Hey, everyone. Hope this post finds you all well! A few days ago, PM_ME_YOUR_FOUCAULTS opened a comm request thread to name the community formerly known as The Dredge Tank. Now that it's been about 4 days and the votes seem pretty steady, we're rea-
"STOP THE COUNT!!!"
"Mr. President, she's talking."
As I was saying, we're ready to call the vote. Nobody's been happy with counterpropaganda, and we've heard you loud and clear. I'm excited to announce that Slop. is now open for all the posts you'd have previously posted to The Dredge Tank.
El Chisme continues to remain the new space for posts that would have been at home in The Dunk Tank.
In case anyone's confused about this, I'm gonna give a really quick explanation so everyone's on the same page with what's going on with the Tanks. The names of The Dunk Tank and The Dredge Tank have racist origins. The moderators of those communities agreed that the names of these communities should be changed. Unfortunately, while Lemmy allows the display names of communities to be changed, it does not currently allow the actual comm names to be changed. In order to change the names of these communities, we would have to shut them down and re-open new comms under new names. The mods of the dunk tank and dredge tank requested the name c/gossip. While there are some legitimate arguments being made relating to misogynistic societal perceptions of that word, the mods include women and enbies who disagree and specifically requested this name. I feel that this situation parallels the initial pushback that was experienced with disabled in which users voiced concerns that this name could be ableist, but the moderators of that community are themselves disabled and specifically requested that comm name, verbatim. Along with this name change, the mods felt that slightly expanding the scope of the community and simultaneously lowering the bar for the previous Rule 8 would allow users to post about more minor public figures as well as more major ones. This was seen as an expansion of the community's role, allowing posts to the new Dredge Tank replacement (counterpropaganda) to become a little more focused. We communicated this poorly, but the intention was to have users offer a sentence or two countering the reactionary take shown in the screenshot. Given how things spiraled from there, we've taken a step back from changing any of the rules during the switchover from The Dredge tank to Slop. We're trying to take time to let everyone breathe without changing too many things too quickly, but we also want to actually make sure people can get back to posting. Hopefully you're all okay with this pacing, lemme know below.
EDIT: thanks to @[email protected] for pointing out that this post didn't include the descriptions of the comms.
Where am I supposed to post...?
Slop is for what the old dredge_tank was like. Roast anonymous reactionaries to your heart's content!
Gossip for an informal discussion regarding people with power / notable / tools of power
Counterprop for a formalized discussion regarding reactionary people no matter how powerful/notable.
In upcoming admin updates:
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I'll post some analysis of mistakes and missteps that were made in recent days, including some of the context that led up to those errors.
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I'll offer a clearer and more complete explanation and description of the ongoing site culture issues that have been previously mentioned. These were poorly communicated before, but I'll do my best to explain both the issues at hand as well as the importance of dealing with them.
The last few days have been really confusing and frustrating for a lot of people and a lot has happened. This is not an appropriate place to reopen, re-litigate, or rehash the struggle session. I will not be debating either the struggle session or the subjects of the upcoming admin update posts here. Please refrain from doing so as well.
"Folks, we're feeding the fish their slop, they're tremendously hungry, incredibly famished. And look: I get to feed them. They say: Mr President, please feed the koi fish, its din din time, and it is! I get to do the little shaka-shaka with the can, and they're happy, they're eating -they're eating- out of the palm of my hand, and they're getting so big and so strong. Look at all these koi fish! I bet they won't have any issues finding -finding- a special someone. And it's wonderful, it's great. Greydon Carter could never be a tremendously effective keeper of fish. His party is not so hot, and all of his betta fishes are dying! But Lyudmila's letting me feed them, and I'm doing a tremendously great job, and a looot better than what Sleepy Joe would do!"
am i fuckin reading this correctly??? only because some of the people were women and/or enbies, their decisions are now supposed to be the pinnacle of wisdom and uncontestable?
