Yeah. The whole thing of Hamas even having to take part in “cease fire” negotiations is just cruel theater. I get why they’re doing it, they can’t just walk away while people are dying, but Israel has 0% intention of honoring any kind of “cease fire,” now or ever, it’s just part of the smokescreen which a lot of the Western news is lapping up and dutifully reporting on as if it mattered.

Good God. Okay, you asked for a response, here is it.

An alternative perspective is that the “pronouns cannot relate to imaginary creatures” is gender gatekeeping. Drag was potentially trolling, but if nobody ever took the bait, nothing would have happened.

Using unusual pronouns was never the issue. It’s insanely common on blahaj for people to use neopronouns, and nobody bats an eye, because it’s normal. Pretending that being trans is equivalent to being a dragon (along with things like encouraging other users to self-harm, because of course this person did, because they are a troll and trying to be cruel to trans people) was the issue.

I cannot fathom how me repeating this for the nth time here is somehow going to make a difference, but whatever. You said something, I’ve replied. Can I go now?

People brought justifications

Fair enough, there were some things that people justified, I shouldn’t have said “nothing” I guess. My argument is that there was a ton of stuff that was not justified, and some of the criticism once we got down to actual events motte-and-baileyed its way back from “he is a Zionist who deletes any criticism of Israel and a transphobe” and into “he gets mad arguing about politics and I don’t like that”, and some of it was literal just random abuse and cursing at him, not connected to any type of event or behavior at all.

Direct attacks are usually removed

Direct attacks in some contexts are removed. In other contexts, they’re allowed. That was my point. I’m actually fine with either policy, broadly speaking, but starting to forbid mild attacks towards friends and allow wild, profane, fact-free attacks towards enemies is a bad road to start to go down. That was much more the core of my point.

You had your politics but you weren’t dishonestly attacking

I’m am going to be honest with you, I didn’t expect you to make this kind of comments

Pretending that PJ is pro-Israel is flagrantly dishonest. It’s also working very well. That’s a good example. Not sure what your complaint here is, I don’t really want to dig through the thread picking out stuff that’s objectively untrue, but that’s one example if you’re saying you don’t believe me about it.

Also, not sure why it’s not okay for dbzer0 to have a “our users” stance while you broadly categorize all .ml users as “losers”

I addressed this already, I never said people who care about politics are losers. I am a person that argues way too much on and off the internet about politics. My point was that for lemmy.ml to suddenly feel like caring about and arguing about politics on the internet makes someone a weirdo is just another example of the sort of tribal “it’s fine with I do it, but when you do it it is evidence you’re some kind of terrible thing” thinking that I am trying to call out.

Satisfied? I’ve already talked about literally all of this, I’m not interested in going back and forth about it just without end. But sure, there’s your response if you want one.

Yeah. The headline is not surprising. The article has some pretty useful information about how the horror is being conducted and the types of lies that are distracting until it’s done, though. Among other things, we (the US) are apparently directly assisting with it on the ground now.

After receiving much criticism over the increased threat of famine that its siege had inflicted on Gaza, Israel, along with its US ally, backed the creation of the GHF in May.

The GHF was intended to replace the UN and international aid agencies, which have operated some 400 aid distribution points across Gaza, with four erratically operated distribution points in Gaza’s centre and south.

Since May, the Israeli military and private contractors, understood to be American, have killed more than 1,000 people trying to access food at GHF distribution points.

There are still some limited UN aid distribution operations, but they are so severely restricted that their effect cannot be felt.

I’m sorely tempted to go back to six months ago, when a lot of the same Lemmy people who didn’t want to vote for Democrats, because that meant they could save Palestine, were still stricken with lingering confusion from that mindset and somehow trying to say that Trump was doing better than even the horror of genocide enablement that Biden had been doing. And dig up their statements from back then and ask them about it.

