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A summary of what happened between Blahaj.Zone and Hexbear.Net (lemmy.blahaj.zone)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by squirrel@lemmy.blahaj.zone to c/main@lemmy.blahaj.zone

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Lots of people who are seeing top-level postings about Hexbear. Net are probably confused about what has been going on and I want to give an SRD-style overview of the whole thing.
Note: As a user of Blahaj.Zone, I am not a neutral party in this and I do not pretend to be. This is how the whole thing has played out from my perspective.

Hexbear. Net is another Lemmy instance that had relatively recently started to federate with Blahaj.Zone and other Lemmy instances. It had previously been known as Chapo.Chat because it began as an instance for fans of the podcast ChapoTrapHouse.
Recently users from Blahaj.Zone (as well as other Lemmy instances) began to complain about the behavior of Hexbear users. The complaints were about rude, obnoxious behavior: Hexbear users calling people "libs" as an insult, denying crimes of Russia and China, denying the crimes of Stalin,...
Such behavior was not necessarily forbidden on Blahaj.Zone, but certain sub-Lemmys had their own rules on these subjects.
One of the threads about Hexbear: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/1854795?scrollToComments=true

After an ever increasing number of users calling for defederating from Hexbear. Net, Ada (admin of Blahaj.Zone) opened a thread to talk about it. The thread was quickly inundated with Hexbear users, complaining in turn about being called out in this way. Though many of their comments exploited a current bug in the Lemmy code which resulted in emoji's being embedded as pictures which results in lots of image spam.
Ada responded by removing top-level comments in the thread which were not from Blahaj.Zone's users, because she wanted to get the feedback of her own community, not from anybody else.
This happened originally in this thread: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/1959801

The discussion on Blahaj.Zone was a back and forth: Lots of people calling for "leftist and queer unity", others complaining about getting harassed by Hexbear users.

Meanwhile, elsewhere: Lemm.ee, a Lemmy instance operated and managed by someone from Estonia, also opened a discussion about Hexbear - at least partially motivated by the admin's increasing unease of the rampant denial of soviet atrocities and the occupation of Estonia by the Soviet Union. Russian propaganda in regards to the war in Ukraine was also an issue.
Lemm.ee was largely encountering similar problems as Blahaj.Zone, though the Lemme.ee admin admitted that the Hexbear admin was generally responsive to reports and complaints.
The thread on Lemm.ee: https://lemm.ee/post/4543536

The thread was also flooded with comments from Hexbear users. The admin of Lemm.ee also responded by hiding most of the comments from Hexbear.
https://mastodon.social/@brooklynman/110911292961470110

Back on Blahaj.Zone, a tangent opens up: A Hexbear user complains about c/196, the new home of Reddit's r/196 which had relocated to Blahaj.Zone and has been its biggest community ever since. The Hexbear user complains about their comments being removed, comments that called out the use of the r-word and other call-outs. The user posts pictures of the removal notices.
Blahaj.Zone's admin Ada steps in and intervenes on behalf of the Hexbear user, having a stern word with the c/196 mod responsible for the removal of the comments.
https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/comment/2136643

A Hexbear admin also gets involved and sends a message to the mods of c/196 demanding the removal of the sub-Lemmy's banner, because it contains "fuck tankies²", arguing that tankies is a slur. The c/196 mod refuses and publishes their message.
[²"Tankies" is a pejorative term for authoritarian socialists in the vein of Stalin and/or Mao.]
https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/1961004

While the discussion if Blahaj.Zone should defederate from Hexbear is still ongoing, the Hexbear admins defederated from Blahaj.Zone without warning from their side, because of...

unaddressed ableist removals from the /c/196 moderators, defense of chasers, no-quarter rules regarding our users, leakage of good-faith DMs from our admin team, and a general lack of initiative to punish these behavior

In her a response to these events, Ada points out in a comment that she never had the chance to adress the ableist incident (she was in bed) while other issues had happened in the past and had been adressed at the time. Thus she could not react before Hexbear defederated.
https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/comment/2135406

TL;dr: Blahaj.Zone's users complain about ill behavior of users on Hexbear. Net. A discussion about defederation begins on Blahaj.Zone. Meanwhile Hexbear users complain about Blahaj.Zone in turn and Hexbear. Net defederates instantly and without warning.

