Hey all,
In light of recent events concerning one of our communities (/c/vegan), we (as a team) have spent the last week working on how to address better some concerns that had arisen between the moderators of that community and the site admin team. We always strive to find a balance between the free expression of communities hosted here and protecting users from potentially harmful content.
We as a team try to stick to a general rule of respect and consideration for the physical and mental well-being of our users when drafting new rules and revising existing ones. Furthermore, we’ve done our best to try to codify these core beliefs into the additions to the ToS and a new by-laws section.
ToS Additions
That being said, we will be adding a new section to our “terms of service” concerning misinformation. While we do try to be as exact as reasonably able, we also understand that rules can be up to interpretation as well. This is a living document, and users are free to respectfully disagree. We as site admins will do our best to consider the recommendations of all users regarding potentially revising any rules.
Regarding misinformation, we’ve tried our best to capture these main ideas, which we believe are very reasonable:
- Users are encouraged to post information they believe is true and helpful.
- We recommend users conduct thorough research using reputable scientific sources.
- When in doubt, a policy of “Do No Harm”, based on the Hippocratic Oath, is a good compass on what is okay to post.
- Health-related information should ideally be from peer-reviewed, reproducible scientific studies.
- Single studies may be valid, but often provide inadequate sample sizes for health-related advice.
- Non-peer-reviewed studies by individuals are not considered safe for health matters.
We reserve the right to remove information that could cause imminent physical harm to any living being. This includes topics like conversion therapy, unhealthy diets, and dangerous medical procedures. Information that could result in imminent physical harm to property or other living beings may also be removed.
We know some folks who are free speech absolutists may disagree with this stance, but we need to look out for both the individuals who use this site and for the site itself.
By-laws Addition
We’ve also added a new by-laws section as well as a result of this incident. This new section is to better codify the course of action that should be taken by site and community moderators when resolving conflict on the site, and also how to deal with dormant communities.
This new section provides also provides a course of action for resolving conflict with site admin staff, should it arise. We want both the users and moderators here to feel like they have a voice that is heard, and essentially a contact point that they can feel safe going to, to “talk to the manager” type situation, more or less a new Lemmy.World HR department that we’ve created as a result of what has happened over the last week.
Please feel free to raise any questions in this thread. We encourage everyone to please take the time to read over these new additions detailing YOUR rights and how we hope to better protect everyone here.
https://legal.lemmy.world/tos/#80-misinformation
https://legal.lemmy.world/bylaws/
Sincerely,
FHF / LemmyWorld Operations Team
EDIT:
We will be releasing a separate post regarding the moderation incident in the next 24-48 hours, just getting final approval from the team.
I’m honestly not sure if a vegan cat diet is possible or not, but random people giving unqualified advice that could easily lead a less knowledgeable person to harm an animal is a problem. What should have been done in this case is for a mod or admin to shut the discussion down with a note telling people to consult a qualified veterinarian regarding any change to their pets diet.
My idea was that respectful, dissenting opinions posted in a small ratio should be allowed in all communities.
It works well in this situation because you can have ten vegans posting about how vegan diets are great for cats, but you’d still have at least one guy posting “This isn’t safe for your cat. Please find sources that aren’t biased before doing this.”
I don’t know if a vegan diet is safe for cats or not, and I shouldn’t need to. Having that one dissenting voice is helpful in prompting people not to trust everything they read on the internet. c/flatearth can still have their narrative, but a policy like this would help put the brakes on it a little.
Of course, do consider this policy in a community that you agree with. This would mean that someone would be allowed to post Russian propaganda in the Ukraine community. If they spam it, it can still be removed. If they’re rude, it can be removed. But if it’s just one Russian comment for every ten comments refuting it, I would hope the ten comments are enough to handle it.
“dissenting opinions” are not the same as mis/disinformation.
It’s just alternate information.
Drinking bleach to kill a disease is technically alternative information. It’s even backed indirectly by science: bleach kills bacteria. The difference here is the information is harmful, incorrect, and being presented as science backed.
Simply put- just because an echo chamber wants to drink the Kool aid - doesn’t mean we should allow them to share it with unwitting passerbys.
Not everyone is going to do the due diligence and assume that the group is wrong: so it is potentially damaging to allow that misinformation to be spread. Multiple examples exist of why moderation is needed.
Freedom of speech is not absolute. If it limits others freedom, it must be checked. If it can harm others, it must be checked.
Show me a study that shows any human or animal benefits in anyway from drinking bleach.
However, there does exist a spectrum of studies both supporting and attacking the idea of a vegan diet for cats, often with contradictory conclusions.
From my understanding there was a nuanced discussion including risks and acknowledging that whole food diets are impossible for cats.
Either people are reacting with emotion far more than I expected, or people are confusing whole food plant based with “no meat products in it”, which of course are two entirely different sets of food.
The admin was childish and obtuse, they could have handled this in a number of other ways and instead doubled down on their emotional reaction and instincts.
Explicitly though, that won’t be what happens, particularly for something as small as the Fediverse. What happens is a post from a small community ends up on the main feed and the prevailing opinion of the entire Fediverse begins a long chain of comments about how dissenting opinions are dumb.
Conversely the community could be feeding incorrect information to the entire main feed.
If your community is unable to handle something as basic as a dissenting opinion - through civil discussion - there is a problem with your community. There are innumerable diets out there: ask yourself why you don’t see their lifestyle coming under fire. You can’t pick fights and then cry foul because you are the minority.
Are vegans all awful people? No. Of course not. But there are a significant number who elevate their lifestyle to a religious status and feel compelled to preach and inflict it on others. THAT is unacceptable.
Why are you so quick to move people into the bad vegan category? Sounds like a lot of people are just using this to confirm their belief that vegans are crazy and they should continue eating meat without a care.
I think I get it. If its possible a cat could be healthy and vegan, then humans have no excuse left do they.
Self preservation at its finest.