I think a little clarification is needed. No. I don’t actually think everyone there is insane. I don’t care about the bans so stop trying to use that. HB enthusiasts coming here and trying to call me out achieves nothing besides proving my point
Edit: Feel free to keep trying to brigade me. It’s not going to scare me to take this down
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Damn it’s nice to see the comments are surprisingly even split between hating on it and actually being reasonable. Quite a difference from when redditors first moved in here last year.
I guess the more people talk about it, the more people actually visit it for themselves and form their own opinions.
given my experience with the chapotraphouse community, yes.
Just you.
HB enthusiasts coming here and trying to call me out achieves nothing besides proving my point
Yeah, you can always count on them to brigade.
Not all of them, some are just idiots.
Yes. Block the community and move on.
Last I checked there was an instance rule preventing the posting of pictures of cheese without a trigger warning.
I blocked hex just days after finding out about lemmy and registering. Some super crazy shit going on there.
Not really. They have a lot of bits and in-jokes which are going to seem incomprehensible to anyone from the outside, but most of them are pretty chill if you engage in good faith. It’s like a lot of tech communities; if you don’t do your research and ask intelligent questions, you’re likely to get told to RTFM.
Childish? Kinda. Insane? No.
There are three relevant things to say about hexbear.
1. It is not a serious instance. Or at least not completely serious; they’re mostly there for memes, funposting, “I know that feel” etc.
So they’re less like the meeting room of a communist party than like the bar where those communists hang out and drink beer, after the meeting is over.
I feel like this is often misinterpreted, as HB users say something that is mostly a taunt and others interpret as actual argumentation. And it also tends to attract younger users, who… well, behave like young people?
2. Even if not a serious instance, they’re serious about their views. Your typical HB user is communist, antifa, vegan, anti-cop, and interprets things in a very specific way. They’re rather transparent about it.
And, because of #1, they aren’t really willing to spend their time entertaining anyone’s counterpoints. It’ll be interpreted as sealioning or similar.
3. Hexbear was already its own thing before federation. As such it developed social norms that often conflict with the norms typically found in the rest of the Threadiverse (Lemmy, Mbin, Piefed etc.)
For example, even if Lemmy as a whole is prone to intrusive political discussions, HB users tend to do it far more. Because they’re used to an environment where this is typically taken as OK.
When it comes to dealing with HB users here, my advice is the exact same as dealing with other users:
- if you don’t like what someone is saying (because it’s idiotic, obstrusive, or whatever), block the person for some peace of mind.
- if you’re consistently uninterested on the content coming from an instance, block the instance.
This is the most reasonable response.
A lot of people here have long since made up their mind about hexbear based both on repeated meta posting on the topic and possibly a bad experience or two with them on a topic they assumed was uncontested but is a landmine topic for communists of a particular bent
I’ve personally never had a bad experience with hexbears, possibly because I’m more empathetic to their perspective, but more likely because I know when it’s time to disengage. There are users on lemmy who feel strongly about a certain topic that’s abrasive to hexbear users and dig in their heels when jeered at (or maybe feel a personal responsibility to stand them down) and are usually the users here who have the most complaints, because the standard reaction from hexbear users is irreverence (both the users and the mods).
Unlike a lot of liberals coming from reddit, communists often don’t have delusions about the neutrality of moderation and so they’ll ban you on a whim if they think you’re there to stir shit. They use the ban hammer judiciously even with users on their own instance. That’s often the biggest complaint both with hexbear and with lemmy.ml.
antifa
Yeah, the famous antifa-tankers. Every single person I’ve ever seen that identifies as antifa was a tanker. Other people run away from that label.
I really hate that I need to point this out, because I feel like it will derail the discussion from Hexbear to fascism:
“Antifa” boils down to “people who actively oppose fascism”, instead of either supporting it or sitting on their hands while doing jack shit.
Maybe you can clear this up then:
Why does everyone there unequivocally, wholeheartedly, unquestionably support Russia?
Russia has barely a trace of communism anymore and it is hard right oligarchy that fits almost every definition of fascism. Not to mention HEAVILY racist and anti-LGBTQ (I have multiple friends who were from Russia and they were the ones who originally told me that before I saw it for myself in Russia)
Yet the “antifa” hexbear will literally down vote you to hell and ban you if you say anything even slightly bad about Russia.