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[–] SgtSilverLining@lemmy.blahaj.zone 9 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (4 children)

I've had two major issues with these guys. While not necessarily worth defederating everyone, I really don't want to deal with hexbear because:

ALL of their content is political. When they first showed up on my feed, I watched what posts/communities came up and how their users interacted on non hexbear posts. I've done my best to remove all politics from my social media. These guys only talked about politics and would go to other communities to turn a normal conversation political.
Everything was extreme and obnoxious. I don't understand why everyone keeps calling them polite. There was a constant "you're with us or you're against us"/"my beliefs are always right" behavior that was really annoying, especially in a public space that wasn't polarized before they got there. It reminded me of this one girl from middle school who would walk into a room and loudly talk about whatever she wanted until all the other conversations petered out.

They're more than welcome to behave like that in their home, but they can't go to a public space and expect everyone to cater to their beliefs.

[–] Eccitaze@yiffit.net 7 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Not a part of blahaj, but the impression I've gotten from what I've seen (primarily in the lemm.ee megathread) is that for better or worse hexbear takes the concept of radical transparency and debate to its fullest extreme. For the better, it can produce some intensely thought provoking discussions--I've had to reevaluate and reconsider my own personal ethics more in the past week or so than I have in the past few years.

But the downside is that it's Just. So. Exhausting. I fully agree that everything they discuss has a political undertone to it in some way. It feels like they just cannot turn off, and I always have to be on my guard when they get involved in any discussion, even if it's nominally about a completely non-political topic. Even when they're making high effort posts instead of spamming emojis and pig poop balls, every discussion feels like a minefield, where the slightest misstep gets you punished with a "here's a response that implies/outright states you're woefully misinformed at best and a protofascist nazi at worst, here's a link to an obscure book written by a communist scholar 50 years ago that you should read before even trying to discuss this topic." Hexbear getting involved in a discussion is the discourse equivalent of a group playing 4-player FFA Smash Bros. with items on and someone rolls up and demands 1v1, no items, tournament ruleset only.

I feel like I just cannot relax when hexbear is active in a discussion, and it's not even like I really disagree with their points--yes, the US is too powerful, yes, capitalism is bad--but I strongly disagree with their conclusions (supporting China and Russia because it weakens the US is the equivalent of voting for Trump because Biden/Hillary isn't liberal enough.) It's just that they are so laser-focused on debate and so ready to believe the worst in everyone (they called using "top kek" a holocaust denier dogwhistle FFS, that shit originated from freaking world of warcraft, and was popularized on 4chan back when it was just a shithole instead of a racist shithole! I occasionally use it because I'm an elder millennial and I like making dated references!) that even if you support their overall goals and philosophy, you still walk away mentally exhausted because of how carefully you had to parse your words to avoid stepping on a landmine.

[–] Zirconium@lemmy.blahaj.zone 5 points 1 year ago

I just don't understand the defense of Soviet Union and China. Just because western civilization committed atrocities doesn't make "communist" ones any better. "We're" suppose to be better than that. Actual communism wouldn't need to commit atrocities

[–] vinceman@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago

Very well put, mirrors my feelings quite a bit.

[–] kabe@lemmy.world 4 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

Tbh I thought the admins of Lemmy.World were being overzealous when they preemptively defederated from HexBear before we even had a chance to see what federating with them would be like, but from where it stands now I think they made the right call. It doesn't seem like anything of value was lost.

Despite apparent assurances from the HB admin team that their users are to be on their best behavior outside of their echo chamber, it seems they just can't help themselves.

[–] SamPond@lemmy.blahaj.zone 4 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Hexbear is what happens when kids (I hope they're all in their early 20s or teens, because otherwise this gets much sadder) spend years reading on leftist theory but have zero real world experience. They get intense, volatile, argumentative and have no idea how those points reflect on themselves and in reality. This is why they go around prancing those absurd beliefs and fencing anyone who disagrees out, while also dogpilling and swarming communities that don't agree: They only know what its like to be leftists in theory.

The one person who made the """"""peace"""""" thread had an earlier post here in Blahaj saying that since working under capitalism is coercion then everyone who solicits sex workers is a rapist, and that's basically the level of being disconnected from reality that they operate in. Unfortunately for them, their echo chamber is going to go on and be the equivalent of a left wing /pol/. For us - and hopefully all other major instances - its a relief to be rid of such crowd.

