We need to talk more about reducing "tone policing" here.
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We need to talk more about reducing "tone policing" here. I understand you want people to use content warnings, but guess what? They don't have to! If they don't do it, just unfollow them.
But please, don't harass them. That's what drove away our last big wave.
Do whatever you need to feel safe, but harassing people to your standards doesn't make THEM feel safe. Stop it.
@scottjenson Arn’t you language and tone policing to try to make your online environment more to your liking? You want to set a community standard of being more chill about content warnings while your opponents want them taken more seriously.
Why not engage in an argument on the merits of the practice of content warnings. Why turn it into a meta conversation about the fate of the platform? You don’t have strong arguments against content warnings so you want to expand the playing field to include “civility” and “the usage of the Fediverse”?
People should advocate for what they believe in, if it makes you feel bad then you should change your behavior not demand they stop pointing it out.
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@scottjenson Arn’t you language and tone policing to try to make your online environment more to your liking? You want to set a community standard of being more chill about content warnings while your opponents want them taken more seriously.
Why not engage in an argument on the merits of the practice of content warnings. Why turn it into a meta conversation about the fate of the platform? You don’t have strong arguments against content warnings so you want to expand the playing field to include “civility” and “the usage of the Fediverse”?
People should advocate for what they believe in, if it makes you feel bad then you should change your behavior not demand they stop pointing it out.
@kevinhippert Not at all! I'm just asking people to be civil and not harass others. If they don't use CW, it's not your job to "train them". It's the number one reason we've been told that people leave Mastodon, that so many people harass them about "they are. doing Mastodon wrong". I hope we can agree that we don't want to chase people away?
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We need to talk more about reducing "tone policing" here. I understand you want people to use content warnings, but guess what? They don't have to! If they don't do it, just unfollow them.
But please, don't harass them. That's what drove away our last big wave.
Do whatever you need to feel safe, but harassing people to your standards doesn't make THEM feel safe. Stop it.
I've already had a few randos in my mentions trying to tell me either:
1) It's ok to correct people if done politely
Just because you use polite words doesn't mean it's polite. If you're giving people advice they didn't ask for, you're harassing them.2) My request was a form of tone policing
Asking people to not harass others is not "tone policing", it's basic trust and safety. It's that classic sad defence that "you're intolerant too!" if you call out intolerance.Ummmm, no
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I've already had a few randos in my mentions trying to tell me either:
1) It's ok to correct people if done politely
Just because you use polite words doesn't mean it's polite. If you're giving people advice they didn't ask for, you're harassing them.2) My request was a form of tone policing
Asking people to not harass others is not "tone policing", it's basic trust and safety. It's that classic sad defence that "you're intolerant too!" if you call out intolerance.Ummmm, no
Normally I wouldn't engage but I feel strongly we need to have this discussion and call out this almost entirely white male issue.
The entire Mastodon team is working really hard to add features to bring in more people, in a safe way. It doesn't do any good if these guys just chase them away!
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Normally I wouldn't engage but I feel strongly we need to have this discussion and call out this almost entirely white male issue.
The entire Mastodon team is working really hard to add features to bring in more people, in a safe way. It doesn't do any good if these guys just chase them away!
@scottjenson Have you considered this idea?
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We need to talk more about reducing "tone policing" here. I understand you want people to use content warnings, but guess what? They don't have to! If they don't do it, just unfollow them.
But please, don't harass them. That's what drove away our last big wave.
Do whatever you need to feel safe, but harassing people to your standards doesn't make THEM feel safe. Stop it.
If you read the writing of the people who came up with content warnings as implemented in Mastodon, then you'll know that they somewhat regret implementing them.
Meanwhile, I think Bluesky's labeling approach, for all its faults, largely got things right, which is why AP T&S decided to do a content labeling idea (not that I've had time to write the FEPs for it).
Most use-cases for content warnings today are like one-word keywords for people's filtering to hide. The content warnings approach puts the onus on the publisher to consider every possible way that someone may not want to see something that they post, when really it needs to be a balance of power: some self-labelling of content, some automated, and some opt-in, then people can choose what they do and do not want to see, without suppressing the publisher's voice to people who do want to see their content.
Edit: see the swicg/activitypub-trust-and-safety repo's issues on github for the background and links
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@scottjenson Have you considered this idea?
@stefan We actually do this on our native apps already.
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We need to talk more about reducing "tone policing" here. I understand you want people to use content warnings, but guess what? They don't have to! If they don't do it, just unfollow them.
But please, don't harass them. That's what drove away our last big wave.
Do whatever you need to feel safe, but harassing people to your standards doesn't make THEM feel safe. Stop it.
@scottjenson some of us value existing local culture over welcoming "big waves," especially when those in the "big wave" tend to walk in and act like they own the place, like it's empty undiscovered country but for a few pesky savages, etc. Gargron's desire to be BDFL of a big social media fiefdom notwithstanding.
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@stefan We actually do this on our native apps already.
@scottjenson Ha, yes, just joking about being a bit more forceful with the messaging.
But yes, I do recall this feature, is it being considered for the web interface?
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@thisismissem Thank you for this. I'd like to know how BlueSky mods have felt about their responsibility in tagging users content. it's always helpful to learn how an existing system work (or doesn't)
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@scottjenson Ha, yes, just joking about being a bit more forceful with the messaging.
But yes, I do recall this feature, is it being considered for the web interface?
@stefan I'll have to get back to you on that. I'm not sure
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@scottjenson some of us value existing local culture over welcoming "big waves," especially when those in the "big wave" tend to walk in and act like they own the place, like it's empty undiscovered country but for a few pesky savages, etc. Gargron's desire to be BDFL of a big social media fiefdom notwithstanding.
