Yeah, at the end of the day Lemmy is just a colloboration between the users, the mods, and the admins.

The admins do have the final say, but in order for users to use their instance in the first place and communities to grow there, they also have to follow the desires of the users and work with the moderators to a major extent. It's just teamwork and being able to compromise on some things but stay true to your principles on other things.

This really shouldn't have been as big a deal as it became, and I would blame that mostly on the mods, somewhat on the users, and maybe just a little bit on the admins for not discouraging the moderators from taking this action in the first place. Everyone could probably have done a little bit better, but it was mostly on the mods for making a bonehead decision without realizing the consequences. That being said, raking them over the coals in the aftermath doesn't really accomplish anything other than letting people feel self-righteous.

It's very easy to see from the outside and in retrospect, but when you're making moderator decisions every single day, you tend to lose a bit of perspective. It can be frustrating especially if admins are interfering with a community that you dedicate so much time and effort to, and I like to think if everyone had walked a mile in those shoes before, they probably wouldn't be acting so condescending right now.