Dbzero Governance Vote Post https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/63525728

Ahoy mateys!

A few of our users have recently pointed out that a lot of the pro-Zionist accounts on the fediverse nowadays seem to come from the feddit.org instance.

But whatever the excuse happens to be, they need to do better imo. Israel is currently the most violent, fascist and genocidal nation state in the Middle East (if you exclude the US military bases there). And yet feddit.org seems to regard the Palestinians fighting against Israel’s ongoing illegal occupation of their land as the real terrorists. ....

More context

Our instance already voted to ban pro-Zionist accounts (see https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/60585441 for reference) and the rule that was implemented is here: Golden Rule #8.

As further context, you can find relevant comments and discussion in this post by a banned feddit admin in MoG (that fact they chose to post in MoG is in itself quite telling), and this post about their defederation from quokk.au over anti-semitism allegations has recently become active again. ...

Note 2: If you think feddit.org deserves a full instance ban instead, or have alternative suggestions, then please leave your comments below. If enough people think that’s the better option, then we’ll do that instead.

In the end the Post had around 70% of support by dbzer0 users, who in the comments also called for defederation.

Here is a Link to Dbzer0 instances tab https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/instances where if you go to blocked instances you can see fedddit.org is now defederated

i dont think feddit has made a post now, but when they do i will add it

about the later's Zionist Bar Problem

I'd prefer to have a less biased title for this thread because this is a very one-sided point of view and just parrots what the db0 admin claims without questioning them.

Edit: Thanks for putting it in quotation marks, OP.

I've noticed this too and have been following the conversation. However, I think self-isolation isn't the answer. Allowing r/The_Donald to go private didn't stop the far right.

What works is challenging these people, constantly. Mockery, abuse, whatever it takes. But building up echo-chambers, or allowing echo-chambers isn't the solution.

Idk if it's building echo chambers in this case or just wanting to get away from a toxic admin.

See the comments and actively of them before the vote and then as it was happening

Building an echo chamber isn't something done intentionally. Well... Sometimes it is.
It's most often created by avoiding people you find annoying, toxic, etc. As long as you keep up that reasoning you eventually only interact with people who mostly agree with you. You're blinding yourself to counter opinions. The definition of an echo chamber.

ok.

When avoiding ideas or being challenged yes. When avoiding abuse no

Disappointing how many downvotes you have, especially given zero other responses thus far. You've got a valid point, and the mod/admin teams at db0 already have their own behavior issues, so there's surely more to the story than this.

I mean, allowing echo chambers doesnt really seem avoidable on fedi tho? Like, only one side has to defederate to break two way communication, so if someone wants to avoid you, you cant really stop them, and the whole concept of moderation in a decentralized system relies on each instance being able to selectively view or block content from other instances based on the values of that instance. You cant really say "what works is challenging people" if the people you want to challenge have an "ignore" button for when you get too loud for their taste.

Its such an empty criticism when they federate with the ml instances.

It's a pretty emotional topic for a lot of people, so I'm not surprised. Still, I'd advise everyone who downvotes to at least take a look at what the other side has to say. This thread has a feddit.org mod comment on the situation:

https://sh.itjust.works/post/55149672

Plenty have alleged that db0 admins are toxic. I don't think that but plenty have. See the ptb sub.

People throw around all kinds of slanderous language all the time: it's the internet, our accent is hyperbole. It's fine.

The bigger issue that I see here is the cultural tendency to not want your viewpoint challenged, and that's coming from both sides on this one. It's also an issue on ml and hexbear; and those instances will throw the same accusations right back in the face of the broader fediverse, and not be wrong.

Every defederation hurts the fediverse, and substantially. The issues that came up in 23' between .world and .ml, things like that destroy these kinds of projects. Defederation also doesn't change the minds of those who are on feddit, and for the db0, and versus vice. If you think someone is wrong, you should tell them so, and you need to be able to tell them.

I think it's the wrong move. I think defederation is always the wrong move. It's more important to fight about important things than it is to be comfortable right now. If db0 users think feddit is a bunch of fascist Zionists, then get into the comments and call them out. Don't just let them comfortably be Zionists while you ignore the problem. And the same applies to feddit. If they've got the right of it, take the fight and defend your points.

