Exploding-heads.com is another instance on Lemmy where alt-right MAGA types tend to reside. Some people on this server want us to defederate from them immediately, some people want to save defederation as a last resort. They have 104 active users (more stats below).
It seems that exploding-heads has also experienced a recent botswarm invasion. This is obviously another point in favor of defederating them, assuming you are worried about botswarms, which is currently being discussed here.
My advice to you all is please try to discuss this in a civil manner, we need not allow them to create divisive conflict inside our communities. No matter how the vote turns out, you’re not going to be able to defederate from your fellow sh.itheads so be nice.
I’ve linked many of the previous discussions below so people who are out of the loop can get a general sense of the situation.
https://sh.itjust.works/post/216888 https://sh.itjust.works/post/225714 https://sh.itjust.works/post/281126 https://sh.itjust.works/post/410325
Lemmy.world just recently defederated them.
https://lemmy.world/post/747912
https://lemmy.world/post/577526
Although this could be considered a point in favor of defederation, it actually means even if we vote to remain federated, people have a great alternative in lemmy.world where they can still participate in our communities and simultaneously be protected from exploding-heads.
Ensuring diversity of servers is beneficial to the platform as a whole, but it is also not our responsibility to bear that burden.
TLDR, just wrap up any last points in this thread before we open the vote tomorrow. Please be civil.
EDIT: To clarify, this isn’t the official vote, this is the final discussion. The vote thread will be posted tomorrow and you will only be allowed to make a single comment saying Aye or Nay.
EDIT2: Vote thread is up, this thread is now locked. Very lively discussion thread sh.itheads. Please try to be more respectful next time.
Their clear support of trans hate is an absolute nonstarter and should be clear grounds for defederation. Hard stop.
On the other link, I saw the anti-vax article when it first popped up while sorting by new. It’s a clearly an inflammatory story from an extremely biased and non-credible source, with the sole purpose of deceiving users and spreading dissent.
My gut instinct was to give the instance the benefit of the doubt that they just hadn’t caught it yet, and just report to let their mods know. Then I saw it was posted by their admin.
I’m all for debates of differing opinions based on interpretations of objective facts - I think it is in fact a valuable part of a healthy community. That said, debates simply become toxic arguments when one party enters the discussion in bad faith.
This instance needs to clearly outline policies on defederation of instances that violate some set of norms (and refederation if instances are able to regulate their content). I for one think it should be pretty straightforward to put a policy in place to defederate hate speech, CSAM, and scientific disinformation.