Why yall surprised civics is gone when admin has been appeasing to sw*ft**s

27 minutes ago, CBC said:

Why yall surprised civics is gone when admin has been appeasing to sw*ft**s

Good morning

3 hours ago, Chemist said:

This is so strange. I visit the Civics section almost daily and I've never seen something that'd consider particularly'serious'. It doesn't seem any different from the other sections

Yeah, I have tons of respect for the staff and admins for the work they do to the site but this ordeal does feel driven by personal reasoning and certain individuals not feeling aligned with how most members on here are now politically versus some actual grave concern of antisemitism.

For all the pearl-clutching,

1) There is no transparency on what the actual post was or which user it was by that apparently validated Graffiti's smear of the section as antisemitic. If It was Gov Hooka - we only know this due to a non staff member (Sheep) being friends with at least one mod or admin on Discord - what did they do? And if it was awful, why not just ban them?

2) If the issue was GovHooka, it's odd to not just ban said user and then have the moral high ground to go "well they maybe should have thought about that before harassing someone on another site" if people came here in asking about them. Let alone all this being done in Discord chats means there's ambiguity. Does GovHooka's alleged antisemitism mean it was fine for Graffiti to allegedly tell him to die? And then how is Graffiti going to be held responsible? Is the forum endorsing Graffiti harassing multiple members on here in defense of Zionism because he's friends with certain members of staff?

3) It being a non staff member (Sheep) who shared the reasoning for the section being gone by virtue of their friend group knowing, let alone the cited reason being accusations of mods purposefully enabling antisemitism. So who is being accused of antisemitism? A user? Multiple users? Which staff members? I think it was @feelslikeadream who called Graffiti hostile in the now hidden thread after they were randomly insulting people. Are they being called an antisemite for recognizing that user as hostile? It's vague which mods are actually assigned to each section. Is the accusation by Graffiti that @Bloo and @khorkina are purposefully spreading and endorsing antisemitism via "under-moderation"? Most users on here would defend these people as not hateful. (I don't tag these people demanding they say if they agree with the decision or not. I reference them so other users reading know what is being alleged on a side platform many of us don't want to have to use)

If any administrator said they didn't want to continue putting their own money and time into the site cause they don't like this particular strain of progressive politics…that's valid! But be honest! It's not my money. It'd be 100% valid for any person putting their money into running this place to go "I'm responsible for this and so I'm removing a section cause I don't like progressive politics and don't want it on here". People who keep the lights on are allowed to not be impartial.

But there also are hundreds of extremely intelligent and empathetic users who contribute their background and insights and knowledge to discuss politics on here, and it feels purposefully cruel and unfair to widely and broadly paint all of us as antisemitic or allege some site wide antisemitism problem at the hands of progressive users.

People have the right to dislike people. Find me or anyone annoying! And not even for politics. It's valid to be like "that ***** is so annoying, did you see them one time say Let Me Loe You is better than Greedy? Their musical taste is always such trash!!!" But I've never done anything as extreme as harassing people in private messages cause I don't like their politics and it's concerning if a claim of site wide antisemitism is being framed as a valid concern if driven by a user who has staff members' ear if said user (Graffiti) is themselves harassing people and violating rules in defense of a far right, ethno-nationalist ideology like Zionism.

Edited June 14Jun 14 by Communion

Me logging in to do my read over of civics threads for the morning and seeing all this mess I've missed

I'm glad to read that the removal is only temporary. Honestly, most social media platforms nowadays are absolute garbage full of bots, n@zis, and little to no moderation. ATRL is one of the very few places on the internet that is both authentic and has reasonable moderation policies against bigotry. I have really enjoyed being on here and reading discussions led mostly by queer people.

That's rare, but I'm also worried about the general direction of this site, especially after The Roof got removed too. There are so few places online now where gay men can discuss politics and have adult conversations.

Remember when ATRL was shut down and everyone was posting in 1 megathread

7 hours ago, Invincibles said:

So where are we supposed to talk about Palestine, Ukraine, US Politics, UK Politics, Iran War, etc?

Apparently we're not supposed to talk about Palestine on this forum because any mention of supporting the right of a Palestinian state is 'anti Semitic'.

3 minutes ago, Mezik said:

Apparently we're not supposed to talk about Palestine on this forum because any mention of supporting the right of a Palestinian state is 'anti Semitic'.

This is literally a lie and i’m tired of you people doing this.

Day 2 of asking:

Who could I talk to get my reactions back or how long should I wait for them to be back?

damn i know yall fingers hurt

The plugin i’ve been waiting for is done.

37 minutes ago, Graffiti said:

Then last week, the Gwyneth Paltrow Israeli real estate story blew up. I took issue with a post that basically defined Zionism as Jewish supremacy. I think that's wrong. Most people who identify as Zionists aren't advocating ethnic or racial superiority. They're simply supportive of a Jewish homeland in some form. Equating that with racial supremacy isn't accurate, and I think it risks feeding into some pretty ugly stereotypes.

