, you responded with very high toxicity.

    Now, I can see that you misunderstood and thought the conversation was about people you don’t know, but your response was very inappropriate and normalizing of hate, using phrases like “For fucks sake this is why the heteros hate us. Younger queers need faux outrage to feel important.” Even the beehaw mod gave you a reprimand.

    That behavior and escalation of the conversation is terribly toxic and I do not blame blahaj for not giving you an in depth benefit-of-the-doubt investigation before deciding they didn’t want that behavior.

    Verdict: YDI but I get how this misunderstanding happened. My suggestion:

    • Reread the post and your comments.
    • Acknowledge your misunderstanding and apologize to the person you were toxic to.
    • Apologize and clarify the misunderstanding to blahaj.
    • Work on your deescalation skills.

    • I'm so glad to see this post. I was starting to think I was taking crazy pills.

      If I was an admin and I banned someone for whatever reason, and their reaction was this insanely aggressive, and they clearly kept using insulting terms to describe everyone (whiny, 'main character syndrome,' saying they haven't suffered enough to be treated with respect) I would definitely not think I was wrong to ban that person. Even if I initially was wrong, the reaction is the kind that makes me think... yeah, don't want that in my community.

    • So. Funny. About the downvotes. Read the post, people. I’m not trying to attack, it’s literally an obvious misunderstanding that I’m trying to lend clarity to. Behold two entirely different conversations:

      @schleudersturz@beehaw.org When I see people I know, I can remember who they are, what we have done together, where we have been, what we have seen and even the tone of voice they might use to exclaim at an occurrence or upon some eventuality but – yet – I often cannot remember their names. Pronouns are like parts of their names. And, so, I tend to address everyone with “they” / “them”.

      @inv3r5ion@lemmy.dbzer0.com apparently, calling people you dont know for the first time “they/them” before being told their pronouns is “misgendering”.

      “People you don’t know” versus “people you know”

      Obvious misunderstanding. It’s all laid out for you if you open your eyes lmao.

      • Those aren't in direct response to each other, but the disingenuousness of it is rather typical of your posting.

    • I’m not sucking up to the pronoun police.

      It’s cool, I’m welcome nowhere.

      • You are welcome here buddy. I get where you are coming from and I used to think in a similar way to you about this topic. I also think dialogue is much more appropriate than sanctions and wild accusations in this sort of situation.

        The gay liberation movement was in some ways a very socially conservative branch of queer activism that sought social acceptance for gay men and women, primarily. The approach we took (I'm 50 years old btw) was to adopt mainstream concepts like the gender binary and monogamous marriage and then advocate to extend those concepts to include gay relationships. The truly subversive queer activism of the late 60s and 70s turned into a quest for acceptance rather than a quest to disrupt the status quo. I don't mean to minimize the achievements of the gay liberation movement, but in reality it did very little for trans folk and did little to challenge existing social structures. It did of course benefit gay men and women, and that should not be discounted. But it was never really about trans rights.

        Younger trans folk are more ambitious. They tend to view the success of gay liberation as a capitulation to the mainstream. They could have gone the same route of minimal resistance to the status quo and just advocated for acceptance of trans men and trans women. But instead they are seeking to tear down the tyranny of the gender binary, which is very much so a social construct, albeit distantly rooted in biology. Anthropologists and sociologists have long studied the performativity of gender, and how it is mostly tied to social expectations and norms within a culture rather than any sort of biological essentialism.

        So in a way, young trans folk are simply carrying on the tradition of queer radicalism that the gays abandoned in our quest for social acceptance. And I admire them for that. Do I think it will ever lead to a mainstreaming of trans identities? Not really, to be honest. But that isn't necessarily the goal here. The goal is more to carve out a space for trans folk where they can play with the idea of identity and gender, in order to deconstruct it and challenge it, and to evolve our culture in a humanistic way, rather than clinging to social norms like they are somehow not systems of oppression and discipline ala Foucault.

