Sorry for this long post! I used collapsing quotes to make it more digestible.
As you may or may not know, there are proposals to change/update the hexbear CoC here. This is an extension of the original discussion thread here.
While there isn’t a specific section in the original CoC about neurodiversity, there are some pertinent sections on mental health crises:
Click to Expand
Hexbear is not a mental health service. Posts/ comments about an active mental health crisis will be removed when they are brought to our attention. Our mod team is not equipped to provide mental healthcare, others can be harmed/triggered and trolls weaponize these events. If you’re having an emergency, you can find a directory of hotline numbers here.
and use of content warnings:
CW: Unabbreviated Triggers - Click to Expand
A content warning (CW) should be before the content and spoiler both the warning itself and the content (the following example does not contain extreme content):
CW Mushrooms I cut up hella mushrooms and then ate them all raw
Topics that must be CW’d
- Violence towards self such as self-harm and suicide
- Violence towards animals or humans such as corpses and carnist products and especially ||abuse, gore, and sexual violence
- Traumatic societal harms such as transphobia, sexual and gender oppression, fatphobia and lookism, ableism, sanism, racism, ageism and other bigotry
- Other common triggers such as discussion of weight and calories, ableist slurs, abortion, NSFW,removed and sexual assault, police brutality, ethnic cleansing and genocide, etc.
Do not abbreviate your CWs. Not everyone knows what the abbreviation stands for. Be aware of your own enjoyment of the site.
I reworded the original mental health crises line to include medical emergencies. That way we are not singling out people who experience mental health crises:
Click to Expand
Users are not equipped to provide care for mental-health crises nor medical emergencies. If you are experiencing an active mental-health crisis, please use a local hotline to speak with someone who can properly address your needs. If you are having a medical emergency, please call your local emergency number.
Making posts on these issues can be harmful to yourself or other users. These posts can be removed.
If this seems unnecessary and you would like to keep the original wording, or want to provide an alternative, please say so.
There was some great suggestions on content warnings. Here is a draft with some changes to include epilepsy warnings and abbreviations for triggers:
CW: Unabbreviated Triggers - Click to Expand
A content warning (CW) must be placed directly before the following topics or depictions:
- Self-arm (SH), Suicide/Suicidal Ideation (SI). Mentioning SI in SH topics can be triggering.
- Violence towards humans or animals including corpses or gore. This includes animal corpses used as food, animal products, and animal abuse.
- Traumatic societal harms such as Transphobia, Sexism, Gender Oppression, Fatphobia, Lookism, Sanism, Ableism, Racism, ageism and other bigotry.
- Weight, Eating Disorders (ED), Calories, Ableist Slurs (See: Section 11 - Slurs), Abortion, Sexual Assault (SA), Sexual Violence (SV), Police Brutality, Ethnic Cleansing and Genocide, etc.
- Epilepsy and Flashing Lights Triggering content should be placed inside a spoiler tag.
Post images that depict triggering content should be marked NSFW. Post titles should contain warnings at the beginning.
Use established abbreviations where possible.
Established abbreviations: Self-Harm (SH), Suicide/Suicidal-ideation (SI), Eating Disorders (ED), Sexual Assault (SA), Sexual Violence (SV), Child Sexual Assault (CSA), Child Sexual Assault Material (CSAM)
Failure to use content warnings properly can result in your post being removed and/or further moderator action.
Contributors: BountifulEggnog@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6622335) (https://hexbear.net/comment/6622203), woozy@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6626173)
If this seems good or you would like to suggest any changes/additions, let me know
There was also some good discussion on latent ableism via the vague “disengage” rule as well.
Original CoC:
Click to Expand
Any discussions may be opted out of by disengaging.
Updated with proposals to reduce abuse, make it a personal statement of resignation than command to others:
Click to Expand
Any user may disengage from any discussion by posting a two word, and only two word, reply: “I’m Disengaging”.
Stipulations:
- Do not post a lengthy reply and then end it with “I’m disengaging.”
- Do disengage yet continue to reply directly/indirectly to the user or about the user.
- Do not complain when someone properly uses the feature on you.
- Do not try to circumvent these restrictions by vague posting or bringing it up later in another thread.
- Do not retroactively use disengage through editing posts or comments.
Abusing disengage, failure to abide a proper disengagement, or circumventing the stipulations can result in moderator action.
