hexbear
Hexbear Proposals chapo.chat matrix room.
This will be a place for site proposals and discussion before implementation on the site.
Every proposal will also be mirrored into a pinned post on the hexbear community.
Any other ideas for helping to integrate the two spaces are welcome to be commented here or messaged to me directly.
Within Hexbear Proposals you can see the history of all site proposals and react to them, indicating a vote for or against a proposal.
Sending messages will be restricted to verified and active hexbear accounts older than 1 month with their matrix id in their hexbear user profile.
All top level messages within the channel must be a Proposals (idea for changing the site), Feedback (regarding non-technical aspects of the site, for technical please use https://hexbear.net/c/feedback), or Appeals (regarding admin/moderator actions).
Discussion regarding these will be within nested threads under the post.
To gain matrix verification, all you need to do is navigate to my hexbear userprofile and click the send a secure private message including your hexbear username.
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I don't see how it's possible to run a mutual aid comm with anonymous people scattered all over the world. Mutual aid really requires a much closer knit network of people working together in tangible non-monetary ways. I've done a little mutual aid offline, and mostly it's the combination of a plan and people giving the right aid and advice to advance that plan that really changes people's situation.
What we have is a charity comm. If we're going to run a charity comm some regulation would help.
Limiting posts to one per week, or month, per account to stop the competition for visibility and subsequent blocking of the comm by people overwhelmed by the number of similar or repeated posts. Hexbear is not a large community, and many people are now blocking the comm because it makes them feel uneasy.
Enforcing the use of an external tracking tool like GoFundMe so people can be confident when targets are or aren't met for a given post. It also provides a little bit of legitimacy and makes donations easier for many people who would be considering it.
Allowing people to provide suggestions for local support such as specific food banks or shelters: things that may reduce weekly repeats on the charity comm. Allowing people to suggest alternative purchases or actions, such as a more cost efficient alternative could be useful.
Regardless of moral judgements, donators need confidence in the system for the comm to function. Otherwise it's just a drama generator that fosters contempt and mistrust while also leaving people feeling abandoned. A couple of incidents have really blown peoples trust, and left them fatigued. The situation is not going to change unless adjustments are made. As for discussions about the validity of a users cause - evidently, even when discussion of causes is forbidden, people still seethe and it still seeps into and erupts throughout the whole instance. The amount of recurring drama from one incident alone that is taboo to talk about is enough indication that simply banning discussions isn't actually helping much, if at all.
This is where I am and I also feel what @iByteABit@hexbear.net has commented with below.
I am a person who can, at times, donate to people in need. But, at a point when it became overwhelming, I had to block the comm (and feel like shit for doing so) and prioritize in-person, local donations over the mutual aid comm. Here is my reasoning for what it is worth:
-The frustration of seeing people shouting over people who clearly need the financial assistance more. This is not to say people cannot ask for help without being in extreme danger, in fact, I don't want to imply that at all. The people "shouting" began to prey upon empathetic posters with guilt-trip, ALL CAPS, calls to action based on dubious urgency. They would aim to eclipse other members who contribute more to the site, who are less sensationalist, and I'd argue more at-risk. Can I prove any of this? Nah, of course not. But, any decent comrade shouldn't be trying to drown out his other comrades in need and they assuredly shouldn't resort to emotional manipulation to do so. We're all ~~socialists~~ liberals here, we're empathetic to a fault. There is no need to emotionally manipulate in order to be heard. Just tell us what you need and be respectful to your fellow comrades with your posting-etiquette. For this reason, I am in favor of limiting the intervals that members can ask for donations with new posts/threads. Bumping or whatever can occur within a mega thread or something. Updates on the situation should occur from the poster in the thread that already exists, otherwise. Spamming the comm with bump threads is just spam that, as others have stated, leads to an emotional-manipulation arms race that ultimately causes high-empathy, generous comrades to get overwhelmed and block the comm. It is my belief that a socialist legitimately in need would not resort to these tactics to begin with and so I am highly skeptical that the posts I'm referring to aren't just some fascist ass-clown abusing goodwill as a hobby and directly harming legitimate comrades in the process.
-The frustration of not being able to reliably, anonymously donate to the people I want to help. Many times when I attempted to help, the medium with which assistance was requested either failed to process because the institution itself thought I was being scammed and blocked in a paternalistic manner from the recipient or I became sketched out by the platform I was being asked to use. I don't intend to dox myself when I want to help people and I don't want to have comrades in need feel unheard because they are using platforms that don't allow for international/anonymous donations. For this reason I am in favor of a mod-sanctioned and organized method to reliably donate to the people in need of assistance.
-The frustration of seeing the communities limited resources be essentially on retainer for just a few charismatic members. Asking for an indefinite subsidy can only serve to limit available resources for comrades experiencing unexpected emergencies. I realize that this line of thought may lead to dubious, theatrical "emergencies" becoming widespread in an effort to "compete" for the communities resources; this is why there needs to be moderation that curtails such emotional manipulations. For this reason I am in favor of anyone seeking indefinite subsidy to be required to set up a patreon or GoFundMe for some basic transparency to protect other comrades in need. In this golden-age of scamming - I really fail to see why using a payment platform is undesirable for both people in need of help and those seeking to help. The concept of "anonymous charity on the internet" is painful naivety.
I fully agree with all of these ideas.
Lemmy is not the right platform to host something like this, especially in an instance that's almost exclusively working class.
There are dedicated platforms for charity that do it better than this one ever will, the most Hexbear can do is to share each charity goal, especially in cases where someone needs immediate and urgent help.
Having a small posting limit shouldn't hurt anyone that's not spamming on purpose, you don't need to be posting multiple times a day to get help, you are just overshadowing other people who also need help.
When I have the ability to give a bit of my money to someone here, it's completely logical that I want that money to go the one that needs it most. Steps need to be taken to distribute our help better, that means we should know when a goal has been reached, and we should make sure that everyone is heard when they ask for that help.
The last point is also very important, there are several cases of people who obviously need guidance and other forms of help more urgently than they need financial help. That's why helping someone find direct and real life help from organisations that exist for this reason can be life saving even.
All in all this community has achieved some great things over time, and some comrades can manage to get over rough patches and difficult situations partly thanks to it. It's a good thing it exists despite the many difficulties of making such a thing work on a leftist anonymous site with people all around the world who don't know one another at all. But it should be improved to try to overcome some of these challenges and make it more effective and impactful.
I'm OOL, what happened? Am I even allowed to ask? lol
Edit: nevermind I think I pieced it together
the inciting incident for this post was a meta-post recently but the history goes back years. its messy.