4 things white people can do to start making the fediverse less toxic for Black people (DRAFT!) - eviltoast

Feedback welcome! Here’s the TL;DR list

  1. Listen more to more Black people
  2. Post less – and think before you post
  3. Call in, call out, and/or report anti-Blackness when you see it
  4. Support Black people and Black-led instances and projects

Other suggestions?

  • Rentlar@lemmy.caEnglish
    25·
    3 months ago
    1. Post less

    Posting less as a general rule seems not helpful in the context of attempts to bring varied voices to the Fediverse.

    I understand the point of the rest of it. May I suggest some form of “consider not posting/replying on charged topics/messages” as an alternative title?

  • folkrav@lemmy.caEnglish
    16·
    3 months ago

    I’m not too sure I understand why point #2’s title is “post less - and think before you post”, even in the article itself. The paragraph pretty specifically talks about restraining ourselves on talking about anti-blackness as non-blacks, and doesn’t say a single word about quantity of posts.

    • The Nexus of Privacy@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOPMEnglish
      3·
      3 months ago

      Thanks, agreed that section heading is somwhat ouf of sync with the text. For now I might change it to “Post less about anti-Blackness …”, and will possibly make a bigger change when I revise

  • maegul (he/they)@lemmy.mlEnglish
    4·
    3 months ago

    Just going off of the TL;DR (sorry) …

    I feel like #1 could be expanded to “actively plug in to some black voices”. Which then, IMO, connects back to some principles about being a good fedi-citizen and how that requires having an awareness of how well the network as a whole is functioning.

    The amount of people that have not even heard the discourse BIPOC are having about the fediverse … but are also fedi or masto-advocates who advertise the quality of mastodon over twitter and are invested in this “truth” … well I suspect it’s way too high.

    I just had a conversation with some such person the other day … they were completely oblivious to all of the discussions that have occurred the past week or so and effectively sea lioning about it and the possibility that X/Twitter could be better for BIPOC while simultaneously talking about how much safer/better mastodon is.

    I’m not BIPOC or an activist or anything … I just follow some BIPOC who talk about this stuff. Some I follow because they’re cool. Some because I want to hear what they say about issues. It really isn’t hard. Going beyond “just listening” doesn’t require much … just search some people out, follow and read a bit. I’d argue, if you care about the network, that there’s a moral imperative to plug into the diversity of the network, even just a little bit here and there (because it’s reasonable to find controversial/difficult topics overwhelming).

    The amount that aren’t doing that is problematic in its own right I’d say.

    • The Nexus of Privacy@lemmy.blahaj.zoneOPMEnglish
      3·
      3 months ago

      Thanks. Yes, I agree that it’s problematic that a lot of people don’t see anything from Black people in their timelines – or do, but don’t pay any attention to it. But, there are also a lot of people who follow a handful of the most prominent Black fediversians – folks like Mekka and Timnit – and nobody else, and tht’s problematic too. So “listen more to more people” tries to cover both.

      And the full article has a paragraph

      Stop saying the fediverse is better or friendlier or nicer than corporate social networks. For many Black people, it’s not. So when you say that it is, you’re saying you don’t care about their experience.