Tl;dr: lots of small trans run instances and single user instances of mostly queer trans feminine people.
It’s important to maintain an open mind but not so open that your brains fall out. the “Bad Space” (might as well call it the “Torment Plexus”) is a tool for blocking trans women.
CharLES ☭ H
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •Some of the blocks called out by this poster do seem to be appropriate. It's not enough that they "seem nice". Like, I recall specific problems. Note also that problematic DMs won't show up by looking at their public timeline and that a lot of instances don't bother to enforce their CoCs.
A huge percentage of fedi is trans, so seeing a high percentage of trans sites is not in and of itself a red flag. Alas, there are fashy trans people.
That said, many of the small instances are not blocked by babka, which is a server with proactive moderation, so, at least in some cases, the person doing the critiquing appears to be right.
Sarah Brown
in reply to CharLES ☭ H • •@Charles ☭ H I think we're way past the benefit of the doubt here. I mean, it's standard transphobe playbook 101: portray the removal of trans women as a necessary step to "protect" some other minority. We've seen it happen with feminism, we've seen it happen with the LGB community, and now this.
If it keeps quacking like a duck, you eventually have to stop thinking it's probably a sheep.
Spencer likes this.
CharLES ☭ H
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •witches.live, for example, has been into some well-dodgy stuff, the details of which I can't recall, but it was major drama at the time.
I don't know what's going on with tech.lgbt, but they're blocked by the server I'm on now, which is also a trans server.
I tend to argue against blocking mastodon.social, but it actually is very poorly moderated. In my own experience, antisemitic reply guys face no action. Apparently, racism is also tolerated. Just because they're big doesn't mean they're entitled to federation.
imo, federating with actual Nazi instances, like shitposter.club is a valid reason to block.
In general, I'm suspicious of shared block lists and it appears the algorithm used here is not one I consider appropriate. That said, I don't think that the lead devs or the proponents of the project set out to fuck up trans people. I think transphobia can be an emergent property of respectability politics and the algorithm/oversight needs to be reworked to mitigate this. And I'd like to see a manual review of the entire existiung list, especially of the ve
... show morewitches.live, for example, has been into some well-dodgy stuff, the details of which I can't recall, but it was major drama at the time.
I don't know what's going on with tech.lgbt, but they're blocked by the server I'm on now, which is also a trans server.
I tend to argue against blocking mastodon.social, but it actually is very poorly moderated. In my own experience, antisemitic reply guys face no action. Apparently, racism is also tolerated. Just because they're big doesn't mean they're entitled to federation.
imo, federating with actual Nazi instances, like shitposter.club is a valid reason to block.
In general, I'm suspicious of shared block lists and it appears the algorithm used here is not one I consider appropriate. That said, I don't think that the lead devs or the proponents of the project set out to fuck up trans people. I think transphobia can be an emergent property of respectability politics and the algorithm/oversight needs to be reworked to mitigate this. And I'd like to see a manual review of the entire existiung list, especially of the very small instances.
There's a lot of accusations flying around about transphobia and racism that I don't think are helpful. But I also don't think the person who you've linked is arguing fully in good faith.
Sarah Brown
in reply to CharLES ☭ H • •@Charles ☭ H Honestly, I have seen members of marginalised communities before being suckered into being useful idiots for organised transphobes, and they end up just as dangerous to us as the true believers.
So honestly, when the end result is equally hostile and dangerous, I find their motivations irrelevant.
People spent months arguing over whether Rowling was motivated by a misdirected urge to protect women, or whether she was just an uncomplicated hater of trans people, before she removed any doubt, to what end?
You and I are both old enough and jaded enough to have seen this exact same bullshit play out time and time again. We both know that trying to convert them, one misguided soul at a time, is entirely a waste of effort.
In this instance I have begun the process of firewalling myself off from the whole thing. If, some months or years hence, someone wants to delve into it and work out exactly who was motivated by what, then I hope they find some joy and utility in that.
I'm just going to protect myself from it.
CharLES ☭ H
in reply to Sarah Brown • • •I totally get where you're coming from. But I think there are some important differences here.
This is basically pre-alpha software. The lead developer has recognised that a problem exists. IMO, he has not yet found the right solution, but he is taking criticism and not making excuses.
The hypervisibility of the fuckups is on purpose, in that the devs want everything to be transparent so that they can find and fix things before it gets widely deployed. They are also actively soliciting feedback. nivenly.org/docs/papers/fsep/
Rowling never owned a "mistake" as she got radicalised.
You and I both have experience of two shared twitter blocklists. One you helped run and the other was the Wil Wheaton one, which I was on. Both of them were responding to real problems - which also exist on ActivityPub. One of these was run transparently and the other was really not. I feel this difference was at the root of why one was good and the other was horrible. This new project, wh
... show moreI totally get where you're coming from. But I think there are some important differences here.
This is basically pre-alpha software. The lead developer has recognised that a problem exists. IMO, he has not yet found the right solution, but he is taking criticism and not making excuses.
The hypervisibility of the fuckups is on purpose, in that the devs want everything to be transparent so that they can find and fix things before it gets widely deployed. They are also actively soliciting feedback. nivenly.org/docs/papers/fsep/
Rowling never owned a "mistake" as she got radicalised.
You and I both have experience of two shared twitter blocklists. One you helped run and the other was the Wil Wheaton one, which I was on. Both of them were responding to real problems - which also exist on ActivityPub. One of these was run transparently and the other was really not. I feel this difference was at the root of why one was good and the other was horrible. This new project, which is still early days, is going for transparency.
I've seen the people behind it on fedi for years and they don't just seem nice, but have a good track record.
(I've also seen a *lot* of fashy trans people on here and I wish it weren't so, but a good block list is actually going to have a ton of trans people on it. IDK wtf is going on with some young trans women, but they're very into being Nazi-adjacent edgelords.)
Federation Safety Enhancement Project (FSEP)
nivenly.orgSarah Brown
in reply to CharLES ☭ H • •