I’ve been posting in the meme communities in Lemmy for a few months now. For the most part, if I make some silly meme about how broke I am or how bad American healthcare is, it doesn’t get removed and the meme does well. But I’ve had several memes get removed that I was pretty sure don’t violate the rules of the instance or the community and now I’m getting pretty frustrated. In each case, I’ve gone to the modlog and (if there’s any reason given at all) they say that I violated a rule that is written so generally that anything could count as violating it. Meanwhile, a meme about American kids killed in a school shooting makes the top of front page.
Now, if you’ve made it this far, your first reaction is to question whether my posts are crossing the line. But I think all of my memes are pretty light hearted even if they’re about controversial subject matter. Let me give you a few examples.
A few weeks a go I posted a meme with the caption “My wife out-drinking everyone at the table-- Our unborn son:” [picture of Tom the cat in the womb]. I understand abortion is a touchy subject for some people, but it’s not like I was advocating for or against abortion. After that, I posted a meme complaining about the lack of specificity of the rules on Lemmy and that post also got removed. That’s enough to let me know that the mods on that instance (lemmy.ml) will delete anything they disagree with. But I’m sure that a meme about killing the rich 1% with guillotines would stay up no problem.
I know what your thinking: Lemmy is a big place, just post on a different instance. And I thought the same thing. I went over to lemmyshitposts@lemmy.world thinking that if they’re allowing shitposts, then they would have a more lax mod policy. Post a few memes about innocuous things, it goes fine. Then I post a meme that pokes fun at the LGBTQIA+ acronym for being too long and that gets removed too. So I’m coming to the realization that any post that is completely innocuous or anodyne to the mods is fine, but if you even touch on certain subjects (e.g., miscarriages, queer culture, Lemmy’s rules, etc) it will get taken down.
It doesn’t even have to be a touchy subject.
I’ve seen plenty of complaints about lemmy.ml being the worst offender for this, removing stuff that is so innocuous that you could show your grandmother at church, because someone in charge found a contorted way to be offended by it. (or worse, because it was critical of China or something)
I think users will ultimately find the path of least resistance, and the least heavy-handed instances will have a healthier growth.
I’ve had three removed comments, no posts, But every time the mod has eventually told me that even though I haven’t broken any rules, they don’t like what I’ve written and have decided to take it down.
I think it’s just the nature of the beast at this point. Smaller communities so the mods are identifying their personal politics with the impersonal rules of the communities.
Right, and the more you participate, the more likely you are to become a target. Ironic for a platform which desperately needs participation more than anything else
Yeah the more you participate the larger the target on your back, and that is a pain, but I prefer these forums to those of Reddit so I can deal with it for now. And the communities here and the general population is still growing and so recently grew so much larger that I think the mods just aren’t prepared for the quick shift it’s been from Reddit.
Also, It’s the frigging internet, so I expect to be irritated at behavior online, mods and trolls are the toll I’m paying to connect with the communities here
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in other words, you’re upset that memes that punch up are accepted and memes that punch down aren’t
We should let the vote system handle unfunny or mean-spirited memes. Moderation should be light handed, IMO.
The problems with “let votes decide” are that most people won’t vote on the best interests of the community in question, and that it increases the impact of brigades. It’s specially bad when dealing with marginalised minorities - because even if “outsiders” don’t underestimate the impact of the mean-spirited meme in question, people put their own enjoyment over the well-being of the others.
As such, even if I’d usually agree with you (moderation should be light-handed), I don’t think that relying on the votes is a good idea.
Instead I think that mods shouldn’t jump at the gun and assume. Context is king; a meme about the LGBTQIA+ acronym being too long can go from anything between “it’s fine” to “it’s prejudice”, depending on:
- how it’s worded
- presence/absence of similar memes in the same comm
- how OP presents oneself (e.g. a trans person posting a meme about this would be interpreted as self-humour)
- other things that OP posted (e.g. does OP target those people?)
Also, sometimes mods should talk officially with the users. Speaking officially is seriously underused, even if it defuses issues before they even happen. Simply commenting “I’m leaving this up because it’s about the acronym alone, but I don’t want to see bigotry here, OK? Everyone, please be excellent to each other, including the LGBTQIA+ members of this comm.” and then watching OP’s reaction is often enough.
not referring to this specific case, specific user, or specific instance — but that policy is exactly how you get an instance full of porn, white supremacy, homohobia, transphobia and general chuddery
It’s really not that hard to distinguish outright hate from a shitty joke. It’s also fairly easy to address things with the community if they get out of hand.
Maybe that’s what’s happening. I just don’t know where the line is anymore. Feel like I have to stick to “I can’t function without my coffee” type memes.
Or you could just not care so much.
If you post memes that are likely to offend someone somewhere, then there’s a risk that one of those someones is going to be a mod, and they’re going to delete it. And really, that’s just the way it goes.
