https://lemmy.ml/comment/16125064
Starring: blindbunny, BrainInABox and of course, the one and only, Cowbee!
Literally the only place I have ever experienced transphobia on Lemmy was from a hexbear, who called me a chaser for saying that my ex was a trans woman.
“You people,” huh?
I hate how they’re incapable of actually thinking, so they latch onto specific phrases so they can pretend you’re a racist so they don’t have to engage with what you’re actually saying
The fuck with this obsession of telling people whether they are or are not trans online?
What a transphobic thing to say. You must be trans
I don’t see anyone doing that in this example. Are you misinterpreting the meaning of the original statement?
“I definitely do not believe half their users are trans”
That is not the same as telling someone they aren’t trans. He’s expressing doubt about the veracity of the results of the poll, not about any particular user(s)
We read the same statement. I interpret it as “I believe less than half of the userbase of the instance is trans” which does not rise to the level of telling someone they aren’t trans. Was anyone specific named or called out as “not trans”? Was there any direct accusation of insincerity or fakery with regards to an individual’s self-identification?
They conduct their own demographic polling - unless you believe their users are lying about their identity there is more demographic evidence in support of that figure than there is evidence to the contrary.
With regards to the polling you’ve referenced: of the 598 respondants, less than half indicated that they were definitively not cisgender. Hexbear, per prolewiki has “over 1,400 monthly users”.
Not only does the raw data from the self-report survey not bear out the premise that half of the users are trans, it also does not factor in response bias, which impacts any such survey.
K, if the survey is wrong then it can be wrong the other way too, maybe OVER half the user base is trans.
Sure, it could be. But there is no inherent level of “telling someone they aren’t trans” by stating a belief that less than half are.
less than half indicated that they were definitively not cisgender
It is just as accurate to say that less than half indicated that they definitively are cisgender - it depends on if you include questioning individuals is a part of the culturally dominant majority cisgender group, or if you view the questioning of your socially-reinforced gender as a departure from the norm.
Hexbear, per prolewiki has “over 1,400 monthly users”.
A sample group of 42% in any survey would be considered a high-quality representation, even when including the likelihood of response bias. But, then again, there’s still even less evidence for assuming it’s inaccurate simply because trans and communist identities are extremely uncommon in the general population - especially when hexbear is explicitly a trans-friendly leftist space.
Of course it can be. But the viewpoint called into question is “I don’t believe that half the users are trans”. Based on the data you personally referenced, that is a valid viewpoint for someone to hold without telling anyone who identifies specifically as trans that they are wrong about their gender.
Further, 598 is not 42% of “over 1,400”.
unless you believe their users are lying
That’s the only snip we need because we are talking about hexbear, you know, the instance designed to be a troll instance…
I could believe it if it was Beehaw… Maybe lemmynsfw
Hexbear existed as its own thing long before there were any lib instances to troll. It’s far more likely that their ideological framework is earnest and is simply incompatible with your own.
Well Yerbatim kind of comes off as a dick reading the rest of the linked conversation. He also seems to be known to the hexbear community in general judging from an other comment coming from a hexbear user. cowbell might be responding to this more than anything else and he got banned for it. He also got banned for it because of this post and not the original so to speak (it’s in the comments of this post).
I didn’t check his history per say but I did check the modlog and amongst a few mean spirited comments, there was this gem:
I got one for you: How does a Hexbear user proceed to kill himself? He shoot a bullet 3 inch above his head, directly in his superiority complex. But seriously, you guys (cause you’re 95℅ guys lets be honest), arent half as intelligent as you think you are. Cheers
I also don’t know what the percentage of trans users would have to do with anything.
.world doesn’t federate with hexbear. My first experience with them was when they abused the emoji exploit so I’m kind of fine with it. I don’t know all the drama nor the actors involved but it doesn’t seem like everyone is being critical enough. I don’t think the glorification or the ban are entirely justified.
