Ada is just as much to blame for this as they are. She has the power to strip them of their mod abilities, to wipe their profiles clean from this instance. Yet she chooses not to, she says she doesn’t want to “interfere”. Yet she’s perfectly happy to in cases of bigotry apologia and spam. The fact she won’t do what’s best for the community says a lot.
Don’t you think we’re getting a bit carried away here?
In their “sorry” post, Moss cites this:
For example, 2 months ago, Kolanaki reached out to us via email and said they were banned from 196 for “playing the victim” and asked us why we banned him, but we didn’t. Moss talked to them and realized that the ban was unjust after reviewing the comment he was banned for. If he had never contacted us, we wouldn’t have known about the ban, and they would have still thought we banned them.
I don’t know about you, but I’d rather deal with small mistakes like this—ones that can be fixed with an apology—than see hundreds of comments harassing people based on their gender. Kolanaki hasn’t been unbanned, but I fully support the admins for keeping cis people from entering trans spaces just to be unkind and dismissive.
Much love to Ada!
Also, the reason ada started even looking at the reports is that the 196 mod team was from LW and there was a federation issue that made reports pile up days. They were asked to create a blaj account to properly manage them but only entered it once a day or so, so there was a big backlog.
If they managed their reports swiftly and would not even have intervined. Bad team all around.
Ada is an incredible admin and the 196 mod team really misunderstood how the community at large felt about her and them. they thought they needed to get out from the oppressive thumb of an active admin, meanwhile the community at large considers the work she does impactful and necessary. so they decide to go to an admin who tolerates intolerance and think the community will go, too. they keep saying they’ll still moderate under the same formula on the new instance, but the formula people liked included Ada. there is absolutely no consensus between the mods and the community, and the mods cannot seem to square that no matter how many times it’s gently explained
This is literally like every single thing in the world and exactly how management is trash. Simply put they do not understand our perspective even when told, a lot.
Excellent point, drag hadn’t thought of that.
Didn’t Ada also say that the mods weren’t logging into their instance specific alts to clear out the reports in the instance queue, so Ada had to handle those?
Yup! And the mods have basically said “But we logged in every few days, wasn’t that enough for you people!?”
And the answer from the community was basically “No, if Ada was doing the work that needed done, then you should have taken up the slack instead of trying to bail to another instance”
And they keep using that specific instance as their example of over moderation, and it doesn’t even clock to me as over moderation. In a trans space, attacking all of trans people as not being inclusive enough of cis people who want to ask questions is pretty not okay, actually, so the old mods getting mad at someone seeing consequences for this “mild take” seems pretty ridiculous.
What a wild ban reason but also weird to go the nuclear route over it. They really should have just made their own instance if they dislike it.
Not really. How many times have you been asked a question in “bad faith” (political views, the type of movies you like, your food choices) that it makes you not want to ever answer a question like it again, even if it’s in “good faith”. Playing the victim without even looking at it from another point of view is the problem. Now, try to see it from ADA’s view… there is a lot of work that goes into being an admin of an instance, and this instance is a safe space. You see these things enough times and you get fed up with it. Maybe not everyone agrees it was the best action, but it wasn’t an incorrect action.
One thing I have learned in my nearly 5 decades on this planet is that everyone sees things differently.
I try to be an ally to everyone different than myself. I’m not perfect at it, he’ll sometimes I’m downright terrible at it. But, I find trying to see things from another’s perspective can be helpful (as long as it’s not from hatred and/or intolerance).
That’s wise but personally I still take issue with handling people that way.
I agree that having some sort of ban appeal system would be good, at least once, so that users that didn’t correctly understand the instance or were acting in good faith can learn, but it’s not currently easy and it would give a lot of work to admins/mods, so it is what it is.
I know a few trans people who avoid 196 because of bad moderation so hopefully a new com with better mods can make the them feel welcome again
Yes, thank you Ada for all your hard work! I knew choosing this instance was the right move and they haven’t proven me wrong yet ☺️ much love!
Was Kolanaki unbanned?
no, actually. thanks for bringing that to my attention I will edit my comment in a sec :)
Mods so afraid they lost what tiny minuscule bit of power they had. Now desperate to remain relevant.
They should reevaluate their life.