Also news@hexbear is 80% articles about the war with everyone citing Russian propaganda as absolute truth and every western media, every human rights group, etc… is completely lying about the war.
An interesting juxtaposition as they are in the same way pro Palestine and cite those human rights groups as telling the absolute truth in that case
I don’t know for sure. I’ll voice a strong belief in this regard, but take it with a grain of salt.
I think that Hexbear’s views on Russia is a specific case of a general tendency that you see all across social media (not just HB or Lemmy): to dichotomise complex matters into exactly one good side and exactly one bad side, while assuming that everyone belongs to those two bags. It should go like:
- NATO bad.
- NATO fights Russia.
- Criticism against Russia assumed to be NATO support.
- Since NATO bad, NATO supporter bad.
- Anyone who would otherwise criticise both NATO and Russia gets screeched at, and eventually shuts up.
- “Russia good” becomes part of a local consensus.
It gets messier when you add Ukraine into the equation, or consider people conflating governments and populations, but it should give you an idea - it starts with somewhat sane premises but quickly devolves into insane lack of logic.
It explains nicely why they’re supporting Palestine, even with the apparent contradiction: Israel is associated with USA and thus with NATO.
IMO their dichotomy in this topic is idiotic. However it is not just from their part, and blaming specifically Hexbear for this, like some people would do, would be unjust (and a self-demonstrating example). We, people using the internet in the 20s, are collectively doing it.
By the way, you see another example of the general phenomenon in this comment chain. Ctrl+F “elephant shit” and look at the comment I was replying to - “you either treat two types of bad as the same, or you’re defending one.”
[Now I probably drew the ire of all sides at the same time. Frankly? I don’t give a fuck; I’m too old and grumpy to play along.]
Why does everyone there unequivocally, wholeheartedly, unquestionably support Russia?
You may not like this, but the simple answer is they don’t.
Russia has barely a trace of communism anymore and it is hard right oligarchy that fits almost every definition of fascism. Not to mention HEAVILY racist and anti-LGBTQ (I have multiple friends who were from Russia and they were the ones who originally told me that before I saw it for myself in Russia)
Correct. Hexbear critically supports the role Russia plays as an anti-NATO country, and ally to the PRC, who Communists do support.
Communists in general see Western Hegemony as the international proletariat’s largest enemy, as the Global North hyper-exploits the Global South. Michael Parenti explains brilliantly in this short, 2 minute clip. Overall, Communists agree with Lenin’s analysis in Imperialism, The Highest Stage of Capitalism, and agree that it remains the number 1 enemy of the international proletariat.
NATO is the military alliance of the largest Imperialist exploiters of the Global South, and therefore weakening NATO Hegemony is a good thing. The Nationalist, far-right Russian Bourgeoisie fights against this, because they were not allowed to join the club after the fall of the USSR like they had hoped!
Hope that helps.
Is there something in the name requiring people to support fascism if it wears the right color?
Is there something in the name requiring people to support fascism if it wears the right color?
Do some people fighting fascism (aka antifa) go overboard? Yes, certainly; that’s bound to happen with any movement, group, or cohort.
For example, someone might miss the target due to witch hunting, or adopt an “ends always justify means” mindset, or even conflate “non-suporter = enemy”.
However. By implying that “antifa is fascism wearing a different colour”, like you are doing, you’re showing to not understand the obvious difference between
- individuals following an ideology grounded on xenophobia, nationalism, racism, militarism, censorship, suppression of your individuality by force, more often than not sexism, homophobia and transphobia; and
- individuals who don’t want the shit above to transform their lives into living hells, including some willing to use force to fight back.
This conflation between both groups is not just immoral. It’s worse - it stinks stupidity and similar filth from a distance. As such I’m not wasting my time further with you, go chew some grass.
But if you’re anti fascism but pro authoritarianism, you’re still wrong…
I highly recommend you give Blackshirts and Reds: Rational Fascism and the Overthrow of Communism and On Authority a read. At least On Authority, as it’s a very short piece, but the two combined should give you a basic understanding of the historical and theoretical basis of why marxists defend the use of authority. I can understand where you are coming from, I was more than a little skeptical of authoritarianism when I was younger and still identified as an anarchist, but I think if you take the time to honestly engage with our position then you will at least understand why our stance is what it is, and how we are diametrically opposed to fascism, even if you don’t agree with us.
