goal 1 is: have nuanced discussions! stay on topic!

When I started writing about git on here, every single time I made a post, people would reply with a HUGE range of thoughts and opinions about git which were totally unrelated to the question I asked.

This was a problem because it meant we could only have extremely surface level-discussions, and people’s hot takes were VERY repetitive. It felt like I was in a time loop — I even made a bingo card about it https://wizardzines.com/comics/git-discussion-bingo

(2/11)

When I say things like “please do not reply saying that you prefer rebase over merge”, it’s not because I think people who prefer rebase are “wrong”.

It’s because I’m trying to dig deeper and have a more nuanced discussion about a specific topic and I don’t want a very common opinion (“rebase is better than merge!”) to drown out other perspectives.

(3/11)

goal 2 is: hear from a diverse set of people!

I spent about 16 years on Twitter. Over time, I noticed that the people in my replies became pretty homogenous: for example I heard from women much less often than I wanted to.

I eventually realized that this was because I was allowing people to behave in a variety of unpleasant ways in my replies that was offputting.

(4/11)

So when I say things like “please don’t start weird arguments, please don’t explain what a git branch is to someone who didn’t ask you to, please don’t imply that everyone who uses computers in a different way from you is dumb and wrong”, that’s not only because I find those behaviours offputting.

It’s also because it drives away the people who I want to hear from.

(5/11)

Over time, if I continue to allow people to be unpleasant in my replies, it makes the set of folks who will talk to me on here narrower and narrower.

I’ve heard from friends that they don’t want to reply to my Mastodon threads because people have been assholes to them on here. That sucks.

(6/11)

One of the most common pieces of “advice” I hear from people is to use muting and blocking. I had hundreds (maybe thousands!) of people muted or blocked on Twitter, but it never really solved my problems.

Actually publicly talking about the kinds of behaviours that I’m trying to avoid on here has made a much bigger difference than muting or blocking people ever did, though I do still use those tools.

(7/11)