it’s a bit weird that some fedi blocklists use language like “fence” because whenever i see that, i don’t think “safety”, i think “homeowners association”, and i think the HOA characterization of certain blocklist efforts is actually not wrong. it is reminiscent of the abstract desire for “safety” rather than any sort of concrete safety or just treatment. “freedom of association” only goes so far to justify punitive and destructive actions at an instance-state level
of course, what is to be done? what is a more appropriate solution? i think whenever such blocklists are circulated, it usually represents a failure mode at an institutional level. the rise of blocktogether on twitter was due to the systemic failure of their moderation. earlier fedi users may or may not remember the infamous “wil wheaton blocklist” that imported from infamous terf randi harper, who billed her list as “99% gaters and mras” (and i guess 1% trans ppl?)
so i think the “question of the day” now, is, what is the failure of fedi and how could we have avoided it and how can we proceed to mitigate it.
for my part i think it comes down to the “instance” model. no one cares if you have to ban someone from a building, but evicting them from their house or expelling them from their country is disproportionate. so naturally, it becomes an issue when the “community” and “living space” are the same thing.
every day more and more it becomes clear we need to restructure around actual communities at a separate layer.
similar to the dynamics of a cliquey community instance, but without the expanded audience that federation brings. imagine just turning off federation.
maybe in some ways that’s exactly what is going on – clique communities are feeling threatened by the inherent lack of control. overblocking is in that vein similar to defensive centralization; after all, what is centralization if not simply blocking all remotes? and the balance is set by how much control they want to wrest back.
i think the “objectionable” part to me is that clique mentality. especially as it tries to assert itself over others. the other day i had someone ask me which instance to join and i realized for the first time in 6 or 7 years that i didn’t have an answer. they just wanted to exist. they didn’t want to have to care about border controls and digital embargoes. and they didn’t really have any good options.
there isn’t really any well-connected generalist instance that isn’t overly blocked or doesn’t overly block. much less an art-focused one. or a fandom-based one. so they stayed on tumblr and discord even though they want to join fedi. there just isn’t anywhere for them to find a home in an area that is both good to live in and free of HOA type behavior. they don’t want a gated community and they don’t want a place with drive-by harassment. and they want to actually reach people.
[I] suspect that the reaching people, the lack of harassment, and lack of blocking are kind of corners of a triangle.
yeah it certainly does seem like a trilemma
instance moderation is absolutely a huge job if you want to stay on top of it. it can be easier if you take a reactive rather than proactive stance. but the problem with proactive stances is that you now need to judge someone before they have harassed you. and the way people approach recommended blocks, they might not have been harassed either. you’ll never know the difference unless you investigate for yourself… and that’s hard rn.
now, if people just said “hey we dont like them, they failed the vibe check and we’re not gonna spill any tears”, that’s more respectable than making something up. i can’t count how many times i’ve seen people blocked for reasons that are patently absurd if you know the people. you use a reclaimed slur, you get blocked for using slurs. somewhere along the line that becomes “hate speech”. a while ago it was “federates with the usual suspects”. guilt by association morphed into “alt fedi”
the hard part is… they’re not always wrong! a lot of blocks make sense when you look into them. but it’s a mix, and the false positive rate is a bit too high imo. and there’s no indication when you lose friends over your admin’s decisions. and the policies aren’t always visible, bc some admins are hiding them now to prevent scrapers tracking them. it just becomes this whole uncertain mess where you never know who blocks who and why.
my problem with oliphant is that there really should be a “tier negative one”, given that the “tier 0” list doesn’t have 100% consensus. my problem with thebadspace is that every single entry has the same tags, even where it makes no sense. my problem with blocklist culture in general is that there’s zero accountability, review, or forgiveness built into them; often, they lack any sort of context, and if there is any reason given, the reasons are laughably flat-out ridiculous, incorrect, or inaccurate. i’ve seen blocks for being “channers” or “edgelord” being levelled against people who couldn’t be any further than that. i’ve seen blocks for “no moderation” when no reports were filed. i’ve seen blocks for reasons such as “underage” or “reclaimed slurs” or vague unspecified “accusations”. there’s no differentiation between “hosts twitter crosspost bots” and “contains literal nazis that will send you death threats”. fundamentally, i do not think that it is healthy to conflate safety with mere annoyance or a misalignment of “our” values. this is before you even get into the subjectivity of all such judgements… it is, of course, everyone’s freedom of association to do whatever they want for themselves, but it is the point at which people start recommending or expecting that you do the same, that it then becomes a problem. and the real problem is not who you do or do not block. the problem is that there are no clear boundaries or clearly-established spaces or contexts for people’s communications. you talk to someone that happens to be on someone else’s shitlist, and you just might end up on that same shitlist for “federating with the usual suspects”, where “the usual suspects” is an unbounded and growing set of people that seems to propagate further every time you look at it. it very frequently leads into policing who any given person mentions offhand or boosts in passing.