i know that the mods are meaning no harm, i had nothing but positive experiences with them before this whole debacle started, and OP in particular has genuinely been really great at clearing up the current situation, thank you for that, BUT BEING PART OF A MINORITY GROUP DOESN'T ABSOLVE YOU OF BEING WRONG AND JUST REALLY INSENSITIVE IN THIS PARTICULAR SITUATION! all this is a little bit similar to certain trans people stating that they are okay with the t-slur being used on the internet, and while im sure nobody harbors this kind of sentiment in here, i hope this shows what harmful pitfalls this "im Part of a minority group, therefore im right"-thinking can bring.
so to reiterate from my removed thread:
The term "gossip" has a long history of being weaponized against women, particularly in ways that diminish their voices and portray them as trivial, unimportant, or malicious when engaging in communication or expressing themselves. This cultural baggage doesn’t disappear just because a few people choose to reclaim or adopt the term in a specific context. By using it, the forum risks perpetuating a stereotype that affects gender and sexual minorities who are already marginalized, especially when used as the name of a community meant to serve them.
some folks from marginalized groups, might want to take back words that have been thrown at them, but it’s a pretty complex thing to do. reclaiming those words means being really aware of how it affects others, especially in places that aim to be welcoming. just picking up a term because some people in the community are cool with it doesn’t really consider the real damage that word might still do to others in that same group. like, using the word "gossip" might give off the vibe that this place isn’t really serious about tackling the bigger issues of sexism that are still out there in society.
hexbear communities should be all about making sure everyone feels respected and supported, especially those who have often been overlooked. using a word like "gossip" might accidentally push away folks who think it's disrespectful or plays into negative stereotypes about them. Even if some people who identify as women or genderqueer, might not see the term the same way, their views can really depend on their own experiences and privileges.
one of the key things to building a welcoming space is to watch the words we use, since some can hurt people, even if we don't mean to. just because some folks in the group are cool with certain words doesn’t mean they’re okay for everyone. If we want our community to feel safe and inclusive, we need to think about how our words affect everyone and steer clear of terms that can be harmful.
tldr: it is great that racist terms like
the_x_tankare being purged from the site, but it is absolutely not great that potentially sexist terms are being used as a substitute.In all of this, not once have we gotten an explanation of why it HAS to be gossip, or why gossip doesn't have the connotations that we keep arguing it does. The most we get is 'we don't think it's that bad'. You'd think that if there was such a strong case for it despite all the protest against it, it would be easy to put together a comment explaining the logic, but not once has that happened, and at this point I don't think we're going to be told.
In all honesty, it's starting to feel less like they don't think it has the baggage it does, and instead they're fully aware but just really, really want to call it that anyway, everyone else's feelings be damned. I don't want to be cynical, but absent literally any explanation what am I supposed to think?
Thank you for the comment
Every community that has been made the past couple years has had the name chosen by the people moderating it.
Just because "gossip" can be used in an offensive and condescending way, does not make it so.
Women talking to each other is an important part of how we keep communities safe.
Women mods of the community specifically asked for the community name as they felt it best represented the types of posts welcome there.
You are more than welcome to make a [email protected] post suggesting better names for a community
I'm sorry but a racist game that killed and maimed people for years has no redeemable qualities.
Gossip has been used to protect communities and has a recent misogynistic association.
There were people concerned about [email protected] name yet the disabled mods that wanted the community specifically chose the name.
Through all that's happened, I've been repeatedly encouraged by how quickly and nearly unanimously the whole community agreed that the tank names needed to be changed. The dunk tank had been around for years, but once the harm was pointed out, it was time to for it to go.
Seeing the staunch defense of the name "gossip" when quite a few people immediately say they find it offensive makes me think that was a special case, and not the sign of the strength of the community I had hoped it was.
Because there was ample evidence of the dunk tank being an abhorrently racist term that killed people where as gossip is a tool that has been vital to marginilized communities demonized by the patrirarchy over time. The site has recently commited to addressing the issue of misogyny on the site and lemmy at large.
Gossip as a gendered term
Origin of Gossip
History of Gossip
Evolution of Gossip
As your sources say gossip as a tool can protect women. Gossip as a term, or potentially as the name for a community, can be used to oppress women. While it would be great for this site to play a role in strengthening the tool and weakening the term, it shouldn't be taken as a given that the users who are affected by this are comfortable taking on the fight of reclaiming the word, or that they think this change is effective in doing so.