Cowbee is a troll and I shed no tears for their ban, but I agree that Yerbatim comes off as a dick.
It seems unlikely that half of their users would be transgender, given that transgender people make up roughly .5% of the overall population; gay people (gay men + lesbians) make up roughly 4.5-5% of the overall population the last time I looked at demographics. All of the LGBTQ+ people together make up about 6% of the total population in the US.
These numbers might have changed somewhat in the last year or two since I last check surveys, but it’s not likely that it’s changed enough to move the numbers sharply.
I know that there was some investigative reporting in my state a few months ago trying to figure out how many minors would be affected by a state-level ban on insurance covering gender-affirming care for minors, and the number was in in the very low double digits. The same kind of numbers of athletes would be affected by bans on ‘biological males’ competing in womens’ sports.
I’m just saying that it just doesn’t seem very likely that an instance with thousands of users would have that kind of demographics, esp. when you consider that Hexbear broadly has a monolithic political identity.
I mean I could believe it about an arbitrary thing over a general populace. I mean like a gay bar is likely to have like 90% gay people in it. And its not like the federation is huge and it tends to attract out groups.
A gay bar doesn’t have a (largely) monolithic political identity though. Sure, most gay people are going to trend more socially and fiscally liberal/left. But you’ll still find a number at any gay bar that are fairly socially and/or fiscally conservative. Log cabin Republicans, for instance. (Yeah, I think it’s dumb to kiss the asses of ppl that want to eliminate your rights, but whatever.)
I honestly have no idea why your shifting to political ideology. My point was when you take anything that is a closed type of system it will have its own identity so I could believe its makeup is whatever and no where near close to the global average is.
They’re pointing out that hexbear isn’t like a gay bar. Its not the sexual orientation that holds them together. It’s extremest political ideology (and probably significant support from the Kremlin)
yeah that was not really my point though. when something is not broad enough, like federation instances, then any particular anomaly is possible. It does not have to be specific sort of place. So lets say instead of a gay bar its just a corner bars but it so happens a fair amount of gay people decided to frequent it because others were or such.
But it is not as if the instance advertises itself as a place specifically for trans people.
yeah Im just saying I think its possible. ultimately I just don’t care and don’t see why anyone else would.
I’m just saying that it just doesn’t seem very likely that an instance with thousands of users would have that kind of demographics, esp. when you consider that Hexbear broadly has a monolithic political identity.
Comrade just learned what an intersectional identity group is
I think that you might misunderstand. Transgender people are already a very, very small minority. The number of people that are in favor of authoritarian communism is also quite low (certainly in the US, at least). Even if you assume that, say, 50% of all trans people are supportive of authoritarian communism, that’s still an incredibly tiny number.
I can’t say that I know a ton of transgender people, but the ones that I’ve personally known have trended well into anarchism, because they recognize the risk of allowing anyone to control their body other than themselves.
Transgender people are already a very, very small minority. The number of people that are in favor of authoritarian communism is also quite low (certainly in the US, at least).
Couple things:
- They might each be small minorities of the overall population, but that doesn’t mean they don’t have a very large overlap with each other. Assuming that they don’t simply because you don’t personally know many who fit that intersection could just mean that you don’t frequent the same spaces they do - possibly because you don’t share one or either of those characteristics
- I’ll let you do your own math and get back to me if your calculated percentages could possibly add up to 700 people (half of an estimated 1400 monthly active users) on the internet who identify as both trans and communist
Estimated “over 1,400” monthly users. Be honest with your numbers.
Ok so 800 people. Hell, let’s bump it up to 1,000 people. Let me know if there could reasonably be 1,000 people online who are both communist and trans
Obviously there could. But on Lemmy? That’s ridiculous.
They existed before the major migration from reddit, and were born out of very specifically the chapo trap house sub, that was decidedly a safe space for trans folks. They then carried that mentality to hexbear, and have strictly enforced those rules since its start. Why is it so impossible to believe that there is a strong bias towards folks that are gender questioning to end up there, and that their politics align?
