I would use Discourse Policies in a different manner and drop the current Community Values policy. In a separate topic I have outlined my thinking, including a proposal that involves positioning SocialHub in a new direction within the fediverse ecosystem, in order to regain its relevancy and value to the open commons.
So, if anyone doesn’t agree with this particular wording, of this particular “community values policy”, they are a “fascist”? And you’re struggling to see why I think this is authoritarian?
I’m not sure you understand what a fascist is. I suggest you read this:
I also note that it’s a common tactic of historical and contemporary fascists, including Stalin and Putin, to denounce people as fascists.
Please @strypey, stop speculating and state your issues with the current policy clearly in a way that we can have a constructive discussion. You saw what happened with Twitter and Meta. So, please stop sneaking around. If you’re a white supremacist, which I doubt, you are not welcome here. If people want a SocialHub where people can get harassed, they can do their own. If the SocialHub is to become a welcoming place for Nazis and corporate fiends, you must find a way to host it yourself: petites singularités will not endorse it.
How comes you’ve gone silent @strypey? Is it that difficult to answer suddenly?
@how, yes. I quote your statement undermentioned:
I cannot imagine speaking in the accusatory manner that you have (to another person) merely because that person has equated your partisan phrasal (which you desire that all participating here affirm, lest they be restricted from all participation otherwise) with that of fascists who conducted themselves similarly.
It should have demonstrated to you that assumptions might not be the most applicable course of action, yet you repeated this mistake.
I’ve no particular problem with your (plural, for the author(s)?) specification of undesirable behaviours and political affiliations, but that’s orthogranol to this specific discussion of whether its enforcement measures, as you’ve aforedescribed, would be reasonably considered to be authoritarian.
I don’t think it’s a very useful discussion regardless, though. In fact, I say that if a policy exists, it should be enforced. Otherwise, the problems with the policy shall never be understood, and the policy shall not improve. An example is the undermentioned criticism, which I agree with in its entirety:
Though, on that note, I have a suggestion regarding your proposal. In it, you state that accounts which disagree with it shall be terminated:
I estimate that this refers to permanent deletion of their account. Instead, I suggest that like those who merely have not (yet) agreed, their accounts should merely be suspended unless they decide to agree.
There’s no reason to prevent them changing their mind later. In fact, I find that convincing people to change their mind is easier when you provide easy avenues to do so. Removing all of their account’s activity would be a way to ensure that that is impossible, which would be a shame.
Does that mean that this is done by instance moderators, instead of users? I presume that the ignore function still works on remote users in its stead?
Thank you for chiming in @RokeJulianLockhart, and welcome to the SocialHub. It’s kinda reassuring that new people actually read this topic!
But I think you’ve missed a number of steps in this community, and are conflated a few things, so please let me clarify as I can.
This policy was discussed between a handful of people who were early adopters here, including someone from the ActivityPub specification authors. We all agreed that this policy should complement the W3C CEPC felt too neutral for an informal community, especially with regard to welcoming and protecting vulnerable communities, and specifically in the historical context of the Fediverse breaking out from oppressive mainstream platform. We did not know yet that Twatter nor Mata would become what they are, nor that the fascists would take over countries like they do, but we were aware of existing harassment issues online, across mainstream social media, and also aware of the history of colonialism. So after a few days (or weeks, can’t remember, won’t lookup) of lively discussion, one person came up with this proposal, and we adopted it.
Now, three years later, 215 people agreed to it and 342 did not take a stand one way or another. Among these 342 people, many simply came here, read a few things, posted a couple of replies, and went away: there’s no easy way to figure this out. Discourse is suspending unused accounts after a period of time to prevent malicious use, but some people do not even remember that they have an account here.
I think we agree on this. But then, you quote @kaniini who objected and there was a resolution to this discussion, that you omit entirely. @kaniini disagreed with the policy, and did not participate any more (and since more than three years), while keeping their account here.
The next quote you take is out of context, and is orthogonal to this discussion. It only brings confusion. Here is a detailed take that I hope clears that confusion:
About remote flags
When someone in the community stumbles upon a problematic post, they can flag it. If their standing in the community is good enough, their flag is automatically accepted; when it comes to remote users, I’m asking the plugin developer to confirm my belief that the Reject button in the ActivityPub plugin Actor’s page is doing the same. And yes, this last part concerns people with access to those Actors – for now it’s admins I think, but that may change as the plugin develops and has not much to do with our community policies here.
I think you misread: I used “suspended” and “termination”. I proposed that “those who merely have not (yet) agreed” (to use your words) have their accounts suspended until they reach out to the team to either accept or refuse the policy. So my proposal and your proposal are the same, aren’t they?
I think that someone who refuses this policy is ready to harass other people, and we do not want this here. I’m still wondering what people do not understand, since those who argue fail to clarify what in the policy is problematic for them.
If anyone wants to chime in, please state why you cannot agree with this policy, or when do you think this proposal to suspend undecided accounts should be enforced. And @strypey I would appreciate to read your opinion.
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Thanks, @how. Overall, I agree, except for the undermentioned:
You shouldn’t assume such a thing. You might consider it a logical estimation instead, but there’s a lot more nuance. Luckily, it doesn’t impact the enforcement action, eh?
Well, what would be a reason not to accept this policy from a logical point of view?
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@how, I have referenced it already:
However, I believe you consider it to be refuted:
I don’t understand why @kaniini not being active anymore is a counterpoint to what they stated. If anything, it demonstrates incredibly well that its content may be correct, because it was evidently important enough to prevent them participating.
I think both @how and @RokeJulianLockhart make some very good arguments. The word nuance is where I sit firmly with my thinking. I have given follow-up on the related thread, since it matches that topic best (on topic here I do not think we need front-door policy enforcement, and it isn’t workable in this federated hub).
See Wellbeing, participation, processes and policies - #5 by aschrijver
The refutation is way earlier… You can read the whole development in Policy Proposal: SocialHub Community Values. It was a long and hard discussion.
And the conclusions are here:
So you see, even I did not remember that @kaniini finally agreed. We did not enforce the policy without consensus. I think most people who are chiming in hereafter are oblivious of this prior process and careful deliberation.
Now, I think that sometimes during February I will come up with an SQL query to be able to:
- identify users who refused the policy and warn them that their accounts will be terminated, giving them a change to expose their situation;
- identify undecided users and warn them their accounts will be suspended, giving them a chance to accept or refuse the policy;
- automate account termination when you refuse the policy. This last points may be a bit harder to setup, we’ll see.
Of course, someone else may figure out the right SQL queries. 
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Looking back at the 2021 discussion it seems that once revisions were made to address the concerns, basically clarifying that the draconian interpreation wasn’t intended, @kaniini was fine with the revised text.
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Thank you for the confirmation @jdp23
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