Hello users of Hexbear, we wanted to inform you that we are going to be locking the_dunk_tank and dredge_tank communities. We have created two new communities /c/gossip and /c/counterpropaganda to serve a similar but clearly distinct purpose than the dunk/dredge tanks.
Not only is the dunk tank a term that has racist origins, but also many posts there were almost no effort and often times requiring later edits to show how they weren't reactionary, ~~not useful with regard to developing rhetoric and furthering dialectical analysis of that which we dunk upon~~.
To that end, we wish posts of reactionaries to be placed in !counterpropaganda@hexbear.net along with an accompanying explanation (as simple or complex as desired) with the intent of countering the reactionary propaganda in the post body, as of now comments are not subject to the same ~~rhetorical rigor~~ rule.
For the posts ~~that are not "low-hanging fruit'~~ of notable people we ask that you use !gossip@hexbear.net .
These changes are mainly part of a continued effort to remove the racist and misogynistic elements from our community and grow.
Any moderators of the dunk tank or dredge tank that want to be a mod in the new communities let me know.
Any users with questions or comments please use this post, this change was made at the behest of the entire Hexbear mod and admin team. We will be looking for more moderators in an organized volunteer drive shortly, if you wish to submit an application you may send it to me via hexbear or matrix direct messages.
Use this post as a place for discussion to these changes. We will keep things as they are for 2 weeks and then reflect on the feedback, including this post: https://hexbear.net/post/3858346
As a personal addendum I am sorry if ~~the closing of the tanks~~ these changes removes a beloved space on the site and if you want to suggest a community to replace them you may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.
Sitewide or community changes come from proposals put forth from the mod team, discussed, and voted on by the mod team.
Any users wanting to suggest a community to replace the tanks, may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net current discussion is here https://hexbear.net/post/3858346 or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.
You may also consider using !shitreactionariessay@lemmygrad.ml as a substitute for dunk/dredge tank posts as well
The mod statement can be found here: https://hexbear.net/comment/5613033
Application
What is your Hexbear username?
Do you have any preferred pronouns?
What are your thoughts on capitalism?
What are your thoughts on imperialism?
What are your thoughts on trans rights?
What are your thoughts on racial justice?
What do think about current and previous protests around the world?
What are your thoughts on Veganism and Animal Liberation?
Do you have any experience with other leftist online communities?
What did those experiences teach you?
What is your approach to moderation, and how do you work with teams?
How do you deal with online drama and people who try to start things for the sake of it?
What current comms would you be interested in moderating?
Do you have any ideas for community engagement?
What is your general time availability? (Time zone, amounts, common browsing times, etc)
This might not be what some of the more serious-minded folks wanna hear, but outside of the newscomm, Hexbear is mostly a shitposting site for me—a high-quality shitposting site, but a shitposting site nonetheless.
If the mod team wants to take Hexbear in a more serious direction, they’re welcome to do so, (NOT REALLY) but they shouldn’t be too suprised if it ends up with less trafic and fewer users.
The name change’s 100% cool, but I’m not sure the replacement comms are an adequate substitute for those of us who mostly just wanna have some lighthearted fun.
Like, of course we shouldn’t allow mysogny on Hexbear, but I’m not really sure what that’s got to do with me just making fun of MagaSSoldier on Twitter and posting it here. If this kinda content isn’t allowed anymore, I gotta say I’d be pretty dissapointed. It’s like when your favorite pub closes down—not the end of the world, but it still sucks. Just hope the modteam gets that.
I remember when the defederations were going on and someone defended Hexbears with the statement, "Hexbears is not a communist org meeting, it's the bar all the communists go to after the meeting". That has always been and will always be my relation to this site. I have a local org that I can go do my serious work and share in how we improve society. I'm here for shit posting and mild socializing.
It would be nice to not have to spend half my time at "the bar all the communists go to after the meeting" looking at dumb right-wing opinions I've seen a thousand times.