        The question fundamentally is whether it's better to conform to social expectations to fit in at the expense of giving up on the more radical project of changing culture, or whether it's best to reject the status quo and simply invent your own culture and spaces. While there is a pragmatism to the former that makes a certain sort of sense, there's also a bravery and radicalism centred around the latter project that I find more exciting and meaningful.

        I'd also point out that this isn't an either/or scenario. We can enjoy the benefit of gay liberation while also supporting the younger generation to challenge the very social structures that oppress us all.

        One key example would be that in the 60s and 70s queer folk and feminists were calling for the abolition of marriage, not for it to be extended to gay people. The marriage abolitionists were much more radical, socially. And many young queer folk (based on my understanding) feel that gender abolition would be a positive step to ending gender apartheid. I've gotta say that it took me a while to come around to it, but I'm on board with that objective, even to the point where I'm considering changing my pronouns to they/them.

        I don't really understand why we need a massive extension of gender pronouns to achieve this objective, since if everyone became they/them that would be a good outcome imo. But that's just my personal opinion. I can see how you can also undermine gender apartheid by making the concept of gender so diverse that it undermines the primacy of the male and female categories. It's just another way to skin the cat.

        In this specific case, I'd say it's PTB + YDI. I don't like the militant way in which some trans folk label anyone with a slightly different take on these topics as "transphobic". How are you ever gonna build support and understanding by insta-jumping to bad faith conclusions at the slightest sign of dissent with the group-think? But then again, trans folk are entitled to a safe space where they can freely explore their identity without constantly having to defend themselves.

        That's lot of words to say I hear you, I acknowledge your experience, and I share some of your concerns. But I also think blaming vulnerable populations for the political climate right now is completely unfair and uncalled for. Trans folks aren't undermining gay liberation, they are just trying a different approach, and they don't want to have to conform to social expectations in order to be accepted. They want to be accepted on their own terms, and I acknowledge their bravery in doing so, despite the push-back.

      • Your loss friend. I tried to help.

  • Hello fellow neurodivergent person. I had to go to the instance to view the comments because reasons.

    I do relate to your kinda harsh wording there as I tend to do the same when triggered. I do think that you could call out others being bigoted or overly arrogant "educating" you instead of using strong language. I sympathize as I do the same if I'm not careful but I suggest not to.

    In any case I think using they them for a new person is great and if you can't look up their pronouns they might be at fault anyway.

  • There’s nothing wrong with referring to people with gender neutral pronouns, whether they prefer those or not. Gender neutral is, by definition, the proper way to refer to all humans, no matter who or what they are. I’m not going to go out of my way to look through the post history of a user to find their pronouns. If they aren’t listed in their display name, like Hexbear required, then they are getting the trusty they/them.

  • TL;DR: BPR CSPR (charged situation-provoked reaction). OP was gatekeeping a wee bit but this was definitively not worth a permaban, at most a "chill your head!" 1d ban. OP being queer and the issue happening outside Blåhaj are also relevant.

    Sorry in advance for the WORDS, WORDS, WORDS.

    Also, I'm not queer. Or an instance owner. I'm open to hear about things that I got wrong. I'm judging things here because it's how this comm works.

    I don't disagree with the core of what you're saying, it's sensible stuff:

    • it is completely fine to use they/them as a default; it is not misgendering
    • some people overreact to what, contextually, clearly conveys "I don't know your gender"
    • queers on the verge of being hunted is way, way more serious than pronouns

    100% agree with the above. But even then, check your own comment:

    This attitude drives me fucking nuts as a millennial who had to fight the real fights for LGBTQ acceptance only for the younger generation to get their panties in a twist for inadvertently being called by the “wrong” (gender neutral) pronoun.

    Queers are on the verge of being hunted and exterminated in the US and y’all are pissy over being called a gender neutral pronoun by someone who doesn’t know you?