But defederation is a lazy and community damaging move, not just to db0, but to the entire project. Defederation is how Lemmy dies.

Interesting that finally there starts to be some reprecusions for the Germans being so pro genocide. I know it's a very small gesture in a very nish social media but I'm happy about it neverthe less.

I mean it is. Look at .ml versus . world versus say.. hexbear.

Banning, defederation,anything to de-voice people: it's constantly being used to create local echo chambers. And it's not like we don't have a down vote button. We have a way to do "no" to content. But banning or defederation is saying "I don't think you should be able to form an opinion on this content". It's very different.

The idealist, liberal myth of the “marketplace of ideas,” in the face of domestic and Israeli fascism.

Socialists—and in particular antifascists & Marxists—understand the paradox of tolerance.

Antifa: the Anti-fascist Handbook

You can't change the mind of someone you don't have access to.

This will probably be unpopular but the leftist - liberal infighting is my least favorite part of the fediverse and why I usually end up having to give people a warning before telling them to get on the fediverse.

This drama is kind of the epitome of that

so there’s surely more to the story than this.

I mean in addition to instances zionism the feddit.org admin used a troll comm to called out several users for the crime of upvoting the defed thread, and then those users started getting DM harassment

People love to criticize the marketplace of ideas and sure it's imperfect... but what's he alternative? Covering your ears and going lalalalala is even less effective than persuasion.

Echo chambers make you stupid.

And it’s not like we don’t have a down vote button.

I've been banned from communities merely for downvoting posts in them. Such behavior is toxic (on the part of the community's mods, not me), but that doesn't stop it from happening.

💯 . As a project we've got some governance things to figure out.

Some of the options can’t be discussed on lemmy.world because of rule 1.

Such a stupid move....

The former often feels like the later.
Even more so when you're not used to it.

Love how someone is using that exact same mwog thread to show how the feddit admin was wronged

No. Having instances with varying approaches to defederation is good for the fediverse. Having no defederation is how you end up with nostr.

This is only the case if you're annoyed by people disagreeing with you. That's what makes echo chambers.

its not really an echo chamber, lemmy unlike reddit is decentralised, so nothing is stopping a dbzero user from just making an account on feddit.org and interacting with them, in reddit if the admins decide to ban a community that community is just gone.

also having an echochambers isnt bad, like an instance like blahaj should be allowed to exist and not federate with instances that have a lax policy on transphobia, and thanks to lemmy's decentralised nature you can join or make an instance that does have wide federation

What’s toxic is downvoting everything in a community you don’t like instead of curating your feed. It’s vote spam.

Maybe Im not saying this right: Im wasnt arguing for the virtues of echo chambers with that, Im saying, with how fedi is designed, there is no means to prevent someone that wants to make an echo chamber from doing so, so suggesting that one should not allow an echo chamber to exist is a fool's errand.
In a more general sense, it seems to me that, either you let people decide what kind of content to see, in which case many if not most will naturally create echo chambers simply because they dont want to see views too different from their own, or you have some means to force people to see stuff they dont want to, which requires some difficult-to-escape authority have power over their media feed and as such is incompatible with decentralized federation (and of course risks that authority pushing everyone into their echo chamber). Both of those things lead to serious issues in my view, so its a bit of a "pick your poison" situation when it comes to social media design.
Beyond that though, it does have to be acknowledged that there is simply more content, more messages and people wanting to spread their word, out there than any given person has the time or attention or mental capacity to process. That means that some system must exist that determines what fraction of it all you actually see (even if its just as simple as "the things most recently posted on a given platform when you looked at it"). I can see no way to do this that doesnt introduce biases.

I think defederation only really makes sense if there is a concern of botting. Individual bad actors should be banned on a case by case basis, blanket banning seems shortsighted. However, I do believe there are bots on some instances now, compared to say a year ago where I believe they were more far and few between.