It’s probably just bitterness, not necessary, though. What’s the point. But yes, back then I predicted this, that the genocide already underway would dramatically accelerate, and potentially under Trump would be the time when Gaza reached its final and permanent end. I really fucking hope I’m wrong, but what’s to stop it? It is happening now, undeterred so far.

motivates a lot of shitty behavior

Indeed

You are pretty much completely correct, though. It is (or should be) only mildly infuriating.

• I strongly object to silencing trans voices on trans issues, even if there are other trans people who feel differently or even if they are okay with the silence. People are tribal, cis or trans, and of course there is a self-selection effect, where people on blahaj are in favor of the blahaj administration for the same reason people on lemmy.ml or Hexbear are in favor of their instances’ administration
• The 196 mods were clearly wrong. I took Ada’s side, to the extent I cared about that whole thing, just because I’m in general opposed to the "boss"es of whatever environment telling the users what to do. It sounds like Ada was doing the bulk of the moderation, anyway, and the mods were just there to give orders but shirking the actual work involved.
• I definitely wasn’t in favor of shitting on JordanLund in that way. I don’t even like Jordan, but the consistent effort to paint him as a Zionist (along with me, FlyingSquid, PugJesus, and more or less anyone who is opposed to a certain noisy contingent of users) and the wild gross personal attacks are not at all something I am in favor of. I think you can probably find me standing up for him against some similar abuse if you look further back, maybe not, but in that individual message I mostly just kind of didn’t want to get involved in it and wanted to clarify my Israel stance and peace out. Look and see if you can find me calling someone a “twat” in anger, or talking about their grubby sticky fingers, anything like that, instead of just it being in a message I’m responding to. You might be able to, but as much as I can manage, I try to get heated about issues and events and not about people’s personal characteristics.
• I didn’t respond to your message just because it was long and it was going to take some doing to look up all the links and unpack it all, and I’d already done what I thought about things more or less to death. If you really want me to, I can go back and take a look, I’m not trying to ignore it but it was a long argument with a lot of repetition anyway so hopefully it’s understandable. What the hell, I’ll take a look later today I think.
• I wasn’t implying people who care about politics on whatever side are losers. I was saying that people are accusing PugJesus of being a loser because he cares and argues about politics, and lemmy.ml is the glassiest of glass houses as far as that accusation.
• I had no real problem with dbzer0 up until a couple of days ago, I actually generally liked their instance because it seemed sensible. Some of the mods’ politics I don’t agree with but that is par for the course and normal. Now having observed some of their decisions at close range I don’t feel that way. I did think about “migrating” to some other place for the topics I care about that have communities like YPTB on dbzer0, but just like in the 196 case, it doesn’t really work entirely that way, and anyway if they continue to let me say what I want to say in YPTB, I probably won’t really care beyond just voicing my opinion on it all.

It’s not just trolling and drama though. I just don’t feel like ceding the narrative space to whoever can pull off the most clever ruse. Like, the truth is important. I know hoping for the internet to be reasonable and trusted is hopeless, but it just bugs me to see people deliberately spinning up this (very effective) total alternate reality about something that matters, on purpose, and having other people buy into it. To this very slight extent, I’m infuriated by it.

Self-identified as one yes.

Also, I know what anarchism is, but thanks.

SoftestSapphic is trans. She was upset about a troll coming into her community and making fun of her identity in a particularly cruel way (likening it to fantasy creatures or a kids’ game or something), and then further upset by the mods of blahaj defending the troll and banning people who criticized them. That’s why she’s angry about it. Honestly, I don’t blame her, it makes perfect sense to me.

Ada said that she defended Dragonrider for quite a long time even after people started telling her they were encouraging people to self-harm and other objectively horrible behavior, because she felt bad because they were getting “harassed.” Of course, when they did something much more minor to Ada, she suddenly felt they were toxic and had to go.

I don’t want to have this whole ridiculous debate again. I feel stupid even touching on it to this extent, I just wanted to give you that relevant context. You’re literally celebrating the dbzer0 admins for banning a trans person for trying to voice her objection to the performative and stupid way that trans issues are handled in some segments of Lemmy. In my world, she should be allowed to say that. In yours and dbzer0’s, apparently she should not, because db0 is the arbiter of whether trans issues are being handled correctly, and she is not, and she needs to obey their instructions for what she can and can’t speak up on.