Never, under any circumstances, use the phrase “you people” unless you’re in the mood for everyone in the universe to act like you just lost the argument.
I hate that this is correct. Because that phrase only ever had a bad connotation for reasons that probably apply in next to none of the cases on Lemmy where someone would take that phrase as a failed purity test.
Probably any time I used that online I meant “most of the people replying in this particular thread”. To me, it’s super obvious what it means but I’ve gotten the kind of smug response you mean several times.
Then what do you people want me to say?
I can come up with a couple of nonspecific alternatives, all of them would cause an even worse mayhem.
The usage here is appropriate but you are absolutely correct. It is the perfect way to start losing an argument.
When reading all the Tankie bullshit it’s actually very easy to get emotional so that’s why I limit my interactions with them. I only come out when they are not offered a counter point outside of their 3 instances.
Solid advice. It can be completely benign, but people will still pounce on it for an “easy win”.
You people make some good points.
Excuuuuuuse me!
Rein those U’s in when you’re talkin to me. I ain’t no princess.
You people are excused. /s
I mean you’re not wrong in that people will often try to play the victim in that scenario, but there are plenty of intelligent people who can easily see such claims are merely a flimsy argumentative tactic. After all, we are discussing it right now, and its pretty easy to recognize when it happens.
Definitely still solid advice though, especially IRL. Online I feel like it’s a bit more acceptable, because you don’t even know the physical characteristics of the person you’re arguing with, so it’s much more difficult to twist you people into some kind of discriminatory or bigoted statement, given that the two debaters are anonymous.
Meanwhile, Lemmy Devs are saying the “transgender topic” is promoted by “the bourgeoisie”, and how “biological men” shouldn’t be competing in “women’s sports”
https://lemmy.dbzer0.com/post/25213024
(also, who the fuck says “biological men” in the transgender context, its called transgender women)
I used to think Reddit was wild
Then I got on Lemmy…
(also, who the fuck says “biological men” in the transgender context, its called transgender women)
Conservatives and other right wing that’s who. That’s why you hear tankie leadership saying it.
Tankies are anti-lgbtq at their core. Anything to simp for totalitarians.
Maybe this is just an online thing? IRL I hang out with quite a few Marxist-Leninists, Maoists, and other folks who’d usually get categorized as tankies and I don’t think I’ve heard them be bigoted towards queer people during the years I’ve known them. I’m also openly queer so it’s not like I’m just an “ally” saying that they don’t see bigotry happening just because they ignore it.
These same folks are also organizing most of the pride events around here and running volunteer security for protests and drag shows, so I’d have a hard time believing that they’re secretly bigoted while spending a lot of their time, money, and taking personal risks to foster a queer community and keep it safe.
How old are these IRL people, just out of curiosity?
They’re between 20 and ~40 years old, and about 25 people in total in my close circles
I think this scenario highlights the difference between communists and tankies. Tankies are a subset of communists (or at least claim to be) but not all communists are tankies.
I’m sure it’ll be hilarious when I explain to my co-organizers that the Stalinist in our group isn’t a tankie because they support LGBTQ+ rights
Well I suppose you could have not seen it.
However, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence.
Considering the big-tent-tankies quite openly discuss (or refuse to discuss) the issue leaves me with ample proof of the movements leadership holding a certain position.
Actually, most of the people who’d normally be described as tankies (Stalinists, Marxist-Leninists, CPUSA members, other flavors of communist that want to seize state power and use it against the capitalist class) that I’ve met are some variety of queer themselves. In my organizing circles usually the queer folks outnumber the few token cis-het people, so again, it could just be that my IRL circles don’t represent the norm.
For context, I’m usually organizing at the local level. I know that things suck at the national level in a lot of orgs like IWW and CPUSA, there’s toxic leadership in there that have seized power in order to keep their own positions and are really ruining the image and functioning of both orgs. Yeah, CPUSA leadership might suck, but your local communists that you might write off as tankies might actually be really caring people.