[–] squirrel@lemmy.blahaj.zone 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Hexbear is what happens when kids (I hope they’re all in their early 20s or teens, because otherwise this gets much sadder) spend years reading on leftist theory but have zero real world experience.

Unfortunately that does not match my experience. Because Hexbear was a ChapoTrapHouse fan instance in the beginning (and still its largest community), most of these people are likely in their late 20s and older, because that is most of Chapo's fanbase (which rose to prominence in 2016).

It somewhat reflects who the ChapoTrapHouse hosts are: They are all "nepo babies", a bunch of people who came from relatively wealthy or at least well off backgrounds. They are all white people from the upper crusty suburbs who love to tell you what they think socialism is supposed to be. And their audience isn't much different from them.

[–] Tabitha99@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I came from wealth. It certainly didn’t make me a communist. What did that, was the years I spent working in healthcare in various developing countries, and watching people die because they couldn’t afford proper treatment. Although I suppose thinking about where I came from also helped.

[–] squirrel@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Good for you and all the props for you that you decided to go out there. The problem with the Chapo bros is: They really did not. They had not-particularly-successful careers as comedians prior to starting their podcast. Whatever your impression of them may be, I think it's hard to argue that they have a particular insight into poor people's lives or working class politics.

[–] lone_faerie@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago

It really feels like the people who grew up on 4chan and later came out as queer, but never learned how toxic that was

[–] Rozauhtuno@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Not entirely true, before the defederation I browsed their communities and I've seen casual threads about manga, recovery from Alcoholism, talking about insects... and everyone was polite there.

It's just that when it comes to politics they get EXTREMELY loud, and everything else is drown out.

[–] lone_faerie@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Honestly, where I've seen the flooding of politics is outside of their own communities. Their instance is already an echo chamber, so there's no need to spread propaganda. But as soon as they venture to other instances, they need to make sure everyone knows how they feel, and if you disagree or just don't want to talk about it, they instantly turn to personal attacks

[–] xuxebiko@kbin.social 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Reminds me of the often-told story of the punk bar bartender and nazis

based on @iamragesparkle;s tweets

I was at a shitty crustpunk bar once getting an after-work beer. One of those shitholes where the bartenders clearly hate you. So the bartender and I were ignoring one another when someone sits next to me and he immediately says, “no. get out.”

And the dude next to me says, “hey i’m not doing anything, i’m a paying customer.” and the bartender reaches under the counter for a bat or something and says, “out. now.” and the dude leaves, kind of yelling. And he was dressed in a punk uniform, I noticed

Anyway, I asked what that was about and the bartender was like, “you didn’t see his vest but it was all nazi shit. Iron crosses and stuff. You get to recognize them.”

And i was like, oh,ok and he continues.

"you have to nip it in the bud immediately. These guys come in and it’s always a nice, polite one. And you serve them because you don’t want to cause a scene. And then they become a regular and after awhile they bring a friend. And that dude is cool too.

And then THEY bring friends and the friends bring friends and they stop being cool and then you realize, oh shit, this is a Nazi bar now. And it’s too late because they’re entrenched and if you try to kick them out, they cause a PROBLEM. So you have to shut them down.

And i was like, ‘oh damn.’ and he said “yeah, you have to ignore their reasonable arguments because their end goal is to be terrible, awful people.”

And then he went back to ignoring me. But I haven’t forgotten that at all.

[–] Entertainmeonly@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago

That may be the best story I read all week. Thanks. Ha "and then he went back to ignoring me."

[–] photonic_sorcerer@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Haha.... They can deal out the punishment but they can't take it themselves... Thought so. Never in my life have I been called a slavery apologist, but 10 mins in hexbear was all I needed.

[–] awwwyissss@lemm.ee 2 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yeah, they've created their own little echo chamber of propaganda + bots and lost touch with the real world.

[–] Rottcodd@kbin.social 2 points 1 year ago

It's beyond an echo chamber in there.

It feels sort of like an isolated village of eldritch abomination worshippers in a Lovecraftian horror story.

[–] Quacksalber@sh.itjust.works 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Fuckin tankies, man...

[–] chunkystyles@sopuli.xyz 2 points 1 year ago

Fuck 'em.