The people who disagreed with you cited clear reasons why in the thread - a thread not even in Civics. You then angrily messaged at least one of these people for their view based on what was posted in the thread you later made in Civics that was hidden.

Keep in mind, I didn't post in any of this until after you made a thread accosting people in Civics.

It's still not clear why the entire forum experience for hundreds of users should be dramatically changed based on what you've vented to your friends about on a diffferent platform. Or why you should be precluded from any accountability for what your alleged to have said and done just cause you've done so on another platform. My forum experience is changed cause I'm apparently extremist according to someone's friend - you - who was telling people to die?

I don't even think there's pro-Israel bias. I think the friction for some is the overlap between pro-Palestine politics and insurgent left politics. I think if normie Dem leaders were rightfully calling Israel a genocidal apartheid state that should be dissolved, you wouldn't find any kind of sympathetic ear for you to vent to about your woes on the unpopularity of Zionism.

And it's concerning that you or your other friend would use the guise of antisemitism to instead fight proxy battles over your issues with either the rejection of Jewish nationalism (you) or perceived "extremist" leftists (your other friend who even said you were giving fascist) and that you two would exploit Rian's friendship with you both via him being an admin and that he'd naturally want to assume as your friend that your concerns of antisemitism would obviously be genuine.

The moderation in the Civics section didn't even allow for the thread for the genocide in Gaza to be like the Ukrainian thread for Russia's illegal invasio with resources to donate or clear solidarity expressed. Instead the thread title still says conflict. The moderation has largely been neutral if not accidentally veering to pro-Israel in the name of decorum. An over-correction one must say given the unpopularity of Zionism for most ATRL users, given your demand to remove the reaction button over how users on Celebria - not Civics - reacted to you.

Edited June 14Jun 14 by Communion

Still just making up shit, chile.

Ya'll heaux better NOT come for my paragraph responses EVA again.

But seriously...

14 minutes ago, Rian said:

The plugin i've been waiting for is done.

The thread prefix tags are bout to be color coded again? I know thats righttt

57 minutes ago, Rian said:

This is literally a lie and i'm tired of you people doing this.

7 hours ago, Rian said:

you can always leave!

oh wow

Mind you, no one ever said Communion is extremist. Annoying, condescending, deliberately obtuse, and insufferable? Sure. What’s remarkable is that even when he isn’t the subject of the discussion, he still manages to make himself the focal point through another one of his unnecessary dissertations.

26 minutes ago, getBusy said:

  1 hour ago, Rian said:

This is literally a lie and i'm tired of you people doing this.

  7 hours ago, Rian said:

you can always leave!

My point still stands. You’re always bitching in here about something I said or did. You don’t have to post here.

Oh its messy in here

Im just glad Civics isnt perma-dead because the rest of the site is a little played out

1 hour ago, Graffiti said:

I'm not going to respond to that user directly because it's the same mischaracterizations and hyperbole we've all come to expect from them. That said, I'm not going to sit back and let people publicly make things up about me. So let me be clear: I'm not a Zionist, and I'm definitely not a Gwyneth Paltrow stan (). That's a pretty wild read on what actually happened.

Since I'm apparently being painted as the villain who got a section removed, I think it's worth explaining how we got here.

A few months ago, I brought a post from a well-known Civics poster to the moderation team's attention. There was a thread about a supposed rise in antisemitic hate crimes connected to the Epstein case, and someone replied "good." This user liked that reply. To me, that seemed like a pretty obvious endorsement of anti-Jewish violence, so I reported it privately. The mods were split on both how to handle it and whether it was actually antisemitic, so not much came of it.

It also wasn't an isolated incident. I've reported that user's posts before, and I know I'm not the only one who has concerns about the tone and rhetoric they bring into discussions. A lot of it feels like it goes beyond support for Palestine and into territory that's just toxic for productive conversation.

Then last week, the Gwyneth Paltrow Israeli real estate story blew up. I took issue with a post that basically defined Zionism as Jewish supremacy. I think that's wrong. Most people who identify as Zionists aren't advocating ethnic or racial superiority. They're simply supportive of a Jewish homeland in some form. Equating that with racial supremacy isn't accurate, and I think it risks feeding into some pretty ugly stereotypes.

For the record, I wasn't defending the Israeli government. I never have, and anyone who's paid attention to my posts should know that by now.

What I find frustrating is that some people in Civics, especially when it comes to Israel-Palestine, seem unwilling to consider that their own biases can sometimes lead them into harmful territory. That's not true of everyone. In fact, I think most people there are acting in good faith and genuinely care about Palestinians. I don't think most of them hate Jews or any other group. Even Communion, who I often strongly disagree with, is someone I view as sincere, even if I find their style abrasive.

Eventually all of this boiled over into a pretty hostile Discord exchange between me and the user in question. I lost my temper. Communion is right that if I had said those things on the forum, I probably would've been banned for a long time. I'm not going to make excuses for it. I was angry and I handled it poorly.

At the same time, if we're willing to acknowledge that people can be angry about Palestine, we should also be willing to acknowledge that people can be angry about antisemitism.