Contributors: SickSemper@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6622373), MizuTama@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6622432), Marxism_Sympathizer@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6622373), SuperNovaCouchGuy2@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6627165), GalaxyBrain@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6626660)
People have been discussing widely accepted ableist slurs for some time, outside of these most current discussions. I felt that should warrant its own section in an updated CoC. I started with the usual sanist suspects but decided to include widely accepted racist slurs as well:
CW: Slurs, Ableism, Racism - Click to Expand
Society at large is biased towards discrimination against marginalized groups. One expression of this is acceptable language. Society tolerates bigoted language that demeans marginalized peoples. Hexbear flat-out filters some of these words, but some remain unfiltered. As leftists we should confront and criticize this by changing the words we use.
Work to rid the following from your vocabulary:
- insane
- crazy
- loony
- lunacy
- lunatic
- hysteria
- hysterical
- idiot
- moron
- lame
- blind
- ignorant
- powwow
- dumb
- crippled
There are also some problematic idioms:
- mumbo-jumbo
- peanut gallery
- gyp
- long time no see
- no can do
- sold down the river
- tone deaf
While we don’t expect everyone to be perfect or immediately undo life-long bad habits, we do expect a level of self-criticism and social-consciousness from users.
All this boils down to me requesting input from this community on the matters closest to you. Any suggestions, re-wording, additions, critiques, or comments on keeping the old CoC rather than changes would be very appreciated. Contributors will be cited as such in drafts. If you have already contributed, thank you! Sorry to bother you with this again.
When it comes to neurodiversity I would like to start a discussion on tone indicators or suggest enforcement of posting in earnest in comms where the description already states that it is an area free of shitposting, like in “chat”.
I for example both am not a native English speaker (which complicates tone reading) and as an audhd I tend to post with my heart in my sleeve and also read replys and posts in earnest unless they are very clearly shitposts. What “very clearly” means can vary by the topic and ones knowledge on it. For example proximity to slop channels impacts this and not everyone on the site is as well in the loop on the latest memes or phenomena that is happening. People are also in very different places on their understanding on actual theory.
I understand that people feel like they should be allowed to have the fun of not using tone indicators, but there are channels for that. I think it would avoid confusion and also de-escalate conflict if intents were always made as clear as possible. Personally I think the good old /s and similar are fine and typically take nothing away from the content, at least for me personally. This could be stated more clearly in the CoC.
Another one that is somewhat related is the whole “mansplaining” thing that sometimes gets turned around into a negative when a neurodiverse comrade uses a solution focused helping strategy. For this I think open communication and indication of intent would help a lot, but that requires the person more marginalized to give an explanation for the explaining and I am not sure that is a good idea, feels a bit like having to apologize for the way you are. But if anyone has good suggestions on this and how the CoC could aid here, please chime in.
Just some follow up questions to get into some specifics.
- Should tone indicators be their own section of the CoC or could they be part of the same section with Content Warnings? I ask since both serve similar functions to the reader, an indication of what to expect. So the CoC would have a section called “Section __ - Content Warnings & Tone Indicators”
- Should using tone indicators be a simple guideline that we all work towards where the only people who get banned for it are the ones who mock it or make a huge stink? Or should failure to use tone indicators follow a more strict escalation where we verbally warn people over it to start and then work our way up to temp bans?
- Should serious comms like c/news or c/covid be more strict on indicators than unserious subs or would you like to see it equally strict site-wide? (Site-wide might help with what you said about people not understanding the latest memes or bits)
- Besides /s, what are some common tone indicators that would be used and what do they indicate?
The last part you mentioned, about “mansplaining” being used as a cudgel. This is very close to what was brought up in the discussion thread about “debatebro/debatefolk” used in the same way. From what I understood of the discussion, neurotypicals have less of a compulsion to scrutinize the details of an argument, or with ambiguous truth conditions. So it’s easier for them to tap out of an argument or let-go without hammering out those details. Then the compulsion to continue is used as an insult to demean neurodiverse comrades. This should be an additional proposal in the next proposal thread. If I don’t see it mentioned, I will bring it up again.
As to how that is handled in the CoC, the suggestion so far is to back off on the “bullying works” attitude. In the recent revision of the draft CoC, I have the following points inspired by comrade @purpleworm from this thread:
- “Bullying Works” does not work. Do not demean or harass others for caring about a topic or details of a topic more than you do.
- Constructive engagement is more important than “dunking”
As far as the rules go, the idea is that mods are to more strictly enforce this:
- No public or private harassment, insulting, or demeaning of users.
If anyone has any feedback on those ideas, please let me know.
My thoughts on these:
- Agree that they serve a similar function, could be merged like this.
- Very much think it should be a guideline, I firmly believe that everyone needs to be given the space to do better and that takes time. It can be more of an ethical code, not a hard fast rule that results in a punishment. I personally prefer this in most things though, especially between comrades.
