Loomio
Fri 16 Aug 2024 5:34PM

Statement from moderation team involving recent racism reports

HB Hollie Butler Public Seen by 222

Hello coop members,

Racism is an ongoing problem in the Fediverse. Recently this has manifested as white people starting threads effusively regarding the experience of being on the Fediverse as exclusively positive, without acknowledging the impact of systemic issues like racism on others. When the very different experience of Black community members is raised, as both a contrast and additional data, it is often dismissed or put in question.

A couple of weeks ago we received a report about a social.coop member who was engaging in this line of thought in a discussion. One of our mods responded to the thread to say that this was problematic, that the CWG ops team had gotten a report about it and that we’d be discussing it at our regularly scheduled August 1st meeting. The reported user then left social.coop before the CWG ops team meeting took place.

Let there be no confusion, Social.Coop is anti-racist, anti-fascist, and anti-transphobic (see our Code of Conduct). This situation highlighted for our moderation team that being anti-racist means that it is not up for debate that Black people are experiencing racism on the Fediverse. It needs to be acknowledged first and then addressed, and never dismissed. Requests for further information such as examples or quantitative data should only follow when it is clear that the affected users are in a comfortable position to provide these, and exclusively after making it clear that there is no intent to negate the lived experience of those affected by racism or other forms of discrimination

We recognize that the decentralized nature of the Fediverse creates conditions where racism can go unnoticed by those not regularly subjected to it and we would like to explore how social.coop can work to mitigate that.

Thanks to the folks who reported this thread, and for doing it with such warmth and respect. We appreciate how the reports were thoughtful and assumed goodwill on the parts of everyone.

Thank you.

@Hollie Butler for the Community Working Group Operations Team

JNM

J. Nathan Matias Fri 16 Aug 2024 5:49PM

Dear Hollie, thank you for this update. These issues are never easy to face, and I appreciate the transparency. As a Guatemalan-American who does face a degree of racism and harassment online (and as someone who studies it), I'll admit that I'm very grateful to be part of a community where I don't have to do the extra labor to explain why these things matter. So thanks to everyone who carries out these values in the moderation here <3

LV

Luis Villa Fri 16 Aug 2024 5:51PM

Terrific statement, thanks.

PG

Peter Gowen Fri 16 Aug 2024 6:50PM

I found this post particularly good at explaining the phenomenon unique to federation/mastodon, and why it persists: https://infosec.exchange/@jerry/112887084476486558

SL

Sky Leite Fri 16 Aug 2024 7:04PM

@Peter Gowen Thanks for sharing, I'll be giving it a read. If you (or anyone else) have resources written by people of color to share I would appreciate it as well

RH

Randy Hall Fri 16 Aug 2024 7:00PM

FWIW this is a key reason I'm proud to be a member of this co-op. I appreciate that you take the ever-present and pernicious problem of racism on the Fediverse seriously. Thanks for the work you do.Â

SL

Sky Leite Fri 16 Aug 2024 7:01PM

Thanks for this post. I'm not familiar at all with the situation, but I can empathize with the people who are forced to deal with racism on an ongoing basis on how horrible it is to have your experiences questioned for the purpose of invalidation.

Even though I'm not as familiar with the topic of racism on the fediverse specifically, and the idea of simply assuming an idea is true because you were told so rubs me the wrong way, it just took one more second of thought to realize that this isn't the case at all. Given that non-white people face racism in so many facets of their lives every day, to me it makes the most sense to assume that also applies to the fediverse, and engage on how its structure interacts with racism.

I'll be reading more about this.

JF

Jonobie Ford Fri 16 Aug 2024 8:15PM

I appreciate both the thoughtfulness in dealing with these reports as well as the post-report transparency. Thanks for all y'all do.

D

dom Sat 17 Aug 2024 2:40PM

based response - fuck racism and kill it with mutual understanding. I'm barely even on mastodon ever nowadays but I'm so consistently pleased with our governance that I keep paying my dues in case I ever return

EM

Eduardo Mercovich Mon 19 Aug 2024 11:28PM

Dear Hollie and all the moderation team: thank you so much, and thank you so much for various reasons.

  1. For doing that ugly work so others can use and create safely (as much as possible) together.

  2. But even more so, for the care and thought and attention that went into this statement. It is not at all as common as we'd like to see this level of consciousness applied to caring for others.

You all made us proud to nurture and develop this humane instance.

Thank you very much. :)

C

cacu Wed 4 Sep 2024 3:50PM

thank you dear Holie and all the moderation team, I appreciate the transparency and these efforts