Fuck tankies.

[–] pewgar_seemsimandroid@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago

ok il note to add fuck tankies to the sign on of a social home instance

[–] phthalocyanin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

reminder:

left-unity means authoritarian entryism

tolerance must function as a social contract, or not at all.

reject auth apologists.

[–] Marxist1312@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 1 year ago (4 children)

Authoritarian is a made up concept in order to make communism and fascism the same thing.

[–] phthalocyanin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

the neck cares not the color of the boot

[–] spaduf@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago

This is the craziest fucking thing I've ever heard.

[–] hobovision@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

All political systems exist on some type of multi-dimensional spectrum. Left-right is just one axis, and kind of a made up one where they mean different things sometimes. The authoritarian axis is a real one, and fascism sits on the same end of that axis as so-called "communism". This doesn't make them equivalent, but it does mean that they both have some characteristics which are the same and bad. I'm fact, one could argue that their position on the authoritarian axis is all that you need to argue they are bad because authoritarianism is in itself the cause of so much human suffering.

[–] Marxist1312@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 1 year ago

What no theory does to a mfer

[–] TwiddleTwaddle@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

That's such a hot fucking take

[–] phthalocyanin@lemmy.world 2 points 1 year ago

hot garbage

[–] ramble81@lemm.ee 1 points 1 year ago

I have been so glad that Sync allows instance blocking at a client level. I tried to give them the benefit of the doubt, but after seeing 4 posts from their instance that were just in bad faith "but it's a joke". I went ahead and filtered them and luckily haven't had to see it.

[–] MossyFeathers@pawb.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Fuck hexbear. I don't know if they just didn't try to federate with pawb.social or if they got preemptively blocked (or maybe they went, "ew furries" and nothing of value was lost), but I'm very glad they aren't federated here. It means I only get exposed to them via comments, and the ones I tend to see don't shine a good light on the community, especially when they brigade instance meta posts.

[–] Jode@midwest.social 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I switched from using Sync back to the Connect app because it allows blocking of entire instances. I got more than sick of the hexbear spam.

[–] AtaKe@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Sync also has instance blocking feature. Though it's not perfect since it only blocks posts, you can still see comments from filtered instances. Hopefully it will improve in future

[–] potat@lemmy.dbzer0.com 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Originally I thought this was a good thing, but my opinion quickly shifted after seeing a lot of non-hexbear posts getting a lot of hexbear spam instead of healthy discussions like I was expecting

[–] FirstMajesticComet@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I saw on !memes@lemmy.ml (viewed on lemmy.ml not federated because this instance is defederated from Hexbear) someone made a meme and Hexbear users were spamming the PPB emojis and embedded pictures in threads. Seemed very toxic, I don't blame anyone for defederating them for that, they only do it outside of their instance, never to themselves so it feels like they're attacking everyone.

[–] Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

To be fair the behavior of c/196's modteam is very disgusting. They perm banned me after I called out someone quoting Keffals (it was recently revealed that they're a literal pedophile (they literally called themselves one)) with the ban message "touch grass" and the modlog is just chock of the mods being openly abusive to people over what amounts to political disagreements. (All anticommunism is always profascism)

I was actually considering writing your admins after I found out about Keffals being a self-admitted pedo but I never got around to doing it. Being banned from a comm for a disagreement is one thing, but it stings a lot more when you were just doing the bare minimum of human decency and being punished for it. What do the admins of Blahaj have to say about the conduct discussed here?

[–] Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Realizing a little too late that OP is not an admin, so i'll drop a mention here to get their attention @blahaj@lemmy.blahaj.zone

[–] TheCoolerMia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

u probably should have done a post on the blahaj meta comm for this :p It will surely be seen there and this post is 7 months old

And I think u can also directly contact the blahaj admins but I've never done that

Oh and 196 has a modmail now ( 196mods@protonmail.com ) so maybe u could ask for a ban appeal there :3

[–] Omega_Haxors@lemmy.ml 1 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

Thanks, I only did it here because when I got banned initially I was under the assumption the admins wouldn't care, but after having read this post it seems like that's not what they're about so before I even had a chance to think about it I started typing. As for why i'm even here in the first place, I accidentally ran into a "hexbear defederation thread" from another instance that was unintentionally very hilarious so I wanted to see if other threads would also be equally funny. It was the lemmy,ca one in case you wanted to see what I mean.

