https://lemmy.nz/post/18610200/13255360

This user describes how most of the women-centered communities on Lemmy were shut down due to harassment of their members.

Another user adds “We need a safe space, but most of the women I know on here don’t have the time or energy to moderate it. And there’s so few of us, it feels like it’s not worth the effort anyway.”

  • Lvxferre
    44·
    2 days ago

    Yup, that’s a problem. Specially because, once the gender ratio gets too skewed towards one side (it is), the Petrie multiplier kicks in; then the sexism targets each woman more and more frequently.

    Potential solutions that I see for the problem:

    • Perhaps creating a few instances for women? I don’t mean instances to talk only about feminism, but for general stuff. With higher standards against harassment.
    • Better mod policing against harassment. Collective action, so it’s easy to say and hard to do it, I know.
      • Ech@lemm.eeEnglish
        29·
        2 days ago

        The admins of what? There is no singular “admins” of the Fediverse. That’s kind of the whole point.

        • Lvxferre
          9·
          2 days ago

          I understood “the admins” as “a meaningfully large amount of the admin teams of the Fediverse”. Collective action.

          • Ech@lemm.eeEnglish
            3·
            2 days ago

            I still don’t read it that way, but assuming it is, that is still unreasonable. There are simply too many differing viewpoints, by design. The best option for this sort of thing is to start a female focused instance. It won’t be able to affect the wider fediverse directly, but it would be able provide the space that is seemingly absent atm.

            • Lvxferre
              3·
              2 days ago

              If I’m reading it right, I also disagree with it, on a practical level; it’s like herding cats and not enough. I also think that an instance for women is the way to go, at least at the start.

              However, to be fair with drag those actions aren’t mutually exclusive, and even if only a few admin teams keep a closer watch on sexism, it’s already improving the situation.

            • Dragon Rider (drag)@lemmy.nzOPEnglish
              23·
              2 days ago

              There are simply too many differing viewpoints, by design

              The instances which support women don’t have to federate with the instances whose viewpoint is that harassing women is fine.

              • Ech@lemm.eeEnglish
                2·
                1 day ago

                Maybe they should, but it’s not going to be a black and white issue for most admins. There’s a reason instances like blahaj and yiffit exist. A space like that for women would be the most realistic way to get the protections for female users in the fediverse that you’re saying should exist.

      • Lvxferre
        131·
        2 days ago

        I think that it would be a good start. But only a start; sexism is a social problem, so even if you ban the individuals saying sexist stuff, you still see sexism elsewhere.

        And even if you ban overtly sexist users, others will keep:

        • focusing on topics typically enjoyed by men, and typically disliked by women;
        • interpreting what each other says based on masculine social norms;
        • assuming that they’re dealing with other men unless explicitly told otherwise;

        etc.

        That’s still aggravating, you know? You can’t pinpoint why but it still makes you feel unwelcome.