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.
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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.
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You know what sucks is that for people complaining about scams or people soliciting for donations for food and then using it for drugs - like, hexbear anonymous donations aren't as substitute for an org in that city or a food bank. We could at best cover a chunk of or entirerty of someone's rent once or, ironically, pay for someone's drugs a few times (why not, I like my own drugs like coffee and cigarettes and shit so why shouldn't someone struggling with cash get them) or maybe help with groceries a couple times. But we could never replace a food bank or a shelter or training programs or whatever, because we're an anonymous forum of mostly hard up for cash leftists.
There's also not a lot of mutual aid in the mutual aid comm - the amount of mutuality depending on someone needing short term financial help and then getting their feet unser later. Theres aid in the mutual aid comm, the amount which notwithstanding, but how can someone asking for food every day actually do the mutual part of mutual aid on an online anonymous forum? There's stuff they could actually do in person where they live but how would we direct that or have anything to do with that? Some of the stories people have also suggest they actually should stop trying to help the people around them and focus on their own survival - like maybe you can't have a roommate living with you in your car cause it's another mouth to feed. Or maybe you need to check in to an inpatient medical program if youre actually risking DKA and hypoglycemic events as often as the posts go up. There was one person who I recall in a, self disclosed, manic episode gave away a lot of their money to an ex or whatever and now couldn't afford rent. Like, whatever the circumstances, you're not in a position to be trying to help other people with money yet and so there's not really a mutual element.
An actual mutual aid network isn't just charity, like we'd ideally be organizing so that some frequent posters would be hooked into real programs that meet their actual needs - except we're anonymous too lol. Like it's a mess.
An actual mutual aid network isn't just charity, like we'd ideally be organizing so that some frequent posters would be hooked into real programs that meet their actual needs - except we're anonymous too lol. Like it's a mess.
If this was how the comm worked, I know about hella resources for people experiencing homelessness in Portland, but I've been hesitant to reach out in these posts because it might be "meta" to offer something other than money.
I've still done so and I'm down to help anyone navigate these systems, but idk if anyone has followed up on any of it.
Same, I have worked in case management for years and am decent at finding resources and navigating them for people but that isn't what's being asked for and I get nervous about coming off rude or something if I throw suggestions out there.
Same. I also do social work and could probably assist in some way and depending on the country/system that can be very concrete stuff, but it isn't money. I do donate here and there as well, but there are posts where I have felt like some advice could also help.
I do this advice thing for good food banks, right to benefits etc. in my local setting elsewhere and I think it would be pretty hard to implement on an anonymous forum like this with people from all over the world. But we could try.
Maybe we should implement an exception to the rule against meta posting for people who make multiple requests, indicating more of a chronic need than an acute one?
This is something that concerns me and could come across as judgemental...
There's a line between helping and enabling or exacerbating a problem. I'm not here to argue over what aid takes precedence but there's a clear difference between someone who is hungry and someone who is experiencing a medical emergency and the aid part doesn't necessarily always have to be money. Money isn't always the best form of help for every problem and the unofficial vibe in the comm is that it is and it doesn't matter what the people use it for if it helps even for a second. I'm not advocating for judging people's situations but we should be aiming to help in the most effective way possible with our limited resources.
It doesn't really feel like the mutual aid is very mutual. And alot of the people posting consistently on mutual aid don't really seem to post or interact outside of the comm. I don't really know too much about the situation but that's just my two cents. Not sure if the comm is accomplishing what it set out to do.
Donations are anonymous, so you don't know who is giving aid. I have helped people who have helped me before and vice versa, can't really say who without making that help non-anonymous but we definitely help each other on that comm. Not everybody uses the comm right, but many of us give when we can and ask when we need.
Edit: I'll add there's a chance I lose my insurance this year because of a specific mutual aid action I took last year. There's someone on here that's donated a substantial amount to me over the years and we play video games and chat for hours sometimes (if they're reading this, want you to know I just don't have access to my Matrix right now, not ignoring you, I really miss our chats). I've made some really good relationships with people over that comm.