Also, the “low opinions” db0 is talking about there were:

I think he’s an obnoxious dickhead

I remember his username and him being a twat

He’s a genocide-supporting Zionist radlib

a goddam stalker

an angry turbolib who blames the left (and Eugene in particular, for some reason) for the pathetic failure of the corporate-c**k-sucking Democrats

Do you think those are direct personal insults, which should be handled differently than for example criticism of an instance’s policies or for someone’s specific actions? Good! So do I. Because db0 apparently has some six inch thick rose-colored glasses that get applied to any action that is done by “our good people,” though, they are just “low opinions.”

Honestly I thought you were smart and well-meaning, just kind of focused on growth of the community and creating positive things. The more I am looking into how dbzer0 does things, the more I think lumping them in with the tankie instances with their admin behavior fits pretty well, and I have no idea why you’re bending over backwards so far to defend them.

Not sure which thread you mean, but If you think people expressing their low opinions about someone is “bullying”, then, well you haven’t experienced bullying. And also, what the hell do you expect of dbzer0 admins to do about people expressing such opinions? You want us to go around protecting the people you like from public opinion? Like, this is a legit absurd argument path.

-db0

Sounds like she “expressed some low opinions” of dbzer0, and it all of a sudden wasn’t so absurd an argument path, and turned into a big deal.

I agree with db0 that this argument has pretty much been and done at this point, but yes this is just more “in-group vs out-group” stuff.

Up to you

I legit thought about sending Strange Æons a message summarizing some of the main drama. It might be too reddit-y for her to be into, but I agree. Bottom line, it’s a fuckin’ gold mine.

Sapphic is trans.

She literally was making a pretty simple and coherent point:

People wouldn’t have engaged with the trolls if the admins banned them, but they didn’t. But sure, keep abusing your position to remove my comments stating the abuse of your staff, i bet it feels great every time. Blahaj is more of a tribalistic cult than a safe space these days. And you can’t guilt me into falling in line like the ones afraid of getting banned. And about my modlog, the bans for “Gatekeeping” are actually for disagreeing with the moderation decisions that protected the trolls, this is a common blanket ban used by blahaj admins to avoid accountability.

Comment removed. “Off topic and pissy.” And then, ban. And you’re so deep in the db0-hole that you have fully absorbed the idea “disagreeing with db0 mods on their handling or defense of a trans issue = transphobia,” and don’t blink an eye or notice a problem with that whole sequence of events. Karl Rove would be proud.

I genuinely think you probably look at that and think “Yep, that makes perfect sense, that trans person is super transphobic, which I’m definitely qualified to judge her on and ban her for, as is db0, yep, get her the fuck out of here before she fucks up our handling of trans issues by giving input to them.” Meanwhile, in reality-land, it is fairly obvious that the dbzer0 admins are just kind of doing whatever they want, and reaching for random Lemmy-friendly labels to slap on their reasons, which you will then not question for some reason.

It’s like drama in academia: It starts to become this titanic bitter struggle which causes people to lose their goddamned minds and fight to the ends of the earth, precisely because the stakes are so small.

Seriously, We’re not going to go around policing people for rudeness. This is absurd and will not work whatsoever.

Absolutely, you should not. People should be able to say what they want, if that somehow wasn’t clear. What I was saying was that it’s very silly to ban people for criticizing your decisions in clear and rational language[1], or for their politics, or for very tenuous claims of “ableism” if you just kind of don’t like the content of what they have to say[2], or to call downvotes “abuse” and try to protect certain ones of your communities against getting downvotes by literally banning anyone who tries to give one to the content… but then, when the target is outside the kid-gloves safe space, turn loose this massive drama-cannon with wild insults and accusations and say “Yes! All good, our admins will join in in fact!” and then now hide behind this thing of “Oh ho that’s just the wild west of the ol’ internet for ya, free speech ya know” that you would never put up with if someone tried to, for example, give YOU a downvote or a dissenting comment[3], because that’s abusive and they’re a troll now.