@deutrino I'll all for you policing your own instance in any way you see fit. I'm just saying it's a lost cause if you want to police the other 10000 instances. Not only doesn't it work, it just pisses people off. It's a lose/lose effort.
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@scottjenson I don't have any data about the usefulness of Content Warnings but I can't think of a use case not already covered by filters.
I rely on filters for content I don't want to see, and I don't need CW to match it. Are there cases where CWs catch what filters don't?
@thibaultamartin @scottjenson people in my circles use them in all kinds of creative ways. Some people will CW stuff they know many of their followers will be bored by - I have a friend for example who is recently very into inline skating but chooses to CW those posts because they know many of their friends don't really care. I CW posts of food, both for the benefit of people with eating disorders and because some people just don't like the stereotype of feeds full of what you had for lunch. I even say whether the food has meat, etc. in the CW because I mostly eat vegan, and some vegans who follow me may not want to open those posts. People will put jokes in the CW punchlines in the body. I've seen polls or other trivia type questions where people CW the answer not to spoil it for others.
There are so, so many great uses for CWs, but they tend to form within individual sub-communities - so we are not even aware of all the ways they get used. This is, to me, a major reason not to try to bully others into using them the same way. My policy is: if something comes across my feed that isn't CWed in the way I would - well, I just don't boost it! No need to bother the author.
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@thibaultamartin @scottjenson people in my circles use them in all kinds of creative ways. Some people will CW stuff they know many of their followers will be bored by - I have a friend for example who is recently very into inline skating but chooses to CW those posts because they know many of their friends don't really care. I CW posts of food, both for the benefit of people with eating disorders and because some people just don't like the stereotype of feeds full of what you had for lunch. I even say whether the food has meat, etc. in the CW because I mostly eat vegan, and some vegans who follow me may not want to open those posts. People will put jokes in the CW punchlines in the body. I've seen polls or other trivia type questions where people CW the answer not to spoil it for others.
There are so, so many great uses for CWs, but they tend to form within individual sub-communities - so we are not even aware of all the ways they get used. This is, to me, a major reason not to try to bully others into using them the same way. My policy is: if something comes across my feed that isn't CWed in the way I would - well, I just don't boost it! No need to bother the author.
@ricci @thibaultamartin Thank you! That is such nuanced way to explain it. I'm not against CWs at all and I do hope communities find better ways to use them.
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@ricci @thibaultamartin Thank you! That is such nuanced way to explain it. I'm not against CWs at all and I do hope communities find better ways to use them.
@scottjenson @thibaultamartin FWIW, I didn't take your original post to be anti-CW, I think "CWs are a very cool feature of this space" and "don't complain about how others use or don't use CWs" are perfectly compatible statements
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We need to talk more about reducing "tone policing" here. I understand you want people to use content warnings, but guess what? They don't have to! If they don't do it, just unfollow them.
But please, don't harass them. That's what drove away our last big wave.
Do whatever you need to feel safe, but harassing people to your standards doesn't make THEM feel safe. Stop it.
the distinction we should make is re tagging others, not what you post with nobody tagged. when tagging others, be super considerate. if it might come off as nagging, don't do it.
I want us to be the social media network for everyone, but some do not want us to get bigger and most of those people are the reason this place survived the leanest years. that's tough to deal with. it's a huge conversation, esp when we're the only design that can handle that size well. ugh.
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@scottjenson @thibaultamartin FWIW, I didn't take your original post to be anti-CW, I think "CWs are a very cool feature of this space" and "don't complain about how others use or don't use CWs" are perfectly compatible statements
@ricci @thibaultamartin Exactly!
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the distinction we should make is re tagging others, not what you post with nobody tagged. when tagging others, be super considerate. if it might come off as nagging, don't do it.
I want us to be the social media network for everyone, but some do not want us to get bigger and most of those people are the reason this place survived the leanest years. that's tough to deal with. it's a huge conversation, esp when we're the only design that can handle that size well. ugh.
@wjmaggos I appreciate your points, we all want this to be an inclusive, safe place.
My only issue is that giving people advice they didn't ask for, is still aggressive. It doesn't matter if you use nice words.
This needs to be solved at the instance level. Police your instance all you want, get the culture you want there. But leave other instances alone. It just doesn't scale to think you can "fix" the other 10000.
If they're not doing it the way you want, then unfollow them
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@wjmaggos I appreciate your points, we all want this to be an inclusive, safe place.
My only issue is that giving people advice they didn't ask for, is still aggressive. It doesn't matter if you use nice words.
This needs to be solved at the instance level. Police your instance all you want, get the culture you want there. But leave other instances alone. It just doesn't scale to think you can "fix" the other 10000.
If they're not doing it the way you want, then unfollow them
not sure we disagree.
but I also want a place where people disagree without being disagreeable. I want people to interact here like they would IRL. I want to be corrected sometimes. I want to see stuff I think is wrong or untrue sometimes. it's harder without many of the social cues we have IRL but trying to make this a place where we never see something upsetting won't be good either. it's very much like the web + email. it should be open but not annoying or people won't use it.
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not sure we disagree.
but I also want a place where people disagree without being disagreeable. I want people to interact here like they would IRL. I want to be corrected sometimes. I want to see stuff I think is wrong or untrue sometimes. it's harder without many of the social cues we have IRL but trying to make this a place where we never see something upsetting won't be good either. it's very much like the web + email. it should be open but not annoying or people won't use it.
@wjmaggos As an old white guy, I've had a personal journey here. It's taken me awhile to understand that being comfortable with being corrected is a privileged place. To see that others didn't have this same comfort level was a big step, but it was also difficult to see how correcting people without being asked is an intrusion. It may be welcome some of the time, but it's still an intrusion.
But this is a very general point. I'm just saying to do this over CWs just feels so unnecessary.