To be fair, hexbear did ban those devs for those comments.
It’s a little noted fact that the lemmy devs don’t really fuck with hexbear or vice versa. Presumably they also recognize the same childish, bad faith, obnoxious argumentative tactics that we have all come to know and love from hexbear.
While I’m on the topic, Nutomic and Dessalines also have very different views, and constantly referring to them as the monolithic tankie lemmy devs is somewhat reductive. Dessalines seems to be the more tankie-ish of the two based on the evidence I’ve seen.
It’s fair to assume that a good number of the OG lemmy.ml users and lemmygrad users aren’t big fans of hexbear either, considering hexbear has always maintained a separate space for themselves. Pretty wild that hexbear users are so toxic and misanthropic that even other tankies are repelled by them.
Imagine not being able to tell the difference between “I don’t believe half of their users are trans” and “I don’t believe in their users being trans”.
Demographics isn’t transphobic. Using trans people as a shield from criticism is.
EDIT: I looked over the October survey. The graphs aren’t the cleanest but the data is there: 15% of all asked identified as trans, with another 9% as trans non-binary. A sample size of 600 to the 2300 monthly users is also really good, so the data ought to be very representative.
This is part of why the hard left, or at least the current version of it, has basically lost me. I firmly support the right of trans and queer folks to exist in the same relative peace and safety as everyone else, but in todays lefty political spaces you’re not allowed to disagree with what a trans person says without being transphobic. You can’t criticize a trans person for their shit takes or bad behavior without being transphobic. I even had a years long friendship end because raising the issue of a clear mental health episode involving paranoid delusion unrelated to their transition or transness made me a “dangerous transphobe”. This person had of course been hospitalized for self harm and major mental heath issues prior, and a desire to keep them safe was “transphobic”
Transphobia is bad. Trans exceptionalism is also bad.
Yeah I feel you. I have had two memorable interactions with trans people who tried to say I was being transphobic for made up reasons. The most recent person went through my moderation history and found a comment I made which supposedly was homophobic. It was a comment roughly saying “trump is sucking off Putin” which was removed for “incivility”. This of course proved that I am a hateful bigot and only wanted to disagree with the trans person due to who they are. Which btw was not something I had a fucking clue about until they called it out.
I feel for both you and your friend. Over the last while with trans stuff being in the news so much it does feel like being constantly under fire with a lot of hope for things getting better like they were even five years ago going by the wayside. I have a friend who has struggled with BPD on top of being trans and it has been kind of hard telling her that she actually is being a little too sensitive and assuming way more hostility than she’s actually receiving from people in her life by “mind reading” intentions that are not there.
As one of the few other trans people in her life it’s really hard being her reality check. When we queer folk have community we do a better job of keeping each other grounded and advocating for the general intentions of cis family, friends and romantic partners and give them grace to be imperfect allies. We can acknowledge when things suck because of a lack of understanding or because someone is still hurting us despite not wanting to… But that’s not always based out of transphobia. The world is imperfect and sometimes that means we don’t always have our cake and eat it too.
The kind of self awareness you’re showing is something we could all benefit from.
Lots of leftists and even leftist groups/spaces acknowledge and criticize the bigotry of lowered expectations. Sometimes called the soft bigotry of lowered expectations. It’s when you cut members of marginalized groups more slack simply because they’re marginalized. Whether someone means it or not, it perpetuates that someone is less smart, less capable, simply because they’re (gender)queer, a POC, disabled, etc. What you’re describing fits the bill.
I’m part of leftist groups that call it out for the bigotry it is, and I hope you can find a leftist group that does, too. They do exist. Or maybe otherwise, you can read a little about the bigotry of lowered expectations and bring it up for discussion with groups that are unknowingly guilty of it. Maybe they can learn from you.