As a trans refugee living in a camp, I rely on communities like this to survive emotionally and materially. When I post for help, I’m not just fighting poverty, I’m fighting invisibility.
Removing meta posts that question or critique mutual aid requests is vital. Every time someone casts doubt or makes "meta" judgments, it makes people like me feel small, like we have to prove our pain or our worth.
This space should be about solidarity, not suspicion. Please protect it, so people like me can ask for help with dignity without shame or fear.
To be clear, I never intended to scam anyone or anything like that. When I asked for money for a new battery for my car, or whatever, I wasn’t lying. I never intentionally misrepresented my needs. I’m just fucking stupid. I would ask for money for some particular thing, and then instead of holding onto it and being responsible, oops!, I’d go buy something stupid, and no, I don’t mean drugs (I need to clarify something about this, down-comment 👇).
I did not spend all or even most of that $4,000 on drugs.
I am a drug addict. So I do sometimes spend some of the money I’m sent on drugs. Some, but never all. I am not the stereotype you probably have in your head: drugs are not the most important thing to me. When I asked for money for a particular thing, that particular thing is what comes first. When I ask for money for gas for my car I NEED GAS FOR MY CAR.
If you don’t believe me, whatever. You believe what you want to believe.
We're already probably the lightest touch active mutual aid community on the internet. It's cool and I like it, but I suspect banning any meta discussion is only going to make donating (already a huge leap of faith sometimes) even less of a trustworthy shot.
I 100% love and appreciate the desire of this site and my comrades to make a judgment free mutual aid zone, people out there are very genuinely in need and shouldn't have to sing, dance and bare themselves to get some help. However, I do think we have to recognise some basic level of practical limits of our opsec requirements and our shitty society. Banning all meta discussion, the tiniest caveat we have to establish some very basic trust, will not help people actually feel able to provide aid to people who need it.
All being said, I think there's a fine line between metaposting and dramaposting. I see no reason the latter should be allowed. Also some relevant world-famous poetry I'm reminded of:
You often say, “I would give, but only to the deserving.”
The trees in your orchard say not so, nor the flocks in your pasture.
They give that they may live, for to withhold is to perish.
..
And what desert greater shall there be, than that which lies in the courage and the confidence, nay the charity, of receiving?
And who are you that men should rend their bosom and unveil their pride, that you may see their worth naked and their pride unabashed?
It's always the nature of giving money that the funds could be misused, especially when anonymous. I can't think of way to improve that risk without putting in some sort of hoops to jump through or a verification process, but that is burdonesome for people that need help and people don't want to risk doxxing. The verification that money was given and received through reports sounds like an improvement possibly. It would be good if it could be more for proper mutual aid, like sharing goods directly or organizing food give-outs but people would have to trust each other more or risk doxxing again. A name change could be suitable.
If someone has verifiable information that a poster is scamming or whatever, they can take that to the mods directly, but I agree with the idea that meta posts cause more drama. As well the maximum request amount seems like a hinderance as some emergencies can be quite expensive, and it's not like a high request forces people to give more, people with the means can donate what they decide.
Here's a dumb but honest question: what even is mutual aid, and how is it different from charity? Cause rn it looks like we are running a very disorganized charity for both regular community contributors, as well as people who use this site almost exclusively for the comm. Is the difference that the money goes straight to the recipient without any accountability or organization or records? Just wondering how this system is supposed to work.
I've wondered this as well, often out loud in posts/comments. The urge to call our charity mutual aid just to make it "leftist" is a bad one, IMO. But there are some minor differences at least in theory. The idea is that it's a "pay it forward" kind of thing where we help eachother out when needed and then those people help others when they are able. But because of the realities of capitalist life I don't see that happening all that often. The people with the stability to send money regularly to randos from the internet tend to stay the same and the people with serious needs tend to stay the same. I think the only real difference in practice is that much of our donations goes to known community members, not random strangers. Does that make it mutual aid? idk, not really probably, but I appreciate it whatever we call it.
