[blueflow]

I was unable to settle on the Fediverse as i did not find an instance from where i could follow and interact with all the people that i know. My social circles are rather "diverse" and people like you are apparently working hard to not allow that.

I guess your users were okay with you setting blocks?

[kstrauser]

Yes and no. I’m working hard to keep people who act horribly out of my corner of the fediverse. I’ve never blocked someone for having different political opinions from my own, for example, but I’ve blocked plenty of people, even those who mostly share my opinions, because they were behaving like jerks. I’m doing nothing whatsoever to keep you from talking to them.

Hang out with anyone you want to, and I’ll do the same. And yes, my users are specifically OK with it. Our moderation actions are public, we put them to a vote when there’s some question about the right thing to do, and I’ve blogged a lot about the details of it all. Users tend to join and stay with my instance because they agree with my moderation actions, not in spite of them.

[blueflow]

"behaving like a jerk" by your cultural norms and standards. I understand your position and wish you and your instance a future of diverse and fruitful conversations.

[kstrauser]

Well, of course we’re not going to block them due to anyone else’s standards.

Thanks! We’ve been online for 8 years and it’s been a lot of fun, other than dealing with moderation of bad actors. Like the one above who called me an n-word, for instance. Although that was one of the easier mod decisions we had to make, to be sure!

[lovich]

Do you believe that people can hold a negative opinion of someone else and choose not to interact with them, or does your world view require that people are compelled to interact with anyone who demands it of them?

[blueflow]

My problem is that the instance admin does the blocking decision for the user, based on their own cultural norms, not the users.

[lovich]

Caveat, I haven’t used mastodon or the fed inverse and might be off on the details.

Isn’t that how the fediverse works? You sign up for an instance based on if you like how they admin it, and if you don’t, you join a different instance?

I’m failing to see how that is a problem for users if they aren’t compelled to stay

[kstrauser]

That’s exactly correct. It’s a marketplace of policies. If someone thinks I allow too much trash through, they’ll go to another server. If someone thinks I block too much, they’ll go to another server. There are thousands to choose from, each with its own local culture.

People who’ve been on my server for many years implicitly mostly agree with my actions. If they didn’t, they’d have migrated.

[blueflow]

Yes, but the different instance has a different set of blocks (both outgoing and ingoing), so the problem kinda persists even when you change instances. You can't have both A and B people in your feed when they (actually their admins) instance-block each other on sight.

[kstrauser]

I hear variations of that logic so often and it’s frustrating. It’s impossible for me to infringe someone’s freedom of speech on the fediverse. Someone can spin up a brand new server right now and start saying whatever they want. I can’t stop them, even if I wanted to, which I don’t. But if I blocked them from my own server, some people are quick to complain about my “censorship”, or whatever.

No. In exercising my freedom of speech to say I don’t want to hear their trash, and I don’t want them harassing my users. Their freedom of speech doesn’t say they have the right to force me to listen to them.

(For people following along at home: the speech I’m talking about here isn’t a debate about appropriate fiscal policy, but about vile escaped-from-4chan trash. I’d never block someone for disagreeing with my politics. I’ll block their ass in a heartbeat for a timeline filled with swastikas and death threats.)

[lovich]

Yea, with his clarification in the other comment it’s clear that this guy is one of those types who probably calls himself a Libertarian while unironically advocating for the removal of people’s right to assembly

[blueflow]

You were projecting hard in your last two comments - i generally do not think by constructed group identity. And i'm lost what parts of my wishes you consider authoritarian. I'm just pissed that instance admins install blocks that leave me unable to make my own decisions who i want to interact with - blocking people i like on my behalf.

Typical scenario is that someone gives me their fedi ident and i can't follow them because either my instance blocked theirs or theirs blocked mine.

Ideally i'd have a tool that knows all fedi blocks, where i can specify the people i want to follow and it tells me on what instance i need to register to be able to do that.

[pixl97]

Diverse conversations are actually pretty rare in reality when conflicting opinions exist. The paradox of tolerance pretty much demands you weed out the extremists or they will be all that's left.

[throwaway095775]

> Diverse conversations are actually pretty rare in reality when conflicting opinions exist

So are we just not supposed to debate anything ever? Just find a convenient excuse to ban/block/mute and move on?

> The paradox of tolerance pretty much demands you weed out the extremists or they will be all that's left

Too bad everyone has a different idea of who an "extremist" is, and conveniently ignores the ones on their side.

[pixl97]

Sigh....

Does HN have diverse opinions?

Some say yes, others will say no. It depends on the topic.

Now the moment you start acting like a jerk on HN you'll get a message from Dang or one of the other mods, and if you keep it up you'll be banned.

Diverse opinions are fine. The problem is there are a lot of people that get way too wound up in the rightness of their opinion, and there are others that are just trolls that live on the conflict. When you start banning the trolls/extremists they go off and make articles like "Site X bans any difference of opinion because they are big meanies" Then other groups like free speech extremists show up to complain about how the site is authoritarian in the most annoying and offensive ways possible, and it's not long after that admins block entire topics to make the problem FOAGA.

Being an admin/moderator of places where people can post will quickly drain you of understanding and compassion. The frog and the scorpion is a good fable here. You get tired of the scorpions asking for a ride then stabbing you in the back on your forums.

[account42]

The "paradox" of tolerance is a weak excuse to enact your own tyranny and nothing more.

[pixl97]

Cool story bro.

Me: "let's hang anybody with account in their username"

You: "why don't you come over to my house, I wouldn't want to seem like a tyrant!"

You see how this might not work out in your favor.

[blueflow]

The trick is not being an ass towards someone you disagree with. If you quote Popper on this, you failed that and are rationalizing your behavior because you know its not good.

[pixl97]

The trick is the other person doing that too. Simply put a lot, if not most people don't want a rational debate where they discuss the many sides of an issue. They want to win.

Take religion for example, seemingly most people that have one tend to believe not only they are right about it (if you debate it's correctness it shows your lack of faith), they are trying to convert you and if they fail you are an enemy.

[blueflow]

Nah, this approach is not good because it kinda starts with the frontiers already drawn.

You don't even need to assert your own position, just ask question like "What is your intent behind saying that" or "Why does it have to be this specific way?" to derail them into some status quo. Provoke them into explaining their "great plan" until they tumble.

[Moomoomoo309]

Can you think of a forum that isn't tiny that does not do this kind of moderation that isn't a cesspool? Your theory seems sound, but I don't know if I have ever seen it implemented such that the theory is correct.

[blueflow]

I believe HN does it pretty well.

[RankingMember]

> "behaving like a jerk" by your cultural norms and standards.

Calling someone the "n-word" doesn't really need a lot of cultural translation to be considered offensive.

[blueflow]

Its less a translation thing, but: I do not consider it offensive, yet i have to accommodate these sensitivities while the reverse is not considered.

[lovich]

There is zero real world scenarios where someone who is communicating in English in the modern day, call someone an n-word and does not mean for it to be offensive.

You mean, you personally weren’t the target of an insult and you apparently are mystified as to why any other people’s feelings are taken into consideration

[blueflow]

s/there is/i don't know/

[watwut]

Nazi and KKK consider it proper valid word, the only one that actually expresses who and what they have in mind. Their goal is not directly to offend, just to express how they feel about some people.

As far as they are concerned, the worst offense against propriety you can do is to ... call them racists. That is totally always unfair.