Swapna KrishnaSeeing a lot of discussion about people being bugged to put discussions of their experiences with racism behind content warnings and friends, this isn’t a good thing. (Thread)
I like Mastodon’s CW culture but.
BUT.
Come on now.
Molly TempletonLet’s be clear that CWs are great. But someone existing as different from you, as a marginalized identity, does not go behind a content warning. And talking about the discrimination they experience might make you uncomfortable—trust me, when I experience racism, it’s very uncomfortable. The response is to try and do something about it, not to tell them they’re making you uncomfortable.
And if all you can do about it in the moment is listen, that’s ok too. But telling them to put it behind a CW is telling them—telling us—that we, as people, aren’t welcome here.
Appreciate everyone boosting and commenting on this thread. I’m muting it (because I’m tired of explaining racism to people), so won’t be responding to anything else here.
JP Toto@skrishna No argument there. That's the kind of conversation that _should_ be in the open.
Having said that, I guess it would be up to the Mastodon instance admins to set the type of culture they want to encourage. I keep waffling on whether or not that's a good or bad thing.
monkeyes2
John Aravosis (@[email protected])
Attached: 1 image To everyone, like me, who is new here on Mastodon -- I swear, I feel like I'm in Canada, escaping Gilead -- here are two posts by the primary developer of the platform (and owner of the non-profit that holds the trademarks etc) explaining that you should ignore people lecturing you about what you should and shouldn't post here. I now consider this issue settled, and will no longer respond to these folks. Time to embrace Mastodon! Thank you for welcoming us.
Trisha Lynn 🇵🇭 🇺🇸 🇨🇦@skrishna I agree, AND if we're uncomfortable seeing someone talk about how they've been treated as part of a conversation about how to make this community better? We're the ones who need to take a step back and look hard at where we're at with regards to our own values. Or we could, you know, scroll past and come back to it when WE'RE feeling better and have processed it on our own, away from them and what they want to express.
The Bird@skrishna Yes!! I very much agree with you.
I was gonna write a post on this actually. Been really frustrated with some white folks takes.
I'm very much of the mind that we ought to be engaging in this kind of consensual, conscious, and willing to change discussion. It's needed to build a more just, equitable, accessible world. The way culture and rules are (unspoken or written) in spaces like these NEED to be periodically examined and updated by members. The space needs to evolve to fit the needs and access of its members, especially those most marginalized - who are BIPOC folks.
I feel like the conversation on CW is part of this ongoing conversation, and anyone who is trying to use "it's the culture here!" card is using the authoritarian tools of our oppressors. That's can be triggering, and it silences very real and valid discussion about how to support newer and/or more marginalized members so they feel included and safe. CW should never be used to silence or coerce marginalized folks to do an action that harms them.
Anyway, I'm starting to ramble a bit. Thank you for this conversation and your words.
@skrishna And I guess to clarify:
When I said " trying to use "it's the culture here!" card is using the authoritarian tools of our oppressors," I meant in the context of how (often white folks) use it to demand labor from BIPOC folks to make their stories and lives smaller or less visible -- that's the tool of the oppressor. CW were made by marginalized folks to help them engage in community care, and it's alarming how some folks are weaponizing it.
I'm probably overclarifying now, but I didn't want folks to take that out of context...
Val@skrishna you make a great point. I've seen various posts about the culture here and happy to do CWs etc but also seen a post from a mod somewhere saying they shouldn't be telling new people what to do (within the rules).
ChuffMeister@scribblingval @skrishna I find CW’s help me scroll, I also don’t want willies on my phone on the tube.
But feeling my way as more birdy crew come.
I also like not having a feed full of text all the time
But feeling my way as more birdy crew come.
I also like not having a feed full of text all the time
Louis Ingenthron@skrishna I agree with your point, but doesn't that same "don't look away" logic work for many political posts, too?
Sentient Mortal@LouisIngenthron @skrishna Maybe our relationship to governance is toxic and hiding it isn't healthy?
Robin Shipton@LouisIngenthron @skrishna There isn’t one logic for all uses of #CWs. For #politics, especially election politics, it’s often not about that.
CWing the 24-hour political news cycle is more often a #MentalHealth issue, not a matter of the specific political issues. CWs let people manage their healthy exposure levels.
With this logic for politics CWs, you can also see how personal experience of marginalized people does *not* fit that criteria to #CW as “politics.”
@robinshipton @skrishna How so? Especially given the overlap between the two subjects?