I appreciate how seriously you are taking the harm of the racist term. I don't appreciate how, at least from the outside, it looks like the position you are in of needing to defend the mods has led you to downplay the potential harm of misogyny to create a comparison.
Can you please help me understand how having a gossip community is oppressive when people can choose to post in other similar communities, or choose to block the gossip community?
Writing a few words to critically analyze the content of the post would make it eligible for [email protected] or a person could just choose to put it in [email protected] could even throw a "main" in there and post it in main.
Having Gossip in addition to the previous two allows people choosing to reclaim Gossip can do so.
Your description is definitely not the way it's being presented in this announcement post. Maybe having gossip as a new community instead of a renaming an old one would be a good idea. That would allow much more room to explore what the liberatory aspects of the act off gossiping would look like, instead of being the place where people are looking for the twitter drama they're used to.
We heard you loud and clear as in making Slop for those that aren't happy with Counterprop
Counterprop, Gossip, and Slop can all be spaces for posts that would have been at home in the dunk tank. Users have the choice which space is right for them:
those that don't want to use [email protected] can use [email protected] and [email protected]
those that dont want to use [email protected] can use [email protected] and [email protected]
those that dont want to use [email protected] can use [email protected] and [email protected]
I'm really not clear on what the intended usage of each community is, so I can't comment.
My main issue was that people's concerns about renaming a community to a term that "was used as a misogynist, oppressive tool against women" were being dismissed. I hope these concerns are taken more seriously.
I've had plenty of issues with how things have been handled, but I think the situation is trending in a better direction. Best of luck in finding the best course of action and in communicating your decisions clearly.
Slop for what the old tanks were like
Gossip for an informal discussion regarding people with power / notable / tools of power
Counterprop for a formalized discussion regarding reactionary people no matter how powerful/notable
why are you so averse to the name gossip for almost no reason
It took me reading the slop rules to realise using the gossip community was optional, you can post about more notable people in slop.
That could be a reading comprehension failure on my behalf (either the slop rules or your posts) but I'm probably (I hope) not the only one
The margins between the three communities are evolving and will be a conversation between the users and the mods.
It really does provide the ability to curate what kinds of "tank posts" you'll see.
Slop for what the old tanks were like
Gossip for an informal discussion regarding people with power / notable / tools of power
Counterprop for a formalized discussion regarding reactionary people no matter how powerful/notable
That's the best description I've read so far
Glad you're back Carcosa
You're just creating some made up relationship between two things when there is none. Some people disagreed about this, some people disagreed about that. They're the same.
Using Disabled for a comm name is a shit ton different than using Gossip.
It seems the real difference and what I keep hearing is that it's the mods choice on the names they choose. If they're name is steeped in bigotry so what the mods wanted it and who are you the community to go against the mods?
How is gossip steeped in bigotry? I would posit that a social concept that protected women was demonized by the patriarchy to reduce its effectiveness.
The comparison between dunk tanks and gossip is incorrect. Women have been hurt for gossiping in defense of their community. The dunk tank is literally a violent racist thing.
Where did I compare them? You're doing that, not me.
Many users have given you countless examples of how it's sexist and misogynistic and the mods and admins response is continuously been the community, many of whom are trans and not white, is behaving like cishet white men because the view of these select few mods is different than yours.
It's gross and toxic behavior. It would be so easy to just listen to your community.
I cannot but if you care to explain I am happy to listen
Many users posted articles explaining the horrible history of racism. I am open to being shown how gossip as a term has harmed women more than it has helped.
its the com name, get used to it. why are you so bound to not having the name?
Because it's misogynistic. And just because you and a couple other mods don't think so doesn't make it so.
Go to the message by yoink you responded to in this thread and then go to the message she was responding to and there you go. If that's not enough to convince you it's obvious you have no interest in being open to feedback on this issue.
While the general principle is the similar, the impact of "the dunk tank" on Black men in particular is so much worse than the connotations of gossip
There is also work to reclaim gossip as a gendered term owing to it's contribution to women's solidarity and safety - there's no similar attempt for "dunk tank" and I'm not aware of anything positive arising from brutalising people of colour for entertainment
I'm trying to thing of a similar phrase to dunk tank that's been decontextualised, I'll post again if I think of one