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:
- βPlease 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.β
- βThe 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.β
- βThese 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.β
The rhetoric and goal of Hexbar are clear based on their announcement: to "dismantle western propaganda" and "demolish organizations such as NATOβ shows that Hexbar has no intention of "respecting the rules of the community instance in which they are posting/commenting.β Itβs 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:
βI 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.β
βAll 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.β
- https://lemmy.world/comment/121850
- https://lemmy.world/comment/1487168
- https://lemmy.world/comment/1476084
- https://lemmy.world/comment/171595
- https://www.hexbear.net/comment/3648500
Overall community comments:
- https://www.hexbear.net/comment/3526128
- https://www.hexbear.net/comment/3526086
- https://www.hexbear.net/comment/3652828
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.
- https://lemmygrad.ml/post/158656
- https://lemmygrad.ml/comment/882559
- https://lemmygrad.ml/comment/540170
- https://lemmygrad.ml/comment/446529
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.
Why is it wrong to be critical of western propaganda?
Because "critical of western propaganda" is a front for promoting authorianism and intolerance. The "western propaganda" they're critical of include human rights, inclusiveness, social security etc.
This is what I find absolutely crazy. I am, by and large, in agreement with socialists on economic matters. But why do they always support China and Russia? Like wtf? In what world is the genocide being committed against the Uyghur people cool? In what world is banning access to free communication including many of the largest websites worth defending? Why is it ok to lock up gay people? How is aggressively invading a neighbouring country cool? How is threatening to invade a neighbouring independent country (which has been de facto independent for over 70 years) whilst frequently flying your military into their airspace as a form of threat somehow the actions of the good guys?
You can believe in socialist economics without needing to defend the extreme authoritarian nature of countries that pretend as though their economy runs on socialist principles (or worse, which are the explicitly non-socialist successor state to a country that formerly professed to socialism). Tankies make no fucking sense to me.
They always say the same opinions because it's part of a massive astroturfing campaign by Chinese and Russian state actors. They're both attempting to sow discord in the West and lay the foundation to ramp it up to interfere in the 2024 US election.
Do you remember what a shit show Reddit became in 2016? We've seen this exact pattern before, where a deluge of people with the same carefully calibrated opinions on everything appear out of the blue. They want to create the illusion that there's some popular movement towards all these inane opinions, and you can even see from the comments on this thread. They're using the same known troll tactics to push this (eg. "Just asking questions").
This a good test of Lemmy's moderation and federation model and will be indicative of how it fairs next year when these campaigns really ramp up. Good on the admins for taking this seriously and nipping it in the bud.