Certainly you might prefer that they have explicit, precise and closely followed rules so you can accurately predict what they’ll do, but there’s really no requirement that they do so - if they want vague rules arbitrarily enforced, that’s their prerogative.
And really, what are you out if they do delete a post? It’s not like you paid for it or you have some sort of quota you have to meet. You just toss things out into the internet, and some of them float and others sink.
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Reading this comment, I think you may be right. It’s just outside my control. It is frustrating to spend time editing images and trying to create something funny only for it to be taken down. But maybe there’s a lesson to be learned here in not letting it bother me so much.
The lesson to be learned here is that Lemmy mods are fickle, unpredictable and prejudiced just like Reddit mods. It’s a rare mod that can moderate objectively and consistently. In a way, mods tend to moderate their own values above and beyond the community’s needs. Lemmy.ml mods have a strong reputation for being skunks. Take that time you are putting into meme making and spin up an instance. Call it LemmyMemeWorld. Then post to your hearts content.
The image is still ok your device, no? Try another community.
I think that’s willfully distorting the situation. Punching down should refer to jokes that seem to be or obviously are made with malicious intent, it’s not about certain groups being protected from humor altogether, that’s infantilizing. From what OP said and posted somewhere in this thread I don’t think their jokes were in any way malicious.
I just want to chime in and agree.
Treating any demographic like they’re too fragile to hear a clean joke (not hateful or malicious) is insulting in its own way.
Hey OP, just for the record: you got a good chuckle out of me for all of the content you created that was removed. Thanks for trying to keep the fediverse interesting.
“lemmy.ml” nuff said imo
Strong moderation is the only thing that keeps a community a community. A good community is a community that says, “No, you and your content are not welcome.”
The lack of that is why platforms like Twitter fail at creating community, just an amalgamation of people throwing their shit into a worldwide circlejerk.
What I’m trying to say is that moderators do not serve your they don’t need to really give reasons or be consistent. They shape the community they Foster.
If your content is removed, find a community that accepts you, because the communities you found do not.
I’m going to respectfully disagree; we should not leave things entirely up to the mods. The rules should be clear about what is or isn’t allowed in the community. Having vague rules that leave it up to mod discretion is a recipe for the mods to take things down for arbitrary reasons (e.g., a liberal mod taking down anything conservative). It is clear to me that this is already happening, because I made a meme complaining about the rules and that was also removed.
Yes, and that’s okay. That community is fostered by that mod. You can make your own communities and moderate them how you like, too.
Communities are not paragons of free speech. They are for like-minded individuals to engage with each other.
Cowtailing to everyone’s opinion doesn’t create communities.
I’m happy to let mods carve out a bunch of niche communities with their own preferences. The fediverse is a big place. If you don’t like instances that are protective of LGBT+ folks you’re cutting it down a bit, but genuinely, you seem to be deliberately picking topics that troll the specific community you’re posting on, then you complained that they took it down. Post where your post will be welcome, stop complaining when you post where you already know it’s not. Reddit and twitter are pretty right wing and troll friendly. Maybe you’ll be happier there.
I hesitate to do this because I don’t want to get the post removed, but here are the memes that were taken down. Judge for yourself if they’re bigoted or as light-hearted as I think they are: https://imgur.com/a/8oNroeo
Anyone who is offended by these needs to calm down and remember that it’s ok to not take everything so seriously.
None of these are hateful in any way. The one about mods definitely has some targeted sass to it, but that’s pretty light.
The mod one is also a critique that you’ll see of every mod everywhere. It’s not new, it’s not (too) specific. It’s a generalization that’s quite often accurate. Clearly whoever took it down knew they were being petulant.
No one is offended by anything, mods are just choosing what content they want in their community. I’m tired of weirdos claiming the world is offended by everything, when the reality is that people just don’t want it.
we should not leave things entirely up to the mods
you don’t have to – that’s the beauty of federation – if you don’t like one particular meme community, there’s a couple dozen others out there with different moderators and different moderation policies
It’s still worth talking about.
Well said, I never really understood why the people who hate moderation don’t just create their own “free” community, but thinking about it now in the context of your comment it makes sense that a loosely-moderated “community” would struggle to feel like a community in the first place.
I’m coming to the realization that any post that is completely innocuous or anodyne to the mods is fine, but if you even touch on certain subjects (e.g., miscarriages, queer culture, Lemmy’s rules, etc) it will get taken down.
I think polarization plays a big part of it. People are quick to downvote/remove stuff that looks like it’s from the “other side.”
lemmy.ml is a cesspit
It seems to be mostly not-quite-incels, or angry teens.
Or both.
It reminds me of trust fund kiddies who are in their first year of polisci.
Yeah actually, stuff what I said - you’re totally right.
Sad but true. Just avoid it
Can confirm. I apparently pissed off the mods there with my other account enough that I get banned basically for making any comment in their worldnews community now. It doesn’t seem to matter if any rules get broken.