For example, posting about police abuse against POC. Is that minority experience that shouldn't get the CW or political and should get the CW?
@LouisIngenthron @skrishna I think that’s going to depend on who is posting.
A Black person posting about anti-Black police violence will know keenly whether a CW is needed for their specific post.
A white person posting about anti-Black police violence doesn’t have the direct experience to judge that right every time, and should use a CW every time so their posts that fall short won’t ambush their Black followers.
Dismal Manor Gang@skrishna: I've heard the term "content wrapper" proposed. I like this idea as it allows expanded intended usage. I occasionally post about topics that are of limited interest like concurrent program design, local weather warnings, US weather warnings, etc that folks in UK or DE or non-programmers would not care about. I can put them in a plain brown envelop that readers can open.
Content Warning almost begs you to open it to see what is so horrible. Doh.
Michael Valiant ✅ ⚔️🚀📚@skrishna I’ve heard this term before that I think of in these conversation: Don’t weaponize the rules to use against the marginalized few
carbon offsets are BS ☕️🥬I'm new here and trying to sit back and see what norms the community follows so as not to make those who were here already feel invaded.
Read plenty on CWs lately and I'm on board. Especially considering I can just turn them off so I'm not clicking just to read 90% of the posts here.
But I have Q's. Do discussions about racism get CW'ed or not? Am I right in understanding that the rules regarding CWs change depending on skin color?
@skrishna @plasma4045 The best rule of thumb I’ve read for CWs about sensitive topics is to consider who the CW is for.
Whose trauma is being respected by not surprising them with it in their feed?
White people don’t need others to CWs for racism. The victims of racism do—or don’t, that’s their call to make as a community, and they’re already good at that call.
So in a way yes, it depends on skin colour. Because so does being a victim of racism.
@skrishna @plasma4045 So e.g. a white person posting about a racist incident almost certainly needs to put a CW on that—for their followers’ sakes.
And e.g. a Black person posting about an incident of anti-Black racism will make that call case-by-case, and they can best judge for that specific post whether unCW or CW is less harmful and more helpful for their followers. Because they know.
I guess to respond to that I'd need to know one's definition of racism.
I've always defined it as the belief that one's skin color makes them superior or inferior to someone else. If that's the definition, who are we to say that any given person has or hasn't experienced racism?
I would like to just treat people as individuals rather than group them by something they can't control. I thought the goal was to ditch that...
@plasma4045 @skrishna Oh, we’ll that’s not a hard question to answer: Systemic racism.
Being colour-blind to race is very sweetly naive but very 90s. It didn’t actually work to reduce racism, hence the need to examine racism through how it embeds in the cultural and technical systems used by otherwise well-meaning people.
The current discourse of CWs is explicitly not about overt racism, but about unconscious systemic racism.
And people here believe that to get to a future where we do treat people the same regardless of the color of their skin is to not treat people the same regardless of their skin?
Or is that not the goal?
Plus, this is a system that mast admins control. So if your instance has an issue with systemic racism, consider changing servers.
Maia KB Chowdhury@skrishna well said.
(((Baslow)))Earlier I posted an apposite quote from Olúfẹ́mi O. Táíwò's book, "Elite Capture", all of which is worth reading from the perspective of what is happening in the Fediverse right now.
Robert Baunsbak Coull@skrishna totally agree, but as someone who treats victims I thought a key reason for authors choosing to content wrap such posts was to avoid triggering other victims of discrimination or violence?
Chani 
@bobcool @skrishna
yep! from what I've read, the issue is that there are *both* people legitimately wanting a break from their own triggers *and* entitled assholes abusing the system to be mean to people who are just existing-while-black etc.
so for now I'm gonna CW anything I say that might be triggery, but think carefully before asking others to CW stuff.
@bobcool @skrishna as an example, there was a post that threw me off the other day, but it was *good* that it didn't have a CW, because it wasn't actually traumatic. it was just someone who looked unusual, and the discomfort was an artifact of that. they shouldn't have to hide their face just because some assholes turn that momentary discomfort into outrage.
Kellie Turtle
Dean Baratta بطبطبط@skrishna this is useful from the CEO and lead developer of Mastodon re: his concept of CWs (tl:dr use them if you want…users have LOTS of ways to limit seeing content with their settings without bullying or shaming others)
Pantstrovich@skrishna I get that for white people, but what about CW for other PoC people who need a break from hearing about all that stuff?
(I guess this is aimed at people in the comments, since OP muted this.)