Part of my issue is also with bad actors “flooding the zone”. If enough noise is getting pushed constantly by bad actors/bots, it can sway public opinion just by virtue of people seeing those opinions more often. This was one of the things that killed Reddit for me, personally. Well that and a slew of other issues.

You’re right, we should continue listening to the opinions of fascists and Lolita Express passengers until the end of time, otherwise we’ll be blindly bumping into furniture in our echo chamber.

I think defederation only really makes sense if there is a concern of botting. Individual bad actors should be banned on a case by case basis, blanket banning seems shortsighted. However, I do believe there are bots on some instances now, compared to say a year ago where I believe they were more far and few between.

This is what I agree with. Regardless, I think almost the entire thread would agree that the fediverse/ lemmy is not fully cooked when it comes to the issue of federation.

Sadly that seems to be upsetting some 😞

I'm sad at how selectively they use that rule

Does no one here understand the younger generations access to ideas? I think the idea that every one claims of creating echo chambers is not an effective one. The law of diminishing returns (as a business term) states that all else held equal an increase in production( or the free debate or posting of opinions) will not produce more profit after a certain point ( or the changing of others opinions) . When it comes to people posting and espousing for state sponsored genocide I think we have hit the top of that curve. If you stop the flow of that information you are not creating echo chambers but more effectively stopping the spread of bullshit and hate. They have Xhitter. Fucking ban this genocidal shit every chance you get, either foundationally or personally. I dont get a whiff of this on shitjust works because I dont engage with it.

I think you misread my comment. I agree that we shouldn't let the fascists speak. I'm arguing against the comment above that says blocking fascists is a slippery slope to blocking everyone.

ah gotcha. Now I understand.

I agree in principal but not in part. I do think its possible to set up echo chambers in the fediverse, and while its not impossible to break out of them, its definitely not convenient.

I agree entirely that its a design/ conceptual issue. I've long argued that the fediverse in its current format is very clearly a "1.0" conception.

Did you know that it’s illegal for you to say,
“I want to kill the president of the United States of America?”

Oh my bad

Just because lemmy is decentralized doesn't mean it doesn't for echochambers. I mean look at ml. Or look at what squid did as a moderator to worldnews and political memes.

Echo chambers are absolutely a thing on lemmy. They exist at different scales (instance, sub, individual) but they absolutely exist.

Does no one here understand the younger generations access to ideas?

Feels an awful lot like "won't somebody think of the children?"

All that means is you've closed your eyes to the world around you. It doesn't mean that the world has changed. Avoidance doesn't help. It actually makes things worse because you cede the moral and intellectual territory.

Alternatively, you can actually take the fight to people instead of hiding from problems. And as far as what the younger generation sees, if you aren't providing arguments against fascism, against zionism, who is going to win that mind?

Hard disagree, and thats thoroughly evidenced by the usership and engagement numbers.

The numbers of fediverse users have more to do with onboarding, VC funding for marketing and the inherent nature of federation itself than it has to do with defederation policies

Its not won't somebody think of the children... Its get this shit out of their face. Block it. Thats the beauty of the fediverse.

The initial point was that younger generations feed off engagements. You block the conversation and it doesn't exist. Its not a matter of closing your eyes to the world. Its closing the gates to the exact statement I made. Does no one understand how the younger generation get the information? Engagement. Was the answer. Failure to allow a platform will stop the spread of the misinformation in the first place.

'Never argue with a fool, onlookers may not be able to tell the difference'.

E: these people and often misinformation machines are not trying to have a discourse. They are planting propaganda. ie. The qoute above. Stop the shit in your home. End the spread by denying a platform.

E2: I mean. I get what your saying on an institutional level, but fuck that this is a social media instance argument so. My first edit stands.

Social networks thrive because they are networks. De-federation collapses the network. Its not more complicated than that.

Less content, less interactions, less engagement.

Dang and I just made this account too. Time to find a new instance... Any recommendations? How is lemmy.today?

This whole process has looked sus to me. And on top of that, I don't think voting by up/downvoting the post itself is a good way to call votes --- it means a minority can pass a rule without it being even seen by the majority (not sure that matters in this case). Voting should be done in a top-level comment.