This whole thing originated because you’ve been slinging around bans for people who don’t get with the program you want them to get with or say things to you that you don’t like. I didn’t come to you whining to ask you to stop anyone being mean to me, I actually got involved because you wanted PugJesus to stop being mean to your comments and posts because he’s not allowed. I’m much more in favor of people being able to have their say, I mostly object to the banhammering side, I’m just now poking at the hypocrisy of it.

Up to you though. You’ve clearly decided, I’m just repeating at this point, so cheers I guess.

1. SoftestSapphic from https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/modlog/961853 (also snoogums)
2. https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/comment/20015605, they said “shizo” FWIW, telling enemies they have psychological disorders is fine though
3. Same modlog link, search for “not up for debate”

I was mostly talking about the modlog, check out the bans for SoftestSapphic and snoogums for example.

I was talking about the bans for SoftestSapphic and snoogums among others. Banning people for downvoting stuff from communities they “don’t contribute to” is also stupid, that’s literally how voting is supposed to work: To surface content people want to see and reduce content people object to. It’s honestly not a real great system but deciding that anyone who downvotes your community’s content is obviously an asshole and deserves to be disabled from being able to do that, so that your content will be protected against people who don’t like it using the Lemmy features which are designed for the content they don’t like, is some only-child “you can’t hit me I’m a ghost” fuckin’ nonsense too.

You just asked for examples of bullying, so I provided. What did you expect me to bring up, was someone sneaking through his window and punching him in the face? I’m not sure what other than personal insults could be meant by that. If it was bringing up examples of wrong things he did, then sure. Some people did that, some people lied about it (claiming he’d said one thing when he’d said the exact opposite), some people actively refused to provide any evidence but just threw insults at him and then peaced out. The first thing, I’d have no problem with, the others I feel like are worth worrying about at least a little bit.

And also, what the hell do you expect of dbzer0 admins to do about people expressing such opinions? You want us to go around protecting the people you like from public opinion?

I want you to stop protecting the people you like from public opinion. I’m completely fine with everyone just being able to have their say, although maybe certain levels of personal abuse shouldn’t be tolerated. But it’s very clearly one-sided. The dbzer0 people have been describing downvoting as “abuse,” so yes, I would say aiming extensive cursing and personal insults at someone and accusing them of things they didn’t do can be “bullying,” or at least something that’s worthy of mods weighing in on it, like they would pounce instantly if someone said something about Sam Altman or something.

Edit: Actually, maybe a better way to explain it: Go back to every one of the quotes I listed about PugJesus. If people came into a dbzer0 thread and said the exact same types of things about Ada, would that be okay? Or would it be a problem that required mod / admin attention?

That’s what bugs me about it, it’s the blatant tribalism of it. You permabanned a trans person just recently because they tried (again, for the thousandth time) to explain what the issue was with Dragonrider, and you didn’t like that, so ban for “pissy.” They’re not in the club, so fuck them. Everyone got all up in arms about ban reason “tankie,” but you’re fine with a comment being removed for the reason “shut the fuck up, liberal” (I actually 100% agree with removing the actual underlying comment – my point is that the slurs are starting to be celebrated, and only go one way, and that’s not a good thing.)

One of your people has just recently invented a new slur (“slopper”) to use to attack people they disagree with as they are being banned. I have no idea the context or what it means, although I can guess.

You get the idea. I don’t want to go back and forth about extensively. I have no idea how much of this is you, or the admin team, or whoever. I actually think probably most of what I see as most worrying is not coming from the admin team. But the culture shift is alarming to me. It’s all about attack, slurs, new fun insults. We need to protect “our users” against downvotes. Other users, on other instances, who got rando-banned, well, fuck them, they’re not “ours,” so who cares.

You get the idea. Maybe not. Anyway, that’s what I think about it.

https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/modlog/961853

https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/48662871

Holy FUCK lol

I knew things were getting weird but I had no idea. I can’t even begin to unpack all the layers of this. There’s too much.