- I think that if a comm spesifically states that it is free of shitposting, it should be enforced more. But only if it’s clear to everyone. I agree that being more mindful of it sitewide would be a better cultural indicator and probably also easier to do.
Agree on all the rest. I also found the comment about how “bullying” is a bad term to use for what is done as dunking very relevant, it’s in the main thread. I think that if we would frame the dirtbag left style pushback as resistance and retire the term “bullying” it would reveal the actual bullying that is sometimes done in the name of dunking better. Because these are two separate things.
What was the argument that dunking and bullying is different? Think I’m a little confused on the last point and don’t think I’m going to search that huge thread for the specifics now.
It’s this one here, in defense of PPB. It’s a conclusion I drew from this comment, not what was said exactly: https://hexbear.net/comment/6634086
Good post.
I’m still not sure I agree that it’s still necessary, as having the dunking culture with no one to aim it at seems to lead to inward dunking all the time now. Libs and chuds don’t really wander in here like they did with initial federation or if we were on Reddit. But I like the logic about why we had it in the first place and the use of dunking over “bullying works”.
Here is what I have so far:
(CW: Unabbreviated Triggers) Section 2 - Content Warnings & Tone Indicators
Click to Expand
2A - Content Warnings
A content warning (CW) must be placed directly before the following topics or depictions:
- Self-Harm (SH), Suicide/Suicidal Ideation (SI). Mentioning SI in SH topics can be triggering, separate accordingly. - Violence towards humans or animals including corpses or gore. This includes animal corpses used as food, animal products, and animal abuse. - Traumatic societal harms such as Transphobia, Sexism, Gender Oppression, Fatphobia, Lookism, Sanism, Ableism, Racism, ageism and other bigotry. - Weight, Eating Disorders (ED), Calories, Ableist Slurs (See: Section 11 - Slurs), Abortion, Sexual Assault (SA), Sexual Violence (SV), Police Brutality, Ethnic Cleansing and Genocide, etc. - Epilepsy and Flashing Lights.Triggering content should be placed inside a spoiler tag. Post images that depict triggering content should be marked NSFW. Post titles should contain warnings at the beginning. Use established abbreviations where possible.
Established abbreviations:
SH - Self-Harm SI - Suicide/Suicidal-ideation ED - Eating Disorders SA - Sexual Assault SV - Sexual Violence CSA - Child Sexual Assault CSAM - Child Sexual Assault MaterialFailure to use content warnings properly can result in your post being removed and/or further moderator action.
Contributors: BountifulEggnog@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6622335) (https://hexbear.net/comment/6622203), woozy@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6626173)
2B - Tone Indicators
Users should work to introduce the use of tone indicators into their posts and comments. Place tone indicators at the end or beginning of the relevant content.
Common tone indicators:
/j - Joking /hj - Half-joking /s - sarcastic/sarcasm /srs - serious /nsrs -non-serious /c - copypasta /lh - light-hearted /lu - a little upset /nbh - nobody here (Used when talking to/venting at no one specific during a conversation) /rh or /rt - rhetorical question /t - teasing /ij - inside joke /hyp - hyperbole /f - fake /cb - clickbaitThere is no punishment for failing to use tone indicators. However it is a helpful practice for neurodivergent comrades and overall communication on the site. Read more here.
Some comms, like the ones that forbid low-quality posts, may enforce the use of tone indicators at the discretion of the respective moderator(s).
Contributors: StillNoLeftLeft@hexbear.net (https://hexbear.net/comment/6631900) (https://hexbear.net/comment/6636914)
I know this is a week old, but one thing that i think would be super helpful but possibly hard to implement is implementing the spoiler markdown and only the spoiler markdown for post titles. It would allow for CWs to actually hide the content instead of it being right there. I know its a big ask and is ultimately maybe not worth it, but it would be nice to have. I know when im in a sensitive space i either dont browse and just hang in the trans mega or dont use hexbear at all. It would be nice to have those spoilers implemented is all.
The draft I handed in said that CWs should be inside spoilers.
(CW: Spoilers) Example
Click to Expand
Spoilers
Or do you mean like this:
(CW: Spoilers)
Spoilers
The only thing is that there isn’t an example of the markdown. The difference is that the first one has a regular sentence followed by a spoiler with the label “click to expand”. The second uses the label of the spoiler to hold the CW.
Oh i mean in post titles. Titles dont currently expand markdown, so you get like a post title that says “(CW horrible thing) names/explains horrible thing”. Unless im misunderstanding you? Idk, i know its a big ask and is maybe more than is neccessary.
Oh, i got you. That would fall under a technical suggestion and can be proposed in c/feedback. Someone would have to program it.
Oki! Ill put it there (well, maybe ill take a look at the github first and see if i can implement it)
