An increasing percentage of what I read is from federated instances. If Beehaw isolated itself I’d probably make an account elsewhere and hook into the fediverse from elsewhere, leaving Beehaw behind. Beehaw is great, but it’s not enough of a community by itself.

I was merrily using Lemmy, and later on Kbin in addition to that, for many months.

But then in recent weeks the culture seemed to change: More aggressive, insulting, and rude posts, even over nothing; some of them first responses to posts, others over nothing particularly political, just pop culture opinions and the like. And way, way more downvotes. And that last one was particularly new to me personally.

I’ve always been a laughably polite person, even irl, according to folks who know me, and had been the same online unless someone was outrageously offensive and mean (though in recent years simply handled that by a process of mute > report > block, rather than waste energy). But in recent weeks I’d noticed way more downvotes coming my way on innocuous posts, which was a first for me. I’d even told folks who were unsure about joining Lemmy, “Ah, don’t worry about the Marxist-Leninist reputation and the bad rap; I’ve never experienced any tankie stuff on there, and only ever had positive experiences - I mean, look, I’ve barely ever been downvoted, only ever received kind upvotes for what I’ve tried to ensure are thoughtful, positive contributions!”

Lately it’s turned nasty, and negative. I joined Kbin and most discourse on there was either polluted by the same culture rising on Lemmy, or dominated by people mocking Beehaw for wanting no part of what many agree is a recent influx of bad habits from Reddit folks. This theory is particularly popular on Mastodon, where people pointed out the switch from Twitter to Mastodon was more politically motivated, whereas the Reddit exodus was more about convenience. I thought that was an interesting explanation for these more negative experiences of late.

I’m sorry if this is a long post that doesn’t at first seem to address the actual question, haha! I guess I’m just trying to contribute my own personal perspective that is related to the topic - and demonstrates why I’ve recently arrived at Beehaw, as an online space that appeals to me, in contrast to those other aforementioned places.

Responses from those users are more likely to pendantic, overly argumentative, and unhelpful.

I’ve noticed a small uptick in responses like that (which, admittedly, may just be confirmation bias).

I think it might be due to the large influx of reddit refugees (full disclosure: I’m one, too). It takes a while to get used to the fact that the “atmosphere” of fediverse instances is different. It takes time for people to realize that this isn’t a toxic environment that encourages assholes. They’ll just keep on being hyper-defensive, confrontational, and/or deliberate misinterpreters of things while they focus on irrelevant points. After all, that was the norm on reddit for years.

Good users grow out of that. Unfortunately, some users just don’t want to. We have to take the bad with the good, though. Defederating completely would make Beehaw much less interesting and fun. The community just isn’t big enough by itself.

TL;DR: Yes, Beehaw benefits from federation. Federation has its drawbacks, but they are massively outweighed by the advantages.

I think we still have two “shields” protecting our ways in Beehaw:

• the lack of downvotes. Perhaps people will downvote you from other instances. But you won’t see those, so you will not care. I find that this removes a lot of negativity on its own.
• when someone posts from another instance, you can see it in their name: so you can take what they say with a pinch of salt. “Oh, he is not from Beehaw; it is more normal for them to behave like that. No use to argue strongly against them”.

As long as we have those, and as long as the federated instances moderate harmful content, it is OK for me to remain federated with them.

Now I may just be an elitist fuck

Sounds about right.

Elitist in his ivory instance over here. (Kidding). But a little offense with me and my Taylor Swift community over here, other instances aren’t bad by any means, and the more federation the more communities.

Nah I like what beehaw is doing, and defederation should always be the last line of defense. However the middle ground is good moderation and enforcement of the rules. Mods are overworked on beehaw, maybe it’s time for others to stand up and offer to take on some of the mantle.