I appreciate this. Thanks. Honestly the other reason I’m not organizing much these days is because I’m busy making my material conditions better. Also being in a union feels like a praxis of its own, with surprisingly less bullshit than other forms of organizing. Who knows, maybe the next four years will see me back in it.
Trans, or LGBT issues in general are used as argumentative shibboleths and rallying points.
In reality, these are non-issues that shouldn’t really concern anyone except those directly affected by them. But the extremists on both sides chose to make them front and center for literally any discussion.
It’s a culture war fueled by a bunch of narcissistic idiots and financed by ghouls who love to see the plebs destroy itself.
Leftists aren’t a monolith. There’s anarchists, democratic socialists, state capitalists and authoritarian leftists (both are social democrats without the democracy part) and more. I don’t think it’s fair to abandon an ideology because a similiar ideologies followers are stupid, or insane.
And left/right is disconnected from cultural progressivism/conservatism (tho they heavily correlate) there are conservative socialists and progressive conservatives. There’s even this god forsaken abomination of an ideology.
It’s your choice, though. If you don’t want to be a leftist, then that’s fine.
Don’t worry, my ideology is cemented. I’m not a kid experimenting with political thought, Ive been at it for decades. I’m just saying I don’t mesh well with the modern left because gender identity politics have co-opted all of those ideologies to their core. I know exactly what my political ideology is, it just lives in hermitage now.
What you’re referring to is quite frustrating, I agree. Even more concerning is that it’s such an obvious vector for foreign actors to leverage in an attempt to weaken the geopolitical dominance of the Western world.
If Russia and China aren’t running psyops and trying to exacerbate the obvious political divide within western nations by utilizing transgender ideology as a wedge topic, they’re not even trying. It’s just such an obvious vulnerability that it beggars belief to think they wouldn’t be trying to fan those flames as much as possible.
I agree wholeheartedly. I firmly believe that there are a lot of young people suddenly realizing they’re trans, that likely wouldn’t be if not for sophisticated and well funded psychological warfare operations by rival nation states.
This is not a reason to turn our backs on vulnerable trans folks. They deserve the right to be safe and heard. But we also need to address the fact that somehow this tiny minority simply existing has driven national political dialogues right off the fucking rails. And for what? The left and right going to war over this hyper-niche issue does nothing but further endanger trans folks and prevent meaningful discourse on far more relevant topics.
So you agree trans people are vulnerable and taken advantage of in the media and general political discourse but the “leftys” lost you cause you talked to some people you didn’t like? I don’t know about you but I’d rather be on the side of an annoying trans person than the side of another old racist with lead poisoning who plays the victim card when people don’t like them.
“You find something about modern leftism annoying so you must be a trumper now”
No. Congrats on being the first person in this thread to look like a complete ass.
Thanks for bringing this up, Cowbee has been banned.
Wait where has he been banned from? discuss.tchncs.de or here?
Alright thanks good to know. Thank you for taking such action. I have rarely seen someone acting so innocent yet at the same time being so disingenuous.
That guy is so annoying with his faux-neutrality/naivety. What a phony, good riddance.
Please look at my very comprehensive “intro to leftism” reading list which is entirely comprised of ML essays and makes no attempt at contextualizing these works within broader leftist philosophy.
Haha indeed, spot on
Oh, they can tell the difference. It’s just that their whole mentality is attuned to seizing on some trivial bullshit, deliberately misunderstanding it into some wild kind of caricature, and then lecturing the “opponent” about how they’re wrong about everything.
This is a perfect way to sum up the same thoughts I’ve had about people who do that shit.
I wonder where those demographics came from.
I tagged Cowbee as a tankie also. I despise the technique also: lobbing “-phobic” accusations if there’s anything that can be seen as negative said in the same paragraph that mentions some group like trans people. It’s shitty for multiple reasons.
The technique is to spread anger and divide people in western countries, or else they won’t get a paycheck.
Cowbee isn’t just another tankie. He knows his theory and will use it to dazzle you with bullshit.