Wouldn't it be nice for a change to try to keep discussion to more healthy topics than Getting Mad at Stuff Online.
the_dunk_tank was our left-wing equivalent of basically the entirety of right-wing online media. Just getting mad at stuff, indefinitely.
You can just block the comm lol. You aren't forced to see the content. That's the whole point of the comms. To contain it, and let you decide if you want to see it or not.
I've seen like a dozen posts on the dunk tank to the effect of "liberals are all showing glee at palestinian suffering and saying they brought it on themselves and gave us trump" based on a handful of random anonymous (likely sockpuppet) twitter accounts. Which is just straight up reactionary braindead nonsense. Like it's the most anti-touch-grass stuff I've seen on here recently. Like fedpost tier nonsense. I don't want to use a website where a bunch of the other users are constantly looking at dumb ragebait and making themselves and everyone else dumber because of it. it's that kind of harmful stuff the admins probably want to clamp down on.
The way some users on here talk about liberals or whatever is actually starting to feel like right-winger tier mush brain ooga booga stuff. Like people are already posting videos and stuff with all caps stuff like "The got-damn LIBERALS are DESTROYING FREEDOM and suppressing FREE SPEECH!!!!!"
Ah yes, we’re just becoming the chuds we hate. Yes.
That's what happens to websites without sufficient moderation. Saying "liberals are bad" for the 10,000th time without any kind of commentary is just spam. Some of the stuff I've seen on here recently is indistinguishable from ragebait. Like yes, it actually feels almost as stupid as looking at some right-wing thing on twitter and seeing a bunch of other right-wing idiots being like "So true!!"
People shouldn't be going online just to get mad at something they voluntarily and intentionally looked for and posted. People working themselves into fits.
And maybe admins and mods don't want to spend their time looking at 10,000 posts like "look at this awful liberal lets be mad together"
Does anyone actually think that getting mad online is a healthy activity? This is like one of the number one most common criticisms of social media. People even on here will say like "twitter promotes ragebait to get create more engagement", and then people come to hexbear just to create the exact same atmosphere?
less traffic is good and basically the point. Why do you need to spend your time looking at random people online complaining about random other people online? Not good for anyone's mental state or life.
So you're saying it's good for less people to use the website now? Why is it bad for people to enjoy things lol.
"let people enjoy things" is has been discussed on hexbear before. Reddit is the ultimate "let people enjoy things" website because you can engage in any kind of gross behavior on it. Hexbear restricts a lot of things. No bigotry, etc.
people enjoy all kinds of things that are detrimental to themselves or others. And it affects the culture of the website in general.
And does it matter if less or more people are using a website if most of the usage is just engagement with a barrage of posts of people's awful opinions?
Should Hexbear be left-wing clickbait? I swear I've seen so many posts on here that are straight up hyperbole or misconstruing something to make it more outrageous.
Like we've had a massive barrage of posts about how supposedly bloodthirsty liberals are all showing glee at Palestinian suffering now that trump is in office and blaming left-wingers or Muslims for Trump.
Which is braindead narrative. You can pick and choose any kind of random post on twitter to create some kind of narrative. I could easily construct a "communists just love mass murder and are racist and blah blah blah" by just posting a bunch of the most unhinged fedposting and MAGA communist stuff I can find. Everyone here would object to that portrayal. Most liberal voters or whoever are not bloodthirsty and hateful towards Palestinians. But people on here are posting literal ragebait from anonymous online accounts that might as well just be sockpuppet accounts.
It was probably one of the reasons they're getting rid of the dunk tank.
so I think a lot of dunk tank content is reinforcing this kind of echo chamber of reactionary confirmation bias. "liberals love murder" or some other stupid thing with no analysis.
I think the admins want to clamp down on this kind of thought-free content because it miseducates people. There is a responsibility on the part of any website to not make people dumber. If we want horrible analysis of current events we can watch mainstream media.