Blackshirts and Reds was eye opening for me
Plenty HB users are authoritarian. I disagree with them in this; however I don’t think that both things cancel out, given the fascism is orders of magnitude worse than authoritarianism alone.
Aaaand you’re low-key defending authoritarianism…
Yeah, because saying “cat shit is not as huge as elephant shit” is the same as saying “cat shit is not shit”. /s
This guy knows nothing of the political spectrum.
This guy knows nothing of the political spectrum.
Liberalism in the center? Gosh, this is the most American political coordinates there could be
It’s almost physically triggering how off-base that is
Maybe you’re telling on yourself by announcing your disdain for antifascists
Most antifa groups are anarchist collectives. So I’m not sure where you’re seeing this, unless it’s solely from people that are terminally online.
Thank you for saying this in a more detailed way than I have been. This is exactly right. They built their own leftist haven and became a whole culture of their own, and then became federated. There is bound to be an initial clash, but honestly I think most of the people who hate on them never gave them a chance. All they saw were the shitposts and the in-jokes and you closed the door.
When it comes to dealing with HB users here, my advice is the exact same as dealing with other users
-
if you don’t like what someone is saying (because it’s idiotic, obstrusive, or whatever), block the person for some peace of mind.
-
if you’re consistently uninterested on the content coming from an instance, block the instance.
I see a lot of leftists (and leaning leftists), even on .world, who would be better off interacting with the users there (maybe blocking the shitposting comms). And outside of those most-seen comms (chapotraphouse and dunk_tank), there is genuine conversation and less shit talking and in-jokes. I believe, with more instances coming in that are federated with them (mine, .ml, and lem.ee? are a couple), some of the Hex-natives are understanding how to interact with curious left-leaning people with unintentionally wrong-headed ideas.
Downvote me all you want, I stand by Hexbear. o7
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Interestingly all those points all applied to The_Donald as well.
I think anyone who’s even remotely curious about hexbear should go make an account and just… Iunno, check it out? That’s what i did and it ended up being my home away from home.
Their viewpoints are gonna be absolute whiplash for most people unaccustomed to speaking about world topics from a non-us-centric perspective, or who have only learned about what communism actually is from our (definitely not biased) general education.
Calling those viewpoints “crazy” is just a shortcut, a base dismissal of thought unworthy of critical thinkers.
If you take me up on this, go lurk a bit! They can’t hurt you. If after awhile of lurking, you have a question (you will have questions) ask them from a position of curiosity that you’re interested in their perspective instead of one there to “educate the commies” and you’ll be just fine. Hell you don’t ever have to engage in politics at all there, hexbear has as many shitposts as the other instances do
I recall i went to hexbear because sh.itjust.works was defedding and erryone was just so mad at them i had to see what the fuss was about. Im very glad i did
Not just you lol. The lads from hexbear are funny aul fellows
Just don’t stare too long into the abyss lol
Hehehe…
Just wait until they start swarming in this thread, they will leave you with no doubts whatsoever. ;)
This community is in world which defederated from hexbear and grad a while ago so we should be safe from most of em.
containment instance
They’re not insane, they’re just victims of tribal thinking like the rest of us. Very narrow worldview reinforced by the others around them, bashing outsiders, thinking “they” are smarter than everyone else. Mostly, they see themselves as good and everyone else as bad, which isn’t very unique among humans either. I don’t think hexbear is worse than anywhere else.
You’re doing the same right now probably.
Honestly my only issue with them is literally anyone who is not them is “an evil pro-genocide lib” (lib, liberal is like the biggest insult they can throw at you as it’s essentially the definition of their opposition.) Doesn’t exactly feel great to see an entire community see you as the absolute evil and everything that is wrong with the world just because you may not agree that an economy run by committee is the best way, or that an authoritarian “vanguard” is the right way to a better society.
If they’re all about workers solidarity and community then they should try to see us if anything as simply “ignorant” not stupid, not willingly aiding genocide, just lacking information that they could help share. Instead a lot of them are just vicious. There are some like Cowbee that seem like good people who want to help others understand their views.
You catch more flies with honey than vinegar indeed:-).
