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Joined 1 year ago
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Cake day: July 2nd, 2023

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  • Thanks, you put into clear words a lot of my jumbled thoughts and expanded on it. It’s a tough choice for the Beehaw admins with pros and cons either way; a tug-of-war on whether the community is strong enough / has what they need to handle this far from perfect world. It would be a loss from the wider Lemmy community, but based on a few outspoken comments we can see there are also people with a “good riddance” stance.

    I think Beehaw needs to do what’s best for them first, as an administrative team and for their core community. When they’re stronger, I’m sure we’ll feel and see their presence on the wider stage. After all, time is intrinsic to progress.



  • Specifically, we chose Lemmy as the software that we would use to launch our endeavor to attempt a safe space for marginalized persons online.

    As a relatively non-marginalized person, I think it’s important to focus on this. Beehaw has grown beyond the marginalized group. If Beehaw were to leave Lemmy, the non-marginalized would be fine and can switch to different instances. The marginalized would follow Beehaw for that safe space.

    It comes down to the purpose of a safe space. There’s the group of people that want to avoid bigots, and there’s the group that want to be a light unto the world, to effect change.

    An example of a little bit of positive Beehaw has had outside of their community would be the influence it has had on me. I’ve read posts from the LGBT+ community that enlightened me to things I’ve never thought about. But I’m also not a bigot, just naive.

    The negative is what has prompted these discussions: the bigoted trolls. It’s just not sustainable for the small Beehaw team to moderate everything.

    My view is that it’s of utmost importance to maintain the safe space for the marginalized. Of those marginalized who want to connect outside the safe space, they are free to engage in Lemmy/Reddit and spread their light.

    What would I do? I would find a new instance and continue to be receptive to LBGT+ discussions that come up on Lemmy. I don’t feel right asking Beehaw to stay on Lemmy at the cost of keeping marginalized people safe from bigots. They deserve to be able to talk about things without having bigots come at them; to be able to laugh and cry and vent and have others understand—especially with the US Right becoming more brazen in their persecution of this community.

    Just my 2 cents.