this post was submitted on 17 Sep 2025
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MeanwhileOnGrad
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Meanwhile On Grad
Documenting hate speech, conspiracy theories, apologia/revisionism, and general tankie behaviour across the fediverse. Memes are welcome!
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Blahaj 😂
That must be one of the most authoritarian ones. Not tankie, but the lgbt tankie equivalent
Got any examples? Blahaj was founded on the principle of protecting trans people, and I have yet to see anything here that people are claiming as mods abusing their power that didn't turn out to be people getting upset about being banned for being transphobic.
There's definitely some tankies here, but the biggest complaint I have about Blahaj is that you can't see downvotes so the most controversial posts can look like the most agreed on takes.
That's exactly the thing: bans for transphobia are often about non-transphobic speech. Not agreeing on specific subjects doesn't mean one is transphobic. Thinking a cisgender person can have an opinion on laws or regulation regarding transgenders is not transphobia. Having your feelings hurt over an opinion while you are a trans doesn't make it transphobia. Transphobia is hate speech.
Source: I have been instance-banned from blahaj on an older account. Maybe twice? Not sure. I'm not willing to share the accounts' names, but I try to respect my instance bans. Don't want to interact there anyways
spoiler
people will assume I'm transphobic because they know me better than myself, apparentlySo Warl0k3 had a pretty good conversation on the matter, but as the original asker I just wanted to add something.
In this regard, Blahaj is no more authoritarian than a lesbian bar. That's the analogy I use to describe how Blahaj is run - it's like a gay/lesbian bar. It's not a place meant to be an open floor of debate or something, it's a place for trans people made by trans people. Blahaj is supposed to be a place where people can get away from the "just asking questions" or having to defend their existence constantly like everywhere else on the internet and real life. And just like a lesbian bar, if you bother the clientele or staff, you can and will be thrown out.
Can't the same be said for the usual suspects like lemmygrad, hexbear, .ml...?
Lemmy is meant to be used to discuss with people. When you try to enforce your rules outside, you go too far.
I still don't think it's a great instance to point people to. Not with an admin actively silencing 'opponents', defaming and spreading misinformation
Your defense is basically "it's meant to be authoritarian"
A bar is not a forum. Lemmy's goal is to discuss and share things. If only a specific point of view is allowed, it ceases to be a "safe place" and becomes a circlejerk. Like it if you want, I find it dumb and will never recommend biased or opinionated instances if they don't allow other opinions.
How do I put this, your belief of what Lemmy and a forum are intended for are...misguided? Not quite the word I'm looking for, but close.
A forum is a 3rd space, like a bar, a restaurant, a community garden, a local store that runs tabletop games, or even a park. A gathering space for people to intermingle. But that doesn't mean that a forum has to allow everything. 3rd spaces still have rules to be followed. When you enter Blahaj, you agree to abide by the house rules. And some of those rules are there specifically to stop sealioning behavior, which trans people are subjected to endlessly everywhere else on the web and looks exactly like this:
There are places where those kinds of questions and debates are okay (as long as they're sincere and not malicious), but Blahaj is designed to be a space where trans people can get together and not be bombarded by those sorts of questions endlessly.