Hello users of Hexbear, we wanted to inform you that we are going to be locking the_dunk_tank and dredge_tank communities. We have created two new communities /c/gossip and /c/counterpropaganda to serve a similar but clearly distinct purpose than the dunk/dredge tanks.

Not only is the dunk tank a term that has racist origins, but also many posts there were almost no effort and often times requiring later edits to show how they weren’t reactionary, not useful with regard to developing rhetoric and furthering dialectical analysis of that which we dunk upon.

To that end, we wish posts of reactionaries to be placed in !counterpropaganda@hexbear.net along with an accompanying explanation (as simple or complex as desired) with the intent of countering the reactionary propaganda in the post body, as of now comments are not subject to the same rhetorical rigor rule.

For the posts that are not "low-hanging fruit’ of notable people we ask that you use !gossip@hexbear.net .

These changes are mainly part of a continued effort to remove the racist and misogynistic elements from our community and grow.

Any moderators of the dunk tank or dredge tank that want to be a mod in the new communities let me know.

Any users with questions or comments please use this post, this change was made at the behest of the entire Hexbear mod and admin team. We will be looking for more moderators in an organized volunteer drive shortly, if you wish to submit an application you may send it to me via hexbear or matrix direct messages.

Use this post as a place for discussion to these changes. We will keep things as they are for 2 weeks and then reflect on the feedback, including this post: https://hexbear.net/post/3858346

As a personal addendum I am sorry if the closing of the tanks these changes removes a beloved space on the site and if you want to suggest a community to replace them you may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.

Sitewide or community changes come from proposals put forth from the mod team, discussed, and voted on by the mod team.

Any users wanting to suggest a community to replace the tanks, may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net current discussion is here https://hexbear.net/post/3858346 or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.

You may also consider using !shitreactionariessay@lemmygrad.ml as a substitute for dunk/dredge tank posts as well

The mod statement can be found here: https://hexbear.net/comment/5613033

Application

What is your Hexbear username? Do you have any preferred pronouns? What are your thoughts on capitalism? What are your thoughts on imperialism? What are your thoughts on trans rights? What are your thoughts on racial justice? What do think about current and previous protests around the world? What are your thoughts on Veganism and Animal Liberation? Do you have any experience with other leftist online communities? What did those experiences teach you? What is your approach to moderation, and how do you work with teams? How do you deal with online drama and people who try to start things for the sake of it? What current comms would you be interested in moderating? Do you have any ideas for community engagement? What is your general time availability? (Time zone, amounts, common browsing times, etc)

  • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    18 days ago

    As another moderator, I’d just like to piggyback this comment and talk about this.

    First, what is (hopefully) the least objectionable part: the creation of c/counterpropaganda. It does have some degree of overlap with c/effort and c/agitprop, but I envision it as a place for stockpiling useful counterarguments and framing devices for use against liberals, whether that be online or when talking to friends and family, where c/agitprop is about creating spreadable images and memes. I might end up posting things from citationsneeded in there. That being said, I wasn’t the one who came up with the idea of the comm, and how it’ll actually evolve remains to be seen.

    While I also did not come up with it, the naming of c/gossip was made intentionally frivolous because what X streamer is saying today is fairly unimportant. In fact, there was an idea that naming it c/gossip would help ferret out people who were like “I’m not doing gossip, that’s feminine! I’m a very serious politics understander who is talking about the very important issue of what neo-Nazi shit [streamer] has said today!” I would be fine with a name change (and tried to come up with some in the mod chat but couldn’t really find something in the same vein) but the fundamental idea of what it should be is fine in my eyes - if you like discussing what a shitty public figure is doing then you can do that there, and those that don’t want to do so can block the comm.

    The reason behind locking the dunk/dredge tanks is, as stated above, due to concerns about the impact of things like toxicity and irony poisoning leading to chauvinism and bigotry, even if it’s accidental. Dunking is not, in my personal view, inherently bad. It is one tool in the toolkit. The ability to dismiss an idea without effort, using all the lovely techniques in the Logical Fallacy diagram, is awesome for when libs and chuds come along with ideas that have been debunked and dismissed for tens if not hundreds of years. It’s also a great way to build a community, as chapotraphouse’s (albeit terminated) existence demonstrated. Many of us came to chapotraphouse or to Hexbear directly either through being dunked on, or by seeing somebody else get dunked on, and seeing that there are indeed people who have some real passion about politics who aren’t seal-clapping chuds. I personally object to an attempt to just stamp out dunking, at least as it’s defined as “refusing to take a person or idea seriously and instead insulting them” (what would be the alternative - a hundred lemmy bots that each respond with a 10-paragraph argument that you could summon for every eventuality?)

    However, we’ve seen complaints from people about how the vestiges of reddit that remain here are turning off people, particularly non-white and non-cis-male people. There’s just a zeitgeist of masculinity and reddit background radiation that people can detect and they then choose to go elsewhere, and we should do everything within reason to try and make the site more appealing to those people. Mandatory pronouns was a great initial step in that direction, but we must continue down the path. We have black and/or LGBTQIA+ moderators who are trying hard to fix these issues. I am neither of those, so I’ve largely gone with their expertise on the matter.

    Is Hexbear a serious political platform? Is it a bar where you hang out after work with your friends and shoot the shit? It is both and neither. But it can definitely be better.

    • Frank [he/him, he/him]@hexbear.net
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      17 days ago

      there was an idea that naming it c/gossip would help ferret out people who were like "I’m not doing gossip, that’s feminine!

      The mods have positioned discussing frivolous current events as feminine and used a loaded word that has in the past been used to justify torture of women for the comm.

      CW: Torture device, pictures of the device on display and woodcut depictions of the device in use

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scold's_bridle

      Here’s a discussion of the origin and history of “Gossip” directly from Federici

      https://inthesetimes.com/article/the-subversive-feminist-power-of-gossip

      I can’t know if this was raised or discussed during discussions, but I do think it’s relevant if the goal is to reduce misogyny and misogynistic behavior on the site. “Gossip” is a weapon of patriarchy.

    • MolotovHalfEmpty [he/him]@hexbear.net
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      17 days ago

      I just wanted to thank you for wading into this and giving a detailed and reasoned response. Even if I don’t agree with every word, I appreciate them all and can see your point of view. The work you and some of the other mods here put in continues to blow me away. You and those mods are the best of Hexbear, which is why I usually don’t weigh in on these editorial decisions.

      Unfortunately, the behaviour and generally hostile and toxic responses of other mods around this issue have been a fucking embarrassment and have deeply hurt the argument for these changes or the idea they’re being done in good faith. (I think they are, for the record, even if I don’t entirely agree with all of it).

    • Antiwork [none/use name, he/him]@hexbear.net
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      17 days ago

      I do not care about comms and still believe we should mostly post almost everything in main, so removing a comm is fine with me, but come the fuck on. If you weren’t a mod this comment would be removed for misogyny and transphobia.

      there was an idea that naming it c/gossip would help ferret out people who were like "I’m not doing gossip, that’s feminine!

      Do some self crit and fuck you.