“How dare you speak ill of the people above you, disagree with their decisions and explain why even, on this YPTB sub. That is classed as ‘pissy’ and ‘shitty’ and will earn a perma ban for those reasons. Meanwhile, if you have a grudge against a ‘turbolib’, here are some handy slurs you might want to use…”

I still also can’t fathom the apparently successful effort to start to split people into “pro AI” and “anti AI” camps.

You know what? Sure.

58. Based on the examination of available information, including credible statements by
eyewitnesses, there are reasonable grounds to believe that multiple incidents of rape, including
gang rape, occurred in and around the Nova festival site during the 7 October attacks. Credible
information was obtained regarding multiple incidents whereby victims were subjected to rape
and then killed. There are further accounts of individuals who witnessed at least two incidents of
rape of corpses of women. Other credible sources at the Nova music festival site described
seeing multiple murdered individuals, mostly women, whose bodies were found naked from the
waist down, some totally naked, with some gunshots in the head and/or tied including with their
hands bound behind their backs and tied to structures such as trees or poles.

60. There are reasonable grounds to believe that sexual violence occurred on and around
Road 232. Credible information based on corroborating witness accounts describes an incident
involving the rape of two women. The mission team received other accounts of rape, including
gang rape, which could not be verified during the time provided and would require further
investigation. Along this road, several bodies were found with genital injuries, along with
injuries to other body parts. Discernible patterns of genital mutilation could not be verified at this
time but warrant future investigation. Many bodies along Road 232 also suffered destructive
burn damage and conclusions as to conflict-related sexual violence (including genital mutilation)
related to these incidents could not be drawn. The mission team was also able to ascertain that
multiple bodies of women and a few men were found totally or partially naked or with their
clothes torn, including some bound and/or attached to structures, which – though circumstantial
– may be indicative of some forms of sexual violence.

It then goes kibbutz by kibbutz, detailing what was or wasn’t found in each location and the limits of what they were able to conclude, including debunking what seems to me like a pretty clear pattern of certain fabricated accounts, in sections 62 through 67.

71. The mission team reviewed incidents of alleged sexual violence related to hostages in
Gaza. Based on the first-hand accounts of released hostages, the mission team received clear and
convincing information that sexual violence, including rape, sexualized torture, and cruel,
inhuman and degrading treatment occurred against some women and children during their time
in captivity and has reasonable grounds to believe that this violence may be ongoing.

They also visited the West Bank, and made sure to make it clear that Israel is also committing inhuman treatment of Palestinians including sexual violence. I think there was a whole separate report or something that expanded on that to put it in context, this one just briefly touches on it.

Overall:

84. Overall, based on the totality of information gathered from multiple and independent
sources at the different locations, there are reasonable grounds to believe that conflict-related
sexual violence occurred at several locations across the Gaza periphery, including in the form of
rape and gang rape, during the 7 October 2023 attacks. Credible circumstantial information,
which may be indicative of some forms of sexual violence, including genital mutilation,
sexualized torture, or cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment, was also gathered.

85. With regards to the hostages, the mission team found clear and convincing information
that some hostages taken to Gaza have been subjected to various forms of conflict-related sexual
violence and has reasonable grounds to believe that such violence may be ongoing.

86. The mission team was unable to establish the prevalence of sexual violence and
concludes that the overall magnitude, scope, and specific attribution of these violations would
require a fully-fledged investigation. A comprehensive investigation would enable the
information base to be expanded in locations which the mission team was not able to visit and to
build the required trust with survivors/victims of conflict-related sexual violence who may be
reluctant to come forward at this point.

This is the report:

https://news.un.org/en/sites/news.un.org.en/files/atoms/files/Mission_report_of_SRSG_SVC_to_Israel-oWB_29Jan_14_feb_2024.pdf

I have absolutely no interest in letting you bait me into an argument where, by correcting you factually, I’m taking Israel’s side so that people can make one of those 200-comment threads about me and what a big pro-Israel piece of shit I am. That’s the report.