Also i'm not going to appeal 196 after what happened, whole situation just put a bad taste in my mouth and turned me off it completely. EDIT: I looked into it, they're still acting like the pedofash that banned me in the first place. If I emailed them they would probably just take that as an opportunity to send spam to my email like the last one who did that. No. Thank. You. The only people I'm going to talk to about this are the instance admins and only to tell them to force 196 to cut out the anticommunist shit and maybe while they're at it mend ties with HB. There is zero valid reason why two of the biggest pro-trans instances should be defederating from each other, especially not because of one single community which wants to die on the hill of pedophilia. HB saw it for what it was which is why they were so quick to defederate.

[–] YaaAsantewaa@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

That's a terrible take, no one wanted to defederate, just the redditors that we all left reddit to get away from and now they're here causing drama again.

[–] good_girl@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

I was absolutely against defederating and am only poking my head in every once in a while now.

The redditors that I left that site for are still here and they're concentrated in 196. I'm disgusted that we're okay with cis people telling trans people what is and isn't transphobic, I'm sick of chasers being normalized, I'm done with people having bad faith interpretations of my arguments and claiming I can't be from poverty or a POC just because I want real change in my country and for smaller countries around the world. (Which is the dumbest fucking possible interpretation)

On that last point:

Fuck the stupid ass respectability politics people play here, the next time some cumbrained fuck goes out of his way to let me or another trans person know he won't fuck us because of our genitals (Genital preferences exist and are valid yes, but I don't give a shit I will never fuck a cis man that trips over himself to let trans people know he doesn't want to have sex with them at any opportunity) I will say whatever I need to even if it gets me banned.

It's absolutely ridiculously hilarious that 196 is so against "tankies" yet their top posts frequently have anti-capitalist, anti-cop, pro-communism content on top of content that signals the desire for real system change, yet the one instance full of people that pose the idea that maybe sitting around posting memes all day isn't going to cause change instantly gets marked as "tankies" and "alt-rightoids posing as leftists". Disgusting.

[–] Franzia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (2 children)

As a communist, who does hold the desires you just drscrubed, there are often significant disagreements between what I desire politically and what someone who might be called a "tankie" desire. Generally around the application of political violence. Doesn't help that many Hexbears will make obtuse jokes that will go over my head or are only funny to those who get the reference.

Your complaints are valid and I agree. I think you're even referencing a comment I made in response to that guy saying he's not a chaser. I wanted to give him just enough rope... as I'm not sure yet, but if he is a chaser he will soon reveal it again. Hexbear has done good to point out potential issues in blahaj zone, so thank you.

I hate this post and poster you've screenshotted. I'm a vaush fan. He's priveleged as all fuck. I'm privileged. And yet, white people with free time are an asset to the cause.

[–] good_girl@lemmy.blahaj.zone 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Do you consider Malcom X a tankie? Che Guevara? The Zapatistas? Is anyone that takes the steps required to see real change outside of the accepted avenues of democracy (Voting and hoping your representatives enact the change you desire) a tankie?

Also please please please do some self-reflection regarding your approval of Vaush.

[–] Franzia@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago (1 children)

What are your thoughts on horses?

[–] good_girl@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Another reason I dislike Vaush and vaushites, you guys are incapable of real discussions of him.

[–] alycat@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago

As a communist

I’m a vaush fan

I swear you're a troll. You unironically m'lady someone the other day like a creep

[–] good_girl@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (1 children)

Congratulations, we're more welcoming of TERFs that go mask off after being called out than our fellow trans people.

Hope y'all are proud.

This user is still not banned despite multiple reports on many of their comments.

[–] ada@lemmy.blahaj.zone 0 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Just to provide some clarification, many folk don't know that "hon" is used as a slur by transphobes. The reason it is used as a slur is because "hun" used to be a common term in the trans community, for newly out trans women to provide affirmation for each other, and it is still used naively by some folk who don't know the history

The user you're debating appears to be the latter. I can find no indication of them being a TERF, a sock puppet or a transphobe. They appear to be a trans person, using the term without realising its history. For that reason, I sent them a message and asked them to drop the term, which they've done.

[–] good_girl@lemmy.blahaj.zone 1 points 1 year ago

Awesome thanks