This generalization does not hold. Sometimes vinegar is better at “catching” these “flies”. For examples being nice to a fascist gives the impression that they are acceptable and have valuable opinions. If you treat them with the contempt they deserve, you more correctly communicate your sentiment and model it for others. This also applies to a person you are talking to directly. If you try to, for example, politely debate genocide as if it is not generally understood to be the worst and most serious crime to be avoided at all costs, you feed into the idea that is not so bad, it is a chip to be wagered just like any other political “compromise” when being “pragmatic”. I have yet to see anyone win over to actually changing their mind and doing something about Gaza because someone validated their logic on supporting Biden buy I have seen people make a complete about-face when presented with the harsh realities.
More realistically, the people who are complacent are the majority in this space and do not like to feel challenged or guilty (even though they are wrong and complicit). Rather than become consistent by actually opposing genocide or otherwise becoming informed on the topics in question, they find an environment full of half-truth excuses that tells them they don’t need to actually change what they are doing and can actually somehow the genociders without supporting genocide.
What they need is not honey. Honey is plentiful and they still do not drink it. But some vinegar may wake them up, give them a chance to self-criticize.
That’s a phrase I live my life by to be honest lol
It is a good one. I mean, there are definitely situations where being not-nice is required, e.g. police dealing with a shooting spree in-progress that shows no sign of abating on its own, but as a whole, I do think society would progress much more smoothly if people were to live by that. (and by “that” I mean logic as a whole, of which this is only one tiny piece:-P)
♥️
Doesn’t exactly feel great to see an entire community see you as the absolute evil and everything that is wrong with the world just because you may not agree that an economy run by committee is the best way, or that an authoritarian “vanguard” is the right way to a better society.
There are many Anarchists on Hexbear, by the way.
Additionally, what is your conception of the Vanguard that leads you to call it “authoritarian?” The IWW is a vanguard, as is PSL. The role of the Vanguard is essentially to be the most knowledgeable and dedicated to proletarian liberation among the Workers, to help educate and organize.
I have to disagree with your last sentence. I do my best to treat people on the internet like I’m talking to them face-to-face. It’s the least that people deserve.
Im going to link your conversation here, where people were giving you detailed responses and you just kept shrugging them off so others can judge for themselves:
You can do these things while talking face-to-face with somebody.
Calling a whole bunch of different people with different opinions than you, that you don’t all know, “insane”, seems to me like you feel you are smarter/better than them.
Defending communist genocide wanabes with moral relativism makes me think you are neither smarter nor better than them.
Just because someone is in big group doesn’t mean he is good person and deserves any kind of respect.
I think all people deserve respect by default. Only through someone’s actions may the respect for them be rescinded. Calling a whole bunch of people something is just almost never correct and only furthers any already existing divide.
Everyone does deserve to be treated with respect by default. Respect is earned, and is not the same thing.
Choosing to associate with certain groups is an action for which respect may be rescinded.
Yeah, no. For example once you join the Nazi party, you gave up your right to be given benefit of the doubt. I am not going to waste my time on a theory that maybe you are a good nazi.
Same goes for when you join hexbear.
Would you insult and belittle people in person? That’s what I’m referring to. You give them an opposing view and they go insane. I don’t care if they have a different opinion. Their opinion doesn’t impact my life. But if some of those people talked like that to people’s faces, they’d probably get punched
The times I went there with differing opinions I never got insulted. They think their views are right and (sometimes) mine wrong. They also shared their reasons and tried in their way to educate me. They have their own culture over there that is more rude/direct than normal, but it’s certainly possible to speak normally to them.
They have an entire sub called “thedunktank” that is about sending targeted harassment to specific users.
Don’t get me wrong. I spoke generally, but it’s impossible for everyone there to be crappy
Genocide vs. harsh words are also similar in kind and differ “only” in degree… but that still makes them pretty different overall! Similarly, over-eating to become a little overweight, vs. being massively obese like 500+ lbs (226.8kg), is again a difference in degree though not in kind (perhaps? or arguably is there a threshold where…?). Another comparison could be Lemmy/Mbin(/Sublinks/Piefed/etc.) vs. Reddit: different in degree… but both are social networks so should we say not entirely in kind?
The average behavior of people experiencing hexbear from the outside - i.e. who did not choose it intentionally - is objectively much worse, compared to an instance such as lemm.ee. Again, in degree, even if not in kind. (you can literally measure the effect quantitatively, e.g. by counting the number of complaints lodged against it, such as this post; it may not be as hard a science as physics, but then again, other than physics, what is?)
