Concerned Users of Derpibooru

Here’s a funny observation for you all.
 
That article from The Atlantic was bolstered by input from Wootmaster, an artist who has images on here of filly rape, Aryanne, flagrant use of the n-word, and who knows what else. That, and the speed and timing in trying to push new rules along with most of the staff being unaware of it after said article.

@Background Pony #0891  

 
Oh we know, you’ll just be another rule 0 or 6 or whatever rule it actually is.

Always remember to NOT respond to bait.

@Background Pony #6C14  
Nazis are bad. Racism is bad.  
Censorship is bad.  
I don’t think that anyone boasting about how their race is better, or how nazism is the one true ideology are “crusaders of free speech” at all. I think they’re idiots. But they should have a right to SAY whatever they want. I may not like what they’re saying, but that doesn’t matter. It’s not my right to tell other people what they can and can’t say. At that point it’s not a place of free discussion and expression anymore. I get the sentiment people have of not wanting to give these people a platform, and if it JUST ended there, fine, maybe I could accept it. Maybe. But it never ends there. There will always be people wanting to censor something else, and people will always buckle to these demands, and soon you have a stifling and restrictive environment where you can’t say anything or else you get punished with wrongthink, and are ostracized by the world.

@Background Pony #6C14  
Tolerance means being able to accept the existence of something, especially an opinion or behavior, without necessarily agreeing with it. Disallowing something to exist or be expressed because you disagree with it or find it repulsive is intolerance, and being tolerant of somebody only if they are or aren’t within a certain set of people isn’t truly practicing tolerance.  
Tolerance is most notable where it’s most difficult. Nobody would be lauded for “tolerating” somebody who agrees with them in every way, but tolerating somebody who completely disagrees with you requires one to be truly tolerant. Love & Tolerance means not ostracizing anybody no matter what characteristics they have or what views they hold, and offering people friendliness even when they offer you none. Ultimately, regardless of any hatred a person might hold in their heart, they’re still a fellow human being, and being shown kindness may help them hold less hatred as they recognize that even those they hate are capable of good acts as well.
 
Regardless of the post I’m replying to being deleted for false-flagging, it’s still good to keep this in mind. All too often people tend to dehumanize those they disagree with.

@Background Pony #253D  
Exactly, they have no principles what so ever. Might as well change rule #0 to “whatever the mods don’t like” and be more honest about it.

@Osha  

 
Indeed it is. That is the ideal of this site and a deviation from it better be explained well. If they are dealing with something, say Patreon threatening them, they should say it. I think the threat of cancellation is very real and that is something that people would have been able to understand to an extent. Now I think so much goodwill has been flushed down the toilet that I am uncertain that repair is possible.

@doloresbridge  
Yeah, if there had been even a remotely plausible explanation from the start, the shitstorm would not have been anything like this. It would have still been the wrong decision, but at least people would be more understanding. But if at this point they make a statement like that, it’s just going to seem like damage control.
 
I don’t want to see the site damaged, but if Patreon pulls the plug, then they would have to move to Subscribe Star. You know, the Extremist Patreon.
 
And now that would actually be quite funny.

Let’s talk about political stances. It turns out you can just abstain from adopting a position. In doing so, you’re taking the meta-position that it’s not appropriate for you to take a position on a particular issue. In my humble opinion, it’s not appropriate for Derpibooru to adopt positions on issues that don’t arise from the show itself, the fandom and it’s culture, or the logistics of running the site. Which positions are adopted should be (and used to be) a compromise between the values expressed in the show, the values expressed by the fandom culture, and what Derpibooru can safely and legally host.
 
And I think Derpibooru basically had the right idea. Why are users allowed to post images supporting LGBTQ-etc? Because the fandom has been making characters gay and revering lesbians since since the beginning, so it’s consistent with the culture. Why aren’t users allowed to promote hateful ideologies? Because it’s a show about characters setting aside their differences and being nice to each other, so it’s inconsistent with the show’s message. So that covers images that adopt a specific stance. What about images that just depict things? What stance does Derpibooru adopt by allowing those?
 
Derpibooru values artistic freedom over morality and “good taste”. It adopts the stance that “So long as no one is harmed, do as you please”. It places a strong emphasis on personal responsibility when it comes to controlling what you do or don’t see. Thus, the decision to allow images tagged with “rape”, “foalcon”, “gore”, “torture”, “murder”, “nazi” and other things that everyone knows are bad, is not an endorsement of these things specifically, but an endorsement of artistic freedom in general. “Your right to say it”, etc.
 