In my experience from lurking around Lemmy, it seems that the big instances are largely populated by stereotypically “reddit-left” people, which includes finding a lot of things offensive (whether they’re actually offended or not) and being relatively hostile to people who don’t seem to share their worldview, seemingly considering it the default that everyone should know and accept. You can see it in this thread as well.
Not being an American and being culturally outside of american partisanship, this has been quite the disappointment for me, but what can you do.
I align with the majority of the politics of “reddit left”, but I also have a sense of humor, so I don’t claim the pearl-clutchers.
Please expand on “reddit-left”.
Please expand on “reddit-left”.
I cannot speak for someone else, but I’m still willing to chime in.
Slacktivists nominally aligned to social causes, and fairly vocal about them, but unwilling to lift a single finger on what matters.
Patronising towards marginalised groups. Often with an implicit “they shouldn’t empower themselves, they should rely on people like ME to defend them, poor things”.
Eager to defend corporations once they wash something in pink, black, or green, due to ignorance on the impact of the economic system on marginalised groups.
Assumptive as a brick and eager to witch hunt. Including distorting what others say to point fingers, or screeching at any sort of internal criticism as if it was a sign of allegiance to the other side.
Eager to employ Chewbacca defence and whataboutism when called out on blatant prejudice, in a way that sounds as irrational as “I have a black friend so I cannot be transphobic lol lmao”.
They’re the living proof that even a broken clock is right twice a day. Because, even if the alt right is idiotic, idioticising, morally repugnant and epistemically laughable, they might have a point when they say that those guys are “virtue signalling”. They don’t genuinely care about the marginalised groups, and they don’t want to change shit, they care about their own precious OH SO PRECIOUS feelings of “being the good guy”. (Except that the alt right is unable to recognise that their own ranks stink the same putrid smell as those guys, plus everything else.)
This sort of “nominally left-wing, but effectively right-wing” individual is by no means exclusive to Reddit, mind you. And there are plenty exceptions to it, even in that shithole. Even then, if you hit someone claiming to be “left-wing” in Reddit, there’s a good chance that the person is like this.
Would it be a good idea to make a community moderation meeting where every mod must be present and agreeing on common rules of moderation? (I don’t know if they already do this - I don’t know anything about moderating this place)
Have you considered that the issue could well be that the things you’re posting just aren’t particularly amusing?
What does that have to do with moderation.
Also, have you ever tried posting OC? It’s not as easy to make a group of strangers laugh as you seem to think. Hell, most people here just repost from reddit.
So, I take it your answer is no?
Take a walk pal.
Unfunny isn’t the same as offensive.
I think I saw the “unborn son” meme OP mentioned. It’s dark, not my type of humor, but I thought it was enjoyable. I’m surprised it got removed.
I’d hope that mods only remove stuff that actually violates written rules.
Sorry. I am late to this. I am the mod here and the mod on lemmy shit posting. I firmly stand my decision to remove your posts. You have to be very careful with what you post memes about and I got user reports about the meme which is why I decided to act on it. People can and will take things the wrong way and that’s before I even go to the potential comments and users memes like that tend to attract.
People here are focusing too much on the examples and too little on the core complain (that Lemmy moderation is inconsistent and this frustrates users). I think that the later is worth investigating, IMO for two reasons:
- The way that federation works, up to three groups can moderate your content: comm mods, admins of the comm’s instance, admins of your instance. As such it’s possible that users find mod problems far more often here than expected. And, while all those three groups are avoidable (unlike in a forum or Reddit), it’s possible that users are having a hard time settling down in instances that work for them.
- Lots of mods here were previously Reddit mods (inb4: myself included). It’s perfectly possible that we brought Reddit’s idiotic moderation culture into Lemmy, without even realising it. And… well, Reddit mods aren’t exactly known for being transparent, smart, or consistent.
- makes it especially hard for users to know what the exact rules aree, as all three of these groups can have different rules, and usually only the community mods put their rules into the community.
And the modlog doesn’t show which mod/admin actually did a moderator action, so it’s almost impossible to appeal to the person who e.g. banned you and clear up potential misconceptions.
Relevant detail: the modlog shows who did what, but only if you’re a mod of that comm. Based on that, I think that it doesn’t show it to the rest of the userbase to avoid mod harassment.
However I think that it should show to the rest of the userbase, at least, “[comm name] mod” or “[instance name] admins” instead of simply “mod”. And there should be an easy way to contact the relevant group behind a certain mod action, that does not involve direct messages!
Another thing that I feel like missing is a proper channel for comm mods to “upstream” reports to instance admins, when the content fits the community rules but may or may not be in violation of the instance rules. That would indirectly help other users because there’s a clearer division of responsibility, and you won’t get situations like “comm mods need to take an educated guess on how to enforce instance rules that they did not set up”.
Very good points!
Yeah, right now, you could only write to any of the mods directly, but that mod might not be the mod who did the mod action at all.
Moderation tools are lacking pretty bad, but in both directions.
Your problem is posting memes lol, maybe try posting in other communities
