Gotta double down on this one too. Here at Mastodon, so much talk about "safety" and "harm" from language or whatever, and the great Montgomery boat thing just puts it in perspective for me.
Brother was just *trying to do his job* and nearly caught a bad one. THAT'S where you need the language of harm and safety etc.
This is just a VOLUNTARY APP/WEBSITE. Yes, don't say mean things. Etiquette and not offending people is good. But "safety" is the wrong word.
@jrm4 it may be the wrong word for you but - for eg - if you are a close to the edge Trans person - it might really be about safety.
When I deconverted, places online where I could discuss what had happened to me kept me safe in a very real and practical way. For example
Oh, thats (likely?) *very* different from what I'm referring to. This place can *absolutely* be for sharing experiences and figuring out how to be safe --in the real world--
My problem is the extent and degree to which people refer to, e.g. experiencing negativity from people *while using social media like Mastodon* is a matter of "safety."
I'm not saying anything goes but I am saying that most often, people saying mean things here is rarely usefully comparable to 'real life harm'
@jrm4 again - how do we tell? How do we know when someone is exaggerating and when actually - it really is a matter of safety for them? Until I walk in their shoes is fine that difficult and it’s easier to accept that people are best placed to describe their own experiences and situation.
Does it do any harm otherwise? It definitely does enormous harm if we get it wrong the other way and deny peoples unsafe situations.
This is a great *theory* -- but in practice, what happens in places like this is essentially the whole HOA thing people are talking about, you end up sanitizing the place to the point that you're censoring others.
3/ Can you give a practical example of territory where you would like to go which you feel you cannot?
Time to get into details. Again, safe spaces are good. But protocols like twitter and mastodon are *not* designed to be closed spaces. That's not what its built for.
I believe their best and highest use is "big town square" -- which means conflict and difficult talk.
Now, how to make them safe enough? You're a special need and that's fine, and for this place to be discover those, good...
Mastodon is 100% designed to allow closed spaces. That is exactlty what federation does for us - and I'm delighted that so many admins agree with me - and defederate constantly.
It's terrific.
For those who want the trolls, haters, 'big public square', free speech absolutists and all the rest - there is the whole of the rest of the internet.
#Mastodon has happily allowed a carve out of something else for some of us. That's great. I'm all for it.
@jrm4 @olives but that example doesn’t mean we should have the open ‘public square’ and all the toxicity that brings. The bad behaviour of 1 admin does not negate the serious benefits accruing from moderated safe spaces.
I mean: if 1 example of bad behaviour means we should have a freely open public square surely the harm done on Twitter etc is evidence a bazillion times stronger of why we shouldn’t?
I can give examples of Twitter type abuse here too. Do they count?
Talking to the wrong guy here: While I understand that Mastodon is the best model, even today **Twitter** is far more valuable to the world.
For reasons that harmonize perfectly with what I'm saying; like right now, the talk of of the Montgomery boat thing is hilarious, savage, and deeply offputting to a whole lot of white people LIKE IT SHOULD BE.
Here's a thing: I'm not going to speak for #BlackMastodon - others will do that.
But if allowing the 'public square' happens, then I predict that the racists and fascists will turn up in quantity - and the abuse will be there instantly as it is on Twitter.
For me that is deeply unattractive and is why I'm here
The point of federation is that if you want the full public square with it's 'robust' (!) 'conversations' you can still have it. And I can avoid it. Sounds great to me
Again, I suppose I'm here to disabuse people of their deeply uninformed idea that "Twitter bad, Mastodon good"
I strongly dislike the guy in charge of twitter now, and I hate its current direction: but
Twitter, perhaps of all the social media platforms, has probably done THE MOST GOOD in its existence, BECAUSE its a big town square, which necessarily does come with some ugliness -- to be better moderated, but not *eliminated*
@olives @jrm4 thanks. But no thanks. So many people have suffered horrible harm at the hands of the thugs over there. Doesn’t mean great stuff doesn’t happen there it does - specially in the space of independent journalists reaching huge numbers they otherwise wouldn’t.
That doesn’t negate the terrible stuff that also happens there.
Who said anything about eliminating Twitter? Please stop this straw man stuff
@olives @jrm4 but that’s not what we are talking about here: we are talking about the proposition that we should just have the full ‘public square’ - essentially the absolutist free speech argument or (my view) there is no such thing and if you allow it, minority and vulnerable voices go. Instantly. And real harm is done to real people in the process.
You're misrepresenting my argument,badly.
I'm not being an absolutist and have never said as such. I never said "no moderation."
I am saying that often HERE, on MASTODON, when well meaning people ATTEMPT to "make a safe space", they make a STERILE one, to the point that they end up actually harming minorities, in roughly the same way that e.g. white closed/gated/ultra-polite/HOA type places do.
So, when you say *real harm* you need to be very clear. This is a thing that , e.g. law is traditionally actually very good at, and that "new communities" sort of suck at, regardless of political leaning.
If you'll notice, we haven't even begun to really get at a concrete definition, which must happen.
but what we CANT do is just blindly agree that "it's harm because I say so." It sounds nice, but, again, sterility and group X ends up steamrolling group Y.
I think risk of suicide and other mental health inujry is a pretty clear example of harm. I'm struggling to see how you could see that any other way.
Did I suggest we blindly agree to anything? No. Did I talk about serious mental health harm? I did.
That's very clear.
Protecting people from that seems like an excellent plan and so far Mastodon has been good at it for some.
I'm not familiar with the Montgomery Boat chat but if it's offensive - then I'm not defending it.
Well you accuse me of making assertions on a 'you've got to jsut trust me here' basis - when I gave very concrete example.
But you seem to be doing what you wrongly accused me of: "I've seen it" and "it happened to me". But the thing that happened to you - as described - was nothing to do people trying to make a safe space. So - an eg?
I did wonder whether the admin concerned would recognise your version tbh. But if it were exactly as described, it isn't what I'm asking for.
You know -- I got curious on what that admin said?
Looks like HE DELETED THAT ENTIRE THREAD, which perhaps speaks volumes; right?
You can search my handle here and see how I discuss things, I've been tough but I'm QUITE confident I've never said anything remotely ban-worthy.
And yet....
@jrm4 @olives right - and that’s not great. But that’s not the point here right? We’re talking about admins defed wearing robustly - and moderating robustly - to keep the fascists and haters out, the fascists and abusers.
I’m all for it and see it as providing a space for seriously vulnerable people which pretty much does not exist elsewhere online. That’s so important and I’ll go a long way to protect it.
@olives @JimmyB
Real talk.
The first really negative interaction I had *on Mastodon* was an admin who thought it would be a good idea to pub my name and say "Hey, look at @jrm the sellout" for suggesting more openness among servers.