I hope we're all prepared for yet another wave of discourse about the ways in which the cultural norms of mastodon do and do not enable some users to be their full selves on this platform.
I'm treating this as a kind of inevitability because it is clear that the broader Fediverse has not learned from the previous wave or the waves that preceded it. And this is in spite of claims from some mastodonians that an influx of users will bring change.
Put simply, something we're going to have to reckon with is the centrality and stability of desired modes of conduct on this platform, specifically as they are policed and enforced through the technical apparatus of the platforms.
What this means is newcomers who point out the cultural weirdness of the space won't be QTed to oblivion, but they will find their mentions inundated by "well meaning" mastodonians who are trying to explain "the way things are."
This explanation serves to reinforce the very norms of conduct, the very cultural norms, that newcomers will struggle against. Further, this explanation will often treat these norms as unquestioned goods, as a moral order that cannot and should not be transgressed.
Put simply, these explanations will place the onus on the newcomer to "change or die," or; "find another server" without recognizing the ways that they are actually denying the very premises of mastodon they claim to uphold.
Insofar as long time mastodonians, and newcomers who're comfortable with these norms will persist in this kind of behavior, we're more likely going to see "balkanization" among instances at best; ghettoization at worst as people self-isolate through instance creation in some pretty unproductive ways.
Moreover, given mastodon's history with instances run by folks of color, this is a Very Bad thing.
Moreover, this treatment of the social and technical structure of mastodon as an unquestioned good also leads to the rapid problematization of folks who do not treat the social and technical structures as the unquestioned goods they're "supposed" to be.
To quote Sara Ahmed, "when you pose a problem, you become a problem," and in becoming the problem, the solution is to make the user go away. Or "start your own instance."
If we start there, then MAYBE we might find a way to welcome this new wave of users such that they can figure out how to be at home in the fediverse and, in doing so, we can figure out how to improve the ways that the fediverse serves as a social platform.
Or, you know, we can repeat the same shit but with a whole bunch more people involved in the discourse.
Dr. Johnathan Flowers
Robert Green