Several people in the community have expressed frustration in regards to the fact that any post that fits the community it's posted to but is slightly out of the normal post type like, for example, being more hardcore rather than softcore, get's a lot of downvotes by people who simply don't like that particular post.
We have also had complaints that particular types of posts as a whole get more downvotes even if they are in the appropriate community and are the normal type of post for a community. This especially appears to be happening to male content.
Additionally we are seeing posts with more downvotes than a community has subscribers, meaning people are downvoting content they don't even want to see in the first place.
We understand some may not like some content of a particular post or community, but downvoting posts discourages these posters who are actually passionate/interested in the topic of the community from posting again. Additionally, when posts are downvoted like that it can bury them in our instance and especially in other instances, preventing them from being viewed by others almost at all.
After some discussion amongst the moderators and admins,because of the reasons above, we've decided to disable downvotes at least for the time being.
What do I do if I dislike a post?
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We recommend those who would normally downvote a post they don't like just, instead, block the user who created the post, or, if the community is a topic you dislike, block the community. That way, you no longer see those posts, but don't effect those posts' visibility to other members of the community and instance.
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Additionally, you can view your "Subscribed" feed instead of "Local" so that you only see posts from the communities you are subscribed to.
What do I do if a post doesn't fit the community it's posted in or is spam?
- Please report the post, either the mods of the community or an instance admin will remove the post if necessary, as soon as possible. We have admins and mods online almost around the clock, so these types of posts should be removed quickly.
Potential future post filtering on lemmy:
- In the future it appears that lemmy may implement a tagging system similar to flairs on reddit. This request has piqued the interest of the lemmy devs, so keep an eye out sometime in the (maybe not so near) future for the implementation of that feature.
As @yay@lemmynsfw.com has said in the comments:
Downvotes should be used for posts you don’t like in your area of interest, and not for niche communities you don’t like.
When the RFC mentioned in the post is developed, we will be able to have a more refined home page, this way we can enable downvotes.
But for now, please block users/communities as it supposed to be.
Please put any comments questions and concerns in the comments below, we are of course always open to community thoughts and feedback, and want to work with you to keep this instance an enjoyable and entertaining place to post and browse.
Hi Annabelle, Wrt negative or harassing comments, you can report them for actioning by mods/admins. I am quick to ban trolls and toxic folks who don't add value to communities, and I believe most mods would agree with me and do the same.
Its not anybody specific. Maybe just a general culture. Maybe ill change my mind after i get some space
As someone who also used to post OC and Mod on here, I can say looking back on things that the "general culture" I think you're talking about is one wherein the community at large has allowed for the (mostly women) OC posters on here to feel unvalued/undervalued, or in some cases outright disrespected.
In terms of unvalued/undervalued, I mean that it comes as a real issue for any forum (or whatever) of this size to cover both the niche and general. I have since leaving here switched primarily to discord groups for the sort of OC posting I want to do, entirely because I have better interactions that way. For someone to see a pic of me they can't just be browsing through /local. In those groups, I (and others) are sought out and enjoyed rather than tossed in with a mix of professional pornstars, hentai, and everything else. And remember, OC posters aren't just doing this because they would like the honor to be included in your special jerkoff session. We do it because we want to enjoy the experience as well. I honestly have no advice for fixing this other than time and size, though in reflection I'd like to apologize to the Admins here for potentially having made them feel same way. Y'all deserve better than you've been treated.
And as for the outright disrespect @b9999998 , Annabelle's most recent post proves exactly what sort of shit is being let slide:
is the top comment on a post saying goodbye to the few likeable men on here when she decided it was time to move on. ANNABELLE BROKE NOT A SINGLE RULE and STILL, she is currently being allowed to be disrespected over a policy the Admins and Community agreed on: "Self-Promotion is only okay as long as the community you are posting in allows it, and you don’t spam it."
Fuck y'alls absolutist need to say the first thing that comes to mind for once, and start thinking about how to develop a community that's not entirely comprised of men with last weeks shit stuck to their balls. The silent rule #1 of any mixed gender group is "don't bother the women (and queer folk) or they won't come back".
So riddle me this anyone: how the hell are you supposed to keep women around when users can criticize (physically), disrespect, belittle, harass, or mock the women who would like to be part of this community? If a new woman joins and sees those sort of comments directed towards a likeable woman who's followed all the rules, do you think she's going to want to become an OC poster on here?
As I said in my reply, this type of toxic trolling is what needs to be reported to admins (since the comment you referred to is in Annabelle's own community, we mods on other communities can't do much outside of our communities - but admins can take action via instance-wide rule 2
Of course, the disgusting part is that many other trolls up voted that comment, and I'm truly saddened by that.
I can say for myself that in any of the communities i mod (including at Reddit), a comment like that toward some OC poster like Annabelle in this context will be deleted and member banned from community when reported - caveat, it does require bringing stuff like this to mods and admins attention.
[Addition] @Rainbow_Spit@lemmynsfw.com, I don't know what your experiences were, but I hope you"ll share with admins some of your own specifics. Also, if you look at the sidebar/rules of https://old.reddit.com/r/ButterflyWings, and https://old.reddit.com/r/DangleAndJingle, you can see how I started those subs and the culture of zero tolerance for trolls and rude members, and have encouraged many OC posters to post in harassment-free communities for 4+ years now.
I appreciate Admin(s?) who stepped up to have those TOS violating comments removed, but it says something deeply wrong that those comments were able to stay up for 7 hours during the most busy part of the day without a single user reporting them. If this is SOP, the users here might need some prodding to get them to use the report. Sorry to say, but anyone who reads toxic comments directed at a woman they like and doesn't report them, but instead chooses to write a nice comment, is the real issue. Though on the bright side, they are probably some of the most capable of improvement.
And while the initial responsibility is on her to manage the comments in her community, it can be tough to remove comments (especially when finances are involved) as women can be perceived as "too bitchy" or "can't take criticism", especially when someone is speaking about their person. Some form of a more robust system could be developed; maybe a few trusted volunteers who could offer Mod assistance on "self-communities", an Admin assigned to overlook the biggest "self-communities" (she is after-all still your #2 post of today), or other system that can enable the community and admins to take action rather than the singular OC/Mod.
Sorry for dumping this on you Admins btw. I know there's many things you're working on to improve the whole experience here, but after having time to digest my experience here and seeing another woman go right as i'm coming back, I just thought I'd say something. Btw, removing downvotes will definitely help foster a better and more respectful community that keeps women and queer folk around. It's actually why I decided to log back on, so count me as proof it's working.
The truth is that mods and admins don't have advanced monitoring tools yet like automod to detect certain behaviors and derogatory words/phrases and to filter. So yes, We do need help from the rest of the instance's members to help identify/report unwanted behavior.
I don't know who the admin is that removed the post you referenced, but IMO it would have sent a stronger message to ban that member (and ask questions later)
Admins/mod teams definitely could use lots more trusted volunteers and help. Can we count on you to help/advise? 😊
It's definitely not the culture but a loud (and jerk) minority. You may even meet someone obsessed with downvoting you, when you see someone like that just report them. It's sad to see you going, but we need to stick together if we want this platform to get bigger.
The one side benefit of disabling downvotes is that this minority of trolls and haters have to be more overt in public view via their comments, and responsible members can help by reporting such to admins for instance-wide bans.
That makes sense.