I agree. But is a statement like “everyone in hexbear is insane” helpful in any way at all in this situation? The only thing it serves is to further any divide and cause more hostility.
They’re not insane, they’re just victims of tribal thinking like the rest of us. Very narrow worldview reinforced by the others around them, bashing outsiders, thinking “they” are smarter than everyone else. Mostly, they see themselves as good and everyone else as bad, which isn’t very unique among humans either.
Absolutely yes. I should have clarified that I agree with your first several points:-). I only disagreed (somewhat strongly) with the last one. Definitely the “is everyone insane (except me ofc 🙃)?” is hyperbolic, and mostly venting, and I even treated it as being a silly / unserious wording, but also halfway serious in terms of seeking information and reassurance that the Fediverse is worth visiting, if someone is more careful where they tread.
Therefore, the OP is not doing the identical thing in reverse, imho, b/c OP is responding to the way that they were treated, which is necessarily not thought-out fully but rather a knee-jerk reaction. OP came to us for help in emotionally processing what(ever) happened to them, whereas people on hexbear.net continually act that way for years and years, plus actively resist any efforts to change (which OP hasn’t even had the opportunity to do yet, this post being mere hours old), which seems to me more than enough time for them to have settled and made a conscientious, intentional decision as to how they want to live their lives. So again, yes OP may have done something of a similar nature, at least similar in kind, but the fact that the degree differs makes all the difference in the world. Maybe?
As for creating division and causing hostility, definitely users of Chapotraphouse have been known to do similarly… but if you want to respond that we should hold ourselves to a higher standard, then I will preemptively agree.:-) Except that the Fediverse has in the past allowed no distinction between communities - TheDonald (if one existed here) would be presented to a (especially new) user in exactly the same manner as e.g. No Stupid Questions (technically I believe that 0.19.5 introduced the allowance for labelling a community by an instance owner, though I am aware of zero communities so far that have used this feature, and many instances have not even upgraded to it yet - at least mine has not yet, though I see that yours has and more are catching up as time passes, maybe even most of the major ones at this point? so maybe there are such labels all around and I am simply not seeing them, though reports such as OP’s and lack of discussion about such makes me strongly doubt that). Except the former would be much more likely to ban you outright for asking a “stupid” question (in their eyes), since as we agree, they feel themselves to be the sole arbiters and conveyors of truth, and moreover, unlike you and I who are discussing this topic so politely (and even pleasantly?) here, are not open to any dissenting POVs (+ are much more likely to enact a full-on ban rather than mere post removal).
Fwiw, I liken it to porn. If someone wants that… then they should be allowed to have it - why should I try to block someone’s access to a contentious conversation, or impinge upon freedom of speech in any way? On the other hand, when someone else’s freedom to speak impinges upon MY freedom to not have to listen to such crap, especially when it blows up my inbox (for WEEKS and WEEKS and WEEKS after I stopped responding!!!), that’s where I draw the line. That’s literally not what “freedom” means - except in their eyes, where they feel that they should be free to ban outsiders, but not for outsiders to block them in return. Put another way: we control ourselves rather than spew our thoughts uncontrollably onto someone, but so many people on certain instances do the opposite, since their culture has taken root to actively applaud that behavior. And yet, except on instances that have already banned hexbear.net (& lemmygrad.ml, and imho lemmy.ml as well, except no major instances do the latter afaik), new users are constantly exposed to that
pornstyle of “contentious content”, which goes against Western standards of normal behavior, without any such warning messages. Thereby leading to posts such as OP’s, who was shocked to see it. As so many have been before, and so many will continue to be, unless something is done about it.So what I am getting at is that in large measure, what causes division and hostility is coming across such a thing unawares. If it were labelled, it would be different - e.g. if you clicked upon a post with an interesting title and a warning popped up “Warning: this community have chosen to voluntarily label itself as containing
NSFW/NSFL“potentially contentious content”, please read this [external statement] before replying to anyone in it.” (and then had an option to not show again, when the user feels that they understand and don’t need the warning anymore)But when you are just scrolling your All feed, as a day- or week-1 Fedizen, and suddenly come upon such graphic/contentious content… it can be more than a little jarring. So it’s not merely their particular style that is the problem, but rather (like porn) it is the infringement of that style upon the unaware users on the rest of the worldwide Fediverse.
I hope this further explanation was of interest to you:-).