    For fucks sake this is why the heteros hate us. Younger queers need faux outrage to feel important. Now the real threats are back on the horizon. Thanks to young out of touch activists caring more about pronouns than our physical safety and well-being.

    You're arbitrarily drawing a line and saying "up to this point, it is not an important matter. Past that point, it is". Well... this is gatekeeping! Cat shit might not be as serious of a problem as elephant shit, but both are still shit, you know?

    Then there's the matter of this happening outside Blåhaj. I get why the admins there ban people for activity outside their own instance: the instance is home to extremely marginalised groups, that requires getting rid of bad faith actors (haters, chasers...) even before they set their feet there.

    So for example. Let's say that I (cis, hetero) said something that can be understood as bigotry. It would be only sensible if Blahaj banned me on the spot - better safe than sorry, right?

    ...however that clearly does not apply to you - even if not trans you're gender-diverse. (I always check profiles before judging people.) Blahaj is supposed to be inviting to people like you. It shifts the issue from "some cis hetero got banned by mistake" to "someone who should feel safe in that instance got banned by mistake". Plus what you're saying isn't even bigoted, it's simply gatekeeping.

    Based on all of that I think that some intervention from the Blahaj admins would be sensible, even if this happened outside their "turf", but they went a bit too far. [/two cents]

    • Let’s say that I (cis, hetero) said something that can be understood as bigotry. It would be only sensible if Blahaj banned me on the spot - better safe than sorry, right?

      No.

      Are you familiar with the siege syndrome? Then there's this American notion of inequality 'cism', that only members of certain groups can be critical of them. That's bullshit. Your gender or sexual orientation doesn't invalidate your opinion (nor validate it).

      • Your gender or sexual orientation doesn’t invalidate your opinion (nor validate it).

        That's correct but not the full picture.

        What matters here is more than just the validity of the opinion; it's also weighting the impact of a potential ban, when you don't really know if it's justified or not. Both a false positive (unjust ban) and a false negative (not banned when they should) are bad, but which is worse? This depends on the gravity of the reason (gatekeeping vs. bigotry) but also your target audience (gender diverse people vs. someone who is not gender diverse).

        Also note that Blahaj admins are not from USA, they're from Australia. I'm not from USA either (I'm from South America.) I'm not sure on how much siege mentality applies in either case.

    • It’s not gatekeeping, and this narcissistic faux outrage over being “misgendered” is harmful to the LGBTQ community.

      You’re not queer and you don’t understand the level of anger right now that American queers have. As someone who faced outright physical abuse chronically for being queer as a kid seeing permanently online baby queers get pissy over pronouns while we’re about to be hunted again is absolutely fucking rage inducing for good reason. These fucking piss babies need to get their shit together.

      • I really feel like the old fight is over. I openly walked hand in hand with my boyfriend in 1996 in Sydney and didn't even get strange looks let alone shouting or hitting

        Boys who acted gay in my all boys high school in the 90s did get bullied for acting gay about as much as I got bullied for having the wrong accent, so pretty bad.

        I think it's fair for the youth today to try and improve less significant issues when they feel safe, and I don't think I have seen people told off for using they/them/themself when they don't know someone's pronouns because they have never met before

        It's also the trans people who are getting overt threats from the US government more so than gays, they also rely on hormone therapy and government could deny that usage, driving them to black market hormones and a lot of suicides

      • You've got a lot of "kids these days don't know how good they have it!" energy, and it's really not helping you here or anywhere.

        Seriously, you're complaining about these people fighting all the wrong battles, but here you are still fighting in that exact battle? In your eyes, they're wasting their time turning on each other... but here you are screaming at them and about them? Do you think the things you are saying in this thread will prevent discrimination and violence? Do you think you're changing minds?

        I understand you're rightfully pissed off about a lot of things. But you really are drawing a line in your life and saying "I struggled. They didn't. They don't have the right to question me. Which isn't necessarily true and also isn't a very productive line of reasoning.

