this post was submitted on 08 Dec 2025
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Perish the thought! The reason is that during Rexodus, the more conservative/right-leaning instances (mainly exploding-heads.com) were so strongly hard-defederated from basically every single Lemmy instance across the board that nowadays there basically are none left. Maga.place is a brand-new one (oldest post is 3 months) and, looking in the side-bar text, I see that it has only 3 active users per month. So it is both new and highly irrelevant to the wider Threadiverse except the notoriety of it representing conservatives.
In fact most communities on the Threadiverse with names such as "conservative" are actually trolling conservatives rather than representing them. Also, a fun historical tidbit: exploding-heads quickly turned on itself and self-imploded, then (after first shifting over to another instance, rammy.site) emptied itself out when Donald Trump's Truth Social came out, leaving exploding-heads itself to eventually die (so there is little point to defederating from it anymore, since it no longer exists, although it is easy enough to leave in the defederation list, and one day that URL might become resurrected...).
"True" socialist instances include places like slrpnk.net and lemmy.dbzer0.com, which I highly recommend checking out. Hexbear.net however only claims to be leftist, while actually being trolls who believe in nothing except the power of being internet edgelords. Lemmygrad.ml and lemmy.ml (the latter also run by the developers of the Lemmy software) are extremely pro-authoritarian places that despite not saying anywhere in the rules about it will nonetheless ban you from every community on the instance (even those you've never so much as heard of) if you ever say anything critical (or not supportive enough?) about Russia, North Korea, or China. That banning btw is arguably fine - it's their instance so they can be free to run it however they wish - but the disingenuousness of never stating that fact up-front, instead calling itself a place for FOSS enthusiasts to discuss things, is one of the main reasons why they are blocked from new accounts, since they have shown themselves to not be governed by the traditional codes of conduct that a Westerner would expect regarding freedom and transparency. So very MANY people have, upon being exposed to that, noped back to Reddit and then complained about the entire Threadiverse, not realizing that those instances do not reflect the wider ideals held by the great majority of the instances here. There are whole entire communities - such as !meanwhileongrad@sh.itjust.works - dedicated to ~~bashing on them~~ documenting their behaviors.
Afaik, "Attitude" does not actually do much of anything - the worst that can happen is that after reaching some ENORMOUS ratio of downvotes to upvotes (I don't know the value, and it could differ from instance to instance anyway, but think like: 10-to-1), an icon gets placed next to someone's username to indicate their fairly toxic overall behavior. It does not filter their submissions, only labels them, so that someone responding has a better idea going into a conversation that the outcome is generally likely to result in disappointment if the goal was to be liked or at least have content received positively. Your own attitude is currently reported as 97% so I don't think this will ever end up happening to you.
Another spam-blocking feature is that you will not be able to DM anyone for I think it is 2 weeks after account creation. Unfortunately, since some people abuse the privilege, crackdowns have become necessary...:-(
I whole-heartedly agree and very much await the day when this aspect can be improved in PieFed software. I frequently get situations with like a +1 score but it represents a +11/-10 split rather than zero engagement - and yes those are two totally different scenarios, which it can be helpful to be able to distinguish!!:-) New features are added to PieFed practically weekly, so one day I strongly hope to see this one.
Thanks for your input and perspective. Good to know other people feel the same way about the votes. And weird about my "Attitude," my profile shows 100% for me, I don't think I've downvotwd anyone yet. My ratio on my main account is like 100/1. I even upvote people who argue with me because I like the attention.
I've been on lemmy for about two years and my main account is on Lemmy.Today, which doesn't block any instance.
The maga trolls are rare but they are 100% right wing and incendiary. There's really only one user from .ml I find consistently... sucks. I see more people attacking folks for having .ml in their username than .ml's giving people shit. Most of them seem pretty socialist/democratic to me. The hexbears have their own vibe and I don't see many .grads outside of their instance, or maybe I just don't notice them.
It's kinda delightful being able to see all the hexbears in the comments like little mischievous ghosts bitching about the liberals.
Meanwhile on Grad is some highschool level call-out culture. The person who runs it is abusive, insulting, has made some pretty crazy comments about Isreal, and uses alts to manipulate votes.
But I agree there needs to be more transparent rules about the expectations for individual instances, that said, mods trying to curate a certain kind of vibe on an instance or in a community isn't out of the ordinary. On the one hand I think we need to protect minority opinions so Lemmy doesn't become a sad, monotonous gruel of opinions. On the other hand, spicy peppers are gross in a fruit cake.
Perhaps it's because I am on PieFed.social and you are on PieFed.zip... somehow?
If you ever have the misfortune of having to communicate with the Sealion Cowbee, you will understand. Arguing with people who ignore 99.9% of what you said, just to hyper focus on just asking a question (which you already answered) just isn't my idea of a good time. Also, why hold knowledge hostage by saying "DM me and I'll hook you up with an answer bro, I swear!" I don't need to walk into any dark alleyways to find my knowledge, thank you very much - I'd much rather stay in the daylight where everyone can criticize an obviously (even/especially not to me) incorrect statement.
Yeah, I think Meanwhile on Grad is a bit much, but other communities don't want to repeat information so keep pointing people to post new instances of admin abuse there rather than repeat the same tired old stories over and over again everywhere else across the Threadiverse. Examples include !yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com, which helpfully keeps communities accountable from mods who run amok, and !fediverselore@lemmy.ca that closed down after Trump won the USA election. But on the other hand, even though everyone on the Threadiverse already knows about the abuses and deceptive practices of the infamous Lemmy.ml devs, hence we don't want to keep hearing about them, nonetheless new people still occasionally come along who need a reference, so Meanwhile on Grad is helpful for that reason.
If you have evidence of people using alts to manipulate votes, please post it in yepowertrippinbastards@lemmy.dbzer0.com. Using alts is common though - and prior to PieFed software there were extremely good reasons to do so, given the limitations of Lemmy - so long as you are careful to not ever vote on the same content multiple times.
This is 100% it exactly: you can do whatever you please, be maga okay sure, be pro-genocide even, whatever so long as you don't push me to do it too - but don't shit in my drink and call it chocolate. Transparency is key. I don't mind lemmy.ml tankies doing their thing on the internet, so long as they clearly label what it is then that's fine. It's the lack of transparency that makes it disinformation.
Again, I've been on Lemmy for two years. I know the deep magic. (Still thank you, Those are good recommendations.)
This account is new to try out piefed, but I list all my alts in my profile. My main is Wren@Lemmy.today - where I'm into the YPTB com. I'm not big on posting about that kind of alt/vote manipulation drama because it's just so... stupid? Inconsequential? On the other hand maga and pro-genocide folks need to be shut down, hard.
I kinda love cowbee. I've interacted but haven't felt inclined to argue with him. As a compulsive fact-checker who literally reads the news as part of my job, I can't get behind some of his sources, but he does post quite a lot of fair and grounded citations to back up his views. I even like how he's a little shit sometimes, because he's absolutely polite enough to back off if someone just walks away. I mean, is it really sea-lioning if someone else really wants to have the last word?
Weirdly, I tracked all my unproductive interractions and found a fairly even spread. Granted, I post to a women's only community and assholes exist across the political spectrum. So no, I haven't had problems with the comrades, except geneva_convenience, I hope their socks get wet at fhe beginning of the day.
It's interesting to see what opinions people take for granted. So many comments here just assumed I didn't know what those instances were like, because I would for sure never wonder why they were on my block list if I knew, right?
Then again maybe I don't know as much as I think. I've changed my mind on a lot of things over the years, I just try to be open.