That's why I think it's important to call out the people and behaviors that make these conversations worse for everyone. We should be able to talk about antisemitism and microaggressions without immediately being accused of being a Zionist, a genocide supporter, or some other caricature. I'm none of those things.

I think Civics can be better, and I think it will be. Give @Rian and the mod team some time to work through this. Rian has been remarkably patient considering the amount of criticism, pressure, and personal attacks that have been flying around.

This isn't something that happened because of one report or one person. It's been building for a long time, and I'm far from the only person who raised concerns. Taking some time to look at where things have gone wrong, including my own mistakes, is probably healthy for everyone involved.

"I took issue with a post that basically defined Zionism as Jewish supremacy. I think that's wrong. Most people who identify as Zionists aren't advocating ethnic or racial superiority. They're simply supportive of a Jewish homeland in some form. Equating that with racial supremacy isn't accurate, and I think it risks feeding into some pretty ugly stereotypes."

You are absolutely pathetic. And yes, Zionism IS Jewish supremacy, hence why Palestinians aren't granted the right of return.

Mods… there's no way you closed our beloved Civics section for this loser?

29 minutes ago, Rian said:

Still just making up ****, chile.

I can't be making something up by literally asking for information.

And that myself or other users have to ask for information because this was all hashed out on an official? Unofficial? Discord server underscores a problem.

The Discord thing really is messy and undercuts any argument that all of these decision were not rushed and were done in good faith.

So what is the fact-finding? Would any of this even be shared if I didn't stick my nose (lol) in it?

Graffiti was angry over people calling Zionism a nationalist and supremacist ideology. He then made multiple posts across ATRL and a thread in Civics attacking users (a mod even said his posts were hostile and aggressive). So... now what?

• He then shares this anger in the ~official ATRL discord~ with... everyone? Some users?

• He then shares Gov Hooka's past post mocking antisemitic hate crime statistics? And the section with this thread is now entirely hidden so people can't even see what is being claimed and referenced?

• How did Gov Hooka and him then even then get involved fighting one another on Discord?

• Did GH start attacking him for mentioning him? Or did Graffiti accost GH like he did other users in PMs on here?

• Is now GH banned? What is the reason going to be cited for his suspension - dismissing antisemitic hate crimes or fighting on Discord?

• Is Graffiti going to face similar suspension for wishing death on him? If not, is the Discord server officially promoted as moderator free?

• What recourse do users who do not want to participate in a Discord server have to ensure they're not being degraded on an official ATRL server?

• Why did Sheep claim the subforum is being possibly deleted cause "under-moderation" when Graffiti claimed the mod team literally thoroughly discussed an issue and were genuinely split?

• Also how is Graffiti privy to what moderators are discussing and were split on what to do?

• How does one user being hostile and mocking antisemitism statistics - and another user being hostile and defending genocidal ethnic nationalism - have then to do with hundreds of other users being implicated in some claim of massive, unaddressed antisemitism?

• What moderating changes can even be implemented to curtail the unpopularity of Zionism as an ethnic nationalist movement?

Edited June 14Jun 14 by Communion

The problem is not at all with the Civics section but with people's inability to control their feelings.

I don't know Graffiti all that well besides a short interaction on Discord that was pleasant and a DM I got from them awhile back. I wrote about that DM in the thread that was created about toxicity in Civics that's now hidden but edited my post shortly after because it didn't feel productive to bring up— not that the thread itself was productive in the first place. I do know GovHooka can be quite abrasive. But is the proper response to throw tantrum threads and kick up dust on other platforms too? Obviously not.

I don't really see too many issues in the Civics thread overall, the crux of the issue is simply people being disruptive. The notion that there's an antisemitism issue is simply not true imo and any isolated examples should just be handled like the isolated instances they are; no different from racism towards Beyonce or transphobia towards Kim Petras.

I don't think being annoying is a crime though. So in regards to people being annoyed by people's essays, I don't think that's a problem. There's a user who doesn't do anything in the thread besides shadow box against people's arguments that don't exist and another who does drive-by rage bait posts but I also don't think either of these people are problems for the thread, just things I don't always choose to engage with for the better of the thread. Perhaps users who are usually the ones trying to engage in discussions with people can try to disengage when they sense the other user is getting frustrated, but I think the onus is on the adult who's frustrated to recognize that and log off for a bit.

All that to say, I'm not sure why there's drama because I wasn't privy to the conversation that happened to those two users, and while I trust and respect the mods, I do hope this is handled so that the reigns are brought in on those who actually have done wrong and the rest of us aren't collateral. I think the Civics thread is extremely important to this site, it's so difficult to find a "safe space" that doesn't feel astroturfed to hell or have bots sharing opinions as real people. I started in that thread as a young, ignorant Trump supporter and learned so much about my actual beliefs that I've done a complete 180. It helped me become politically active in my community and for campaigns. I don't think I would have learned anything without that section, it might sound dramatic but I think it's not only made me a better person politically, but personally as well. I can articulate thoughts better and control my feelings a bit better than I would have been otherwise. It's undeniably net good from my perspective and a few people stepping out of line doesn't really change that for me.