      • I think if you'd expressed yourself a bit more reasonably you'd probably be fine expressing the general sentiment that some segment of the queer community is overly focused on performative actions and calling out people who aren't toeing the line of ideological purity over real world gains in rights and acceptance. You can express criticism in a measured way or you can try to use it as a means to insult and inflict insecurity and hurt. Those are very different things.

        It's the difference between "hey idiot, I ordered this without ketchup, make it again" and "hi, sorry, this wasn't supposed to have ketchup on it". One is abusive and unreasonable, the other is a polite way of getting your point across. Dr House is funny to watch on TV, but he's not a model for effective communication in the real world. If you focus on being as angry and unpleasant as humanly possible at every turn, people will ignore you and shut you out regardless of whether you would be making a good point.

        It costs you nothing to find a slightly diplomatic way to make your point, but being overly harsh about it may cost you everything.

      • The uh scare quotes aren't really helping your case. Being queer doesn't mean you automatically understand the seriousness of other queer people's concerns and it also doesn't mean you're free of bigotry.

        Consider like lgbt erasure from official histories, many people scoffed at concerns like this and thought it was hysterical pearl clutching to make a big deal about whether or not someone's sexuality was mentioned or whatever. Others will tell you it literally saved their lives knowing that people like them existed in the past.

        I don't think it's that hard to just be kind, and if you can't be kind be funny and then block them and move on :P

      • You're 100% right that I'm not feeling the anger you queer people are feeling. And, again, I agree with the core of what you're saying. It boils down to "goddammit can't those bloody kids get their priorities right???", doesn't it?

        And even with your anger being justified, and even with the core of your complain being spot on, there's still gatekeeping there. And it's completely extraneous to what you're likely trying to say. You could say the same stuff that you're saying without it.

        And the people who hate you queer people would still do it regardless of pronouns. It's just an excuse from their part; the actual reason why they hate you is that you're subversive (and that's a good thing). Once they remember "hey, trans and gender non-conforming people exist", all that "God, then man, then woman" hierarchy goes down the bloody drain. Without those kids talking about pronouns they'd pick on something else. Like they already do, their go out of their way to make shit up about you.

        [Regardless of agreeing or disagreeing I genuinely wish that you stay safe. And the kids too - even if acc. to you their priorities might be out of place, they still deserve safety.]

  • I know this flies in the face of what everyone else seems to be saying, but fuck it.

    I don't know of an acronym, but my reaction is that even if they overreacted, your insanely aggressive response makes me think it's right to leave it in place. I get that you're saying that you're just angry because you like blahaj, but up and down this thread your bitching is so antagonistic... Like, calling it narcissistic, referring to people who care "too much" about their pronouns as having main character syndrome? This is not the behavior of a friend, or an ally, and it's not one I'd love in a member of my community.

    Being queer and neurodivergent is not an excuse to be an asshole. As someone who identifies as both queer and neurodivergent, let me say I wouldn't unban you for this. Whether the initial ban was right or wrong!

    I went through real shit in the 90s for being queer. I wasn't even diagnosed as neurodivergent (despite a disgusting amount of evidence since I was a child, because "girls don't get ADHD") until my goddamned 30s. That doesn't mean that just because other people are suffering differently, their suffering doesn't matter, and screaming about it makes you look like an abusive fuck. People don't have to suffer "enough" for your definition to deserve respect. Jesus.

    I get that this could be stepping on your trauma, and nobody loves being excluded, but this reaction ain't it.

  • Blahaj mods are insanely ban happy. I do not understand for the life of me what you did wrong here. I don’t even really understand what kind of online community they are trying to cultivate with this?

  • I find these issues so tiring. Lemmy is a project run by volunteers, usually with specific goals in mind.

    While I think that more democratic means of administering instances would be good I also can't really see how to implement them and if someone is volunteering to run a server then criticising the precise way they do it, especially when moderator actions are public, seem a bit rich.