I would accept being dazzled with BS
They’re just shuffling cards. This is the shape a valid rebuttal would have, so they perform that, regardless of whether it has any basis in reality.
Hexbear is a psyops.
Ding ding dingg
I don’t believe ANY hexbear users are leftists either.
they’ll probably say that’s leftphobic. These cretins can’t manage logic and reason.
There are definitely some that have been lured in by the grift. I feel bad for those people but there’s no way for us to reach them as long as they stay in the hexbear bubble.
Hell, I’ve had to deal with MAGAts for years, I see no difference in how I will do that with tankies.
Shitbirds of a feather, Randy.
I’m not saying I’m going to cater to them or give them any special effort, I’m just saying I feel bad because they were possibly headed in a generally good ideological direction before they stumbled onto hexbear and got totally brainwashed.
It’s frustrating to think about what might have been.
deleted by creator
Denying the self-reported identity of a marginalized person is absolutely bigoted, and those demographics come directly from self-reported polling data.
Unless you are simply unaware that they conduct their own demographic polling, dismissing those demographics as ‘not real’ is the same thing as accusing those users of lying about being trans
I can’t load that link but it’s pretty awesome that they, for the for time in history, conducted a poll casually while managing to get a 100% participation rate. Also impressive that the results were distributed and read by every single Lemmy user, including OP.
conducted a poll casually while managing to get a 100% participation rate
It’s been a while since i’ve taken Statistics but i’m pretty sure 40% participation is exceptionally high for a demographic poll.
If it weren’t for the pretty glaring selection bias (I think that’s the right term), you’d be right. But it’s pretty easy to imagine that trans people were more interested in responding to that poll than others.
The resulting error of that selection bias decreases as the sample rate increases - that’s part of the reason why sample rates are a valuable indicator of survey accuracy
But having that discussion is qualitatively different than dismissing whatever assumptions brought by it by saying ‘I don’t believe it’.
Where did you get the idea that OP knew this information and dismissed it? I haven’t seen any evidence of that.
He knew 50% was the figure in question and he said ‘i don’t believe anything that comes out of hexbear’. Stands to reason he very well did have that information and simply dismissed it for having come from hexbear.
“figure in question”? I’m asking for specifics. Because all I see is the image in this post.
Singular, open, surveys online, are rarely good data. This suggests there are a lot of people, in comparison to the general population, who do not identify as definitely CIS, and presents some interesting things to think about. However, the actual scientific value of this survey is pretty poor. Online surveys are particularly bad for academic considerations, especially when there is just one.
Dude is being a dick though. However saying you doubt the veracity of a single online survey isn’t a clear sign of bigotry. There are many reasons to doubt ANY online survey. If you would like to find out why, you can search something like “are online surveys particularly bad for scientific research”, and you will get a lot of work discussing why this is so.
Dude is being a dick though.
Apparently it’s okay to unequivocally call people transphobes with little to no basis, but sarcasm? Now that is a dick move! /s
I’ll just repeat what I said elsewhere:
Saying “I don’t believe this figure” isn’t born out of a reaction to that information, it’s simply an expression of disbelief that there could possibly be that many trans communists in a community you personally dislike.
I commented one time on the bear that Ukraine has a right to self defense and self actualization and got flooded by 15 different users, all pro-russia, then banned.
Oooook. But that tracks I guess. I lean left and theres nothing I hate more than leftists, except fascists… ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
how do i block any post with “hexbear” anywhere in the title or comments?
Most mobile clients allow you to hide posts that contain a certain keyword in their title. Here’s a non-exhaustive list of clients that support keyword filtering off the top of my head:
- Voyager (multiplatform; I believe you need to have the app because the option doesn’t show up on the website for me)
- Mlem (iOS)
- Arctic (iOS)
- Thunder (Android)
- Sync (Android)
I don’t know of any that can hide posts with a keyword mentioned in any of the post’s comments; doing so would require the client to make a lot of extra API requests.
Step 1 might be getting off this community?
Keyword blocking