Just a side point about Nazis. A person can have a fetish for “The Nazi Aesthetic”, without actually being a Nazi. In the same way, a person can engage with the subject matter in a work of fiction without actually agreeing with it.
 
This is the political stance Derpibooru should take. If they start compromising on their anti-censorship stance, there’s no telling where it stops.
 
“They banned that offensive thing instead of just telling people to filter it. Why aren’t you banning this offensive thing? You banned it because you disagree with it, doesn’t that imply you agree with the things you aren’t banning?”

@DerpyFast  
Great points all

This probably annoys me the most out of any reaction He just pointed out the article last time. Now he is acting like that their is a real big problem that he wasn’t aware of. Maybe a bunch of people sent him all this media reports and he really does believe them. Or maybe he doesn’t have a spine in the slightest. The more I look over this article and others that I’ve seen who have this type of response the madder that I get. Why? Not because he said that there is a “problem” but that he said that the actual racism is “so prevalent”. He is not just partly conceding to the article but fully conceding the fandom’s very dignity. Saying that less than 1% of images here and a few discord servers he’s also forgetting /mlpol/, but even then is a such stain on the famdom that we are all complicit in to an extent and we need to “grapple with”. Seth, you already grappled with it when you stopped posting edgy nazi stuff ages ago. It’s okay to say an assurance of some type or even have a conversation on it, but have some dignity for this fandom. If you are saying that I, or anyone else, who willingly participates in a fandom that is a overall positive space to so many different groups of people, from Military vets to the LGBT community, is somehow guilty of something because of a few edgelords and a tiny community of actual nazis that is somehow something that outweighs all of that is utterly stupid. Even if he is facing down a true threat of the fandom coming under sustained external attack he should still at least emphasize that there is so much more to this fandom. But he didn’t. Not enough anyway. So now if this continues on in the media, they have Seth to quote saying that the freaking fandom is utterly nazi infested. I don’t wish him any ill will but my criticism is indeed harsh because this feels so cowardly and doesn’t help the situation at all regardless of what side your on this.

This is pathetic. This is what the mods thinks of us.  

@Derwol  
Well, I mean, that seems to be very much the issue at hand. Yes.
 
Edit: at least they deleted that now

@Derwol  
We have known this, yes.

@doloresbridge  
Yes, it had to be reported twice. The first people who reported it (including me) had their reports closed without deletion.

@Derwol  
@Filiecs  
You’re not sharing the full context.  
There was a BP post after that which was also rule 0’d and the comments were locked while that comment was still up.  
Mods had to be contacted via a public discord before it was actually handled properly.  
This isn’t an issue of different opinions, someone on the mod team is actively abusing their position at probably the worst possible time for it.

@Background Pony #BA40  
>This isn’t an issue of different opinions, someone on the mod team is actively abusing their position at probably the worst possible time for it.  
Is that legit? Are we actually living in North Korea the site?

@Background Pony #BA40  
Either so lacking in self-awareness of their bias that I would not think that they deserve to be a mod, or acting maliciously, yes.

@DerpyFast  
Yeah, this is a pretty reasonable take.

I’m just curious when will communist imagery be banned. If the stance is to ban all “hateful” things, hammer and sickle should get the boot no less than the swastika did.
 
Then again, I see some of Dilarus’ images in the vein of “kill all cops” and stuff are not here, so perhaps something is being done?

@Background Pony #CD0B  
They’ve been over this numerous times, basically it will not be banned because users haven’t had a problem with it before, if you don’t like it, filter it, if you find a picture offensive, report it, yada yada
 
Not gonna go into any of their more ardent “that wasn’t real Communism” tier takes but what I’m trying to get at, is that this avenue of questioning doesn’t go anywhere and just distracts from the true core of the problem.
 
We don’t want MORE censorship, we want less. We literally just wanna grill, for godsake.

I still wonder why derpibooru “banned” aryanne but not disgusting shit like incest or foalcon  
The hypocrisy is pretty amazing.

@Background Pony #CD0B  

 
I mean, the tl;dr of the kind of arguments I’ve seen from staff goes along these lines: