Hello users of Hexbear, we wanted to inform you that we are going to be locking the_dunk_tank and dredge_tank communities. We have created two new communities /c/gossip and /c/counterpropaganda to serve a similar but clearly distinct purpose than the dunk/dredge tanks.

Not only is the dunk tank a term that has racist origins, but also many posts there were almost no effort and often times requiring later edits to show how they weren’t reactionary, not useful with regard to developing rhetoric and furthering dialectical analysis of that which we dunk upon.

To that end, we wish posts of reactionaries to be placed in !counterpropaganda@hexbear.net along with an accompanying explanation (as simple or complex as desired) with the intent of countering the reactionary propaganda in the post body, as of now comments are not subject to the same rhetorical rigor rule.

For the posts that are not "low-hanging fruit’ of notable people we ask that you use !gossip@hexbear.net .

These changes are mainly part of a continued effort to remove the racist and misogynistic elements from our community and grow.

Any moderators of the dunk tank or dredge tank that want to be a mod in the new communities let me know.

Any users with questions or comments please use this post, this change was made at the behest of the entire Hexbear mod and admin team. We will be looking for more moderators in an organized volunteer drive shortly, if you wish to submit an application you may send it to me via hexbear or matrix direct messages.

Use this post as a place for discussion to these changes. We will keep things as they are for 2 weeks and then reflect on the feedback, including this post: https://hexbear.net/post/3858346

As a personal addendum I am sorry if the closing of the tanks these changes removes a beloved space on the site and if you want to suggest a community to replace them you may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.

Sitewide or community changes come from proposals put forth from the mod team, discussed, and voted on by the mod team.

Any users wanting to suggest a community to replace the tanks, may do so at !commrequest@hexbear.net current discussion is here https://hexbear.net/post/3858346 or submit a mod application to take a more active role in shaping the site.

You may also consider using !shitreactionariessay@lemmygrad.ml as a substitute for dunk/dredge tank posts as well

The mod statement can be found here: https://hexbear.net/comment/5613033

Application

What is your Hexbear username? Do you have any preferred pronouns? What are your thoughts on capitalism? What are your thoughts on imperialism? What are your thoughts on trans rights? What are your thoughts on racial justice? What do think about current and previous protests around the world? What are your thoughts on Veganism and Animal Liberation? Do you have any experience with other leftist online communities? What did those experiences teach you? What is your approach to moderation, and how do you work with teams? How do you deal with online drama and people who try to start things for the sake of it? What current comms would you be interested in moderating? Do you have any ideas for community engagement? What is your general time availability? (Time zone, amounts, common browsing times, etc)

    • REgon [they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
      40·
      5 days ago

      “People being mad about an unpopular decision is a sign it’s a good decision actually. The fact a lot of people haven’t brought up a separate post I made that didn’t get seen because why would it, is very telling of this.”

      What?

            • BynarsAreOk [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
              36·
              5 days ago

              oh also the people dunking on people online for being sad about the election results. yeah kamala winning probably wouldn’t be better but assuming everyone who’s sad is a democrat is massively uncharitable

              This is an extremely L take, you’re talking specificaly about the election results yeah? That already excludes people who are sad about both candidates being the same on issues like Gaza. If you already understood both candidates are shit the election itself shouldn’t make you any more sad then any other day during the past year of genocide for example.

              To be sad about Trump winning means the actualy believe the mainstream rethoric, which means they’re not an ally or at best they’re still very far away from having a concrete view about current issues so their opinion is mostly worthless or at the very best just noise.

              Its not uncharitable to say if you’re only sad now that you’re probably a shit lib that deserves to be dunked on. We’re not changing their minds, if we were capable of that then they’ve turned into a socialist or abandoned the dems at least when they saw any of the Gaza hospitals being bombed and not when orange man won the election.

              Point is, even if you’re not necessarily a socialist but already abandoned the Dems following Oct 7th you’re not going to be particularly sad about Trump. Same on any other issue the dems refused to fight on.

              • Azarova [they/them]@hexbear.netEnglish
                20·
                5 days ago

                Kamala would’ve meant "states rights"ing trans rights, Trump means an acceleration of discrimination against trans people and likely federalization of the horrific laws we’ve seen passed in many states. They would certainly be the same otherwise, but to say people being sad about the outcome aren’t allies, especially given the demographics of this site, I think is a bit much. And before I get accused of being a liberal or a democrat for caring about losing the healthcare that has kept me alive faster than I would have under a Kamala admin, I voted PSL and was always going to vote PSL, but especially because of the genocide in Palestine. And just to clarify, people are upset about a Trump win, not a Kamala loss. She did everything in her power to lose as hard as possible and deserved it for open endorsement of genocide and tacking very hard to the right on just about everything.

                • MolotovHalfEmpty [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
                  4·
                  5 days ago

                  I totally agree, and I say that as someone who took some schadenfreude in prominent media liberals suddenly being faced with the realisation that all their self-deluding electoralist optimism was just that. It’s entirely possible to see the sham of the American uniparty for exactly what it is and still feel shit or sad when the thing you know is likely to happen happens.

            • doublepepperoni [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
              26·
              5 days ago

              I think it’s absolutely valid to comment on the phenomenon of infantilised baby talk, we all rightly made fun of the fren types for that

              Though I will agree the post you highlighted seems a bit mean. They just seem like very unremarkable embarrassing American liberals

    • NewAcctWhoDis [any]@hexbear.netEnglish
      10·
      5 days ago

      The fact my compromise has been seemingly entirely ignored is also telling

      This is a featured post, your compromise has a handful of upvotes in a meta comm.