    Different servers have different goal, some are trying to be public squares like this one, where more voices are welcome than not even to the detriment of some people. Others are trying to be safe cozy spaces, or friend clubs or whatever and someone just not liking your vibe is a fine reason to pre-emptively close the door in your face.

    When someone does so they're not even restricting your ability to see things, and usually not even making an account on their instance. You can literally run a bot to mirror everything over to your own version of a community if you don't like the way they administer theirs. All they are doing is restricting your ability to send messages to their userbase under that particular account. Blahaj is going for a certain vibe, it's not a vibe I want so I'm not their and I don't really use their communities but it's very clearly communicated to the userbase and behaviour like this is done specifically so users that feel vulnerable have a place to be gay with like zero confrontation about the particular way they want to be.

    So who cares?

  • im a queer person. im neurodivergent. this shit is so goddamn fucking annoying, especially as an older queer who got physically assaulted on a near daily basis for being queer in the 90s. the kids today get their panties in a twist over being supposedly "misgendered" by someone calling them gender neutral pronouns before being corrected. narcissistic victimhood bullshit.

    People shouldn't need to suffer a specific amount to deserve your respect. This is important to many people. But you use it to insult those people. Regardless of why you got banned or how angry you are about it, saying things like this is not a good look. It looks a lot like victim blaming and gatekeeping.

    Your experienced suffering doesn't make you better than anybody else or give you carte blanche to anything, including insulting or trivializing what others consider important. I would encourage you to treat people to the respect and kindness you deserved but didn't get in the 90s.

    • Because the suffering matters. We were beat to shit in the streets so these toddlers can whine about being misgendered.

      These people are fucking weak and gonna learn real soon what actual oppression tastes like.

      • It's ultimately about the fact that no one in their life respects them. Do you really not remember being treated that way? Being disrespected on every basic level because of who you are? Don't you remember how much it fucking grated on your nerves?

        I grew up in the deep south, and it affected me deeply that everyone around me liked to use gay as a synonym for stupid, bad and especially defective. I remember how I just couldn't take it anymore, to the point that I flipped out at one point in highschool and literally got up screaming in a class and flipped a table.

        The constant, inescapable pressure is unbearable. It drives you nuts, to the extent that if it shows up when you think you're around people who are cool with stuff it stings especially bad.

        Ask yourself what matters to you more, honestly, do you care more about other queer people or you own feelings, because that's what you're asking other people to do as well. The pronouns thing isn't a big deal for you, but hell, everyone's got baggage. Everyone's got things that set them off because of some fucked up shit in their past.

        Because it's kind of sickening to see a fellow queer person relishing seeing other queer people get the boot. I won't lie, it makes me so angry and so sad.

        Because no matter how much I may be annoyed by some sections of online queer spaces (I've been on Tumblr for a fucking decade and God I'm tired of it), I don't want them to suffer. I want them to be okay, and I don't think you actually want them to suffer either.

        I think you're angry and you feel rejected by people who should be understanding. We're all freaks and weirdos to the outside world, we're all used to being policed to the extent that we can barely breathe. Seeing it on the inside of the community must be really frustrating and blazingly painful. I'm sorry that this happened to you, I really am.

        But I do want you to consider who you want to be, and what you want to care about here. I see someone spiralling and I want to let you know that it's not to late to take a moment and reflect on where you want things to go.

  • Blahaj just feels like bizarro land, where the kinds of people who are usually inclusive seem to go out of their way to hate anything that isn't exactly like them, and share their exact ideas. It's basically /c/Conservative, but gay (er, openly gay anyway).

    • Blahaj just feels like bizarro land, where the kinds of people who are usually inclusive seem to go out of their way to hate anything that isn’t exactly like them, and share their exact ideas.

      Think of it like an autoimmune disorder - in an attempt to keep the community safe, it attacks anything of its own that looks even slightly out of order.

247 comments