I think about this in on the ground work as well. Many many orgs call their work mutual aid when its really just charity. But it feels very hard to ask anything of people who are destitute, even if involving them in the work sustaining them could be liberatory
You could argue that what this community is usually doing isn't actually mutual aid. Mutual aid in most socialist theory says that help should never be a one way street, you should help e.g. house a homeless person but the homeless person should also help the organization keep afloat by helping cut costs or operate in whatever way is within their means. Our loose housing group obviously practices mutual aid, for example, some of the homeless people help cook homemade meals for the houses they're in to help reduce food costs or they help maintain a garden.
I personally think that a homeless person having direct access to donors is better than a traditional charity. In some cases, this does not make sense (e.g. someone needs a very secure way of receiving funds due to threats to their life, many refugee organizations fall into this category and require security people on the payroll to safely help people). Charities are often middlemen that means test applicants for aid and pay out their board members with hundreds of thousands of dollars of cash, in many cases its a racket that uses donations to fund propaganda about how good these sorts of organizations are. Imagine if those hundreds of thousands of dollars were going to people that desperately needed it.
I think the meta posts should be removed. I've only seen people be harassing doing it and the people that need help in m_a (as I am and have been) don't appreciate being talked down to or given unsolicited advice during a bad period of their lives.
I feel like the current status quo of the comm is just demoralizing for all involved and I’m not really sure what could be done.
I can’t really speak for anyone seeking assistance, but as an outside observer it feels like people aren’t receiving as much help as they’d like or potentially could and I imagine it’s tiring having to make multiple posts a day with potentially little to show for it.
On the other end of things I think comrades looking to lend a hand can find it hard to know how best to do that. It’s hard to know sometimes who has already been helped and who is falling through the cracks. So I think it can be overwhelming for potential donators and unfortunately discourages people from doing so.
I can’t speak to the administrative or moderation side of things or what would be feasible, but I have some interest in trying to make the comm more effective for everyone involved.
Hopefully other people share their input in ways they think things could be improved.
Idk if that’s the point of this thread or it’s just about meta stuff or whatever…
I think meta posts being allowed is good. There should be a way to make suggestions and such and meta posts allow that
I think there should be a one post a day rule. I've personally needed help and never posted because the current meta is to drown each other out. It makes an already stressful thing to do feel adversarial, and I don't want to be pushing other people down.
As for if there's people scamming? Of course there are this is the internet. Not much to be done about that without also potentially harming someone in need.
Meta posting opens the door to shame and ridicule. I've already seen this happen by browsing the modlog a few times - it just got handled and i think that it's absolutely good it was handled. i think there's nothing to really say about MA that can't be discussed as issues arise, privately. For better or worse, there are people who enjoy wrecking stuff like it. Issues with specific users can be handled by mods and admins - a lot of what can be said about it would be to curtail or limit the function of MA - the additional burden would be suppressive of use.
Please don't give any room to the sorts who want to metapost about mutual aid - I'm sure some folks mean well, but it's just going to enable drama that doesn't need exist and will impede function
I definitely get the instinct here, but the status quo is that metaposting is allowed (just not direct reply comments) and I count two metaposts in the past month. The one that incited this post, and one of someone thanking the donor who came through for them, weeks ago.
I don't think that's an unmanageable level of metaposting or being done in bad faith. If they were proposing opening up more metaposting I'd agree with you but the question being posed is keep the status quo or shutting off all avenues for feedback or calling out anything, because the mods don't want to be the ones to handle concerns for ethical reasons. So that kind of nixes handling it privately.
I appreciate that reactive comments just harassing people asking for help are deleted and agree we need to clamp down on those as strongly as possible, but I don't see that problem happening with posts, historically
The forum structure of /c/mutual_aid means it functions like a charity market. All the issues we have were already addressed by sites like GoFundMe. Either force users to use sites like GoFundMe or start writing their systems into hexbear's codebase.
We can self crit all we want over it but in the end its a software issue.
I like how, no matter how many times I say that I didn’t blow all that money on drugs, that I don’t spend all the money I receive on drugs, this shit just persists and persists.
Nobody was honest with me when I posted threads asking if everything was alright, because it seemed like something was up.
I think it's fine as-is.
The WWW is plenty big. There's risks in everything. My risks when donating make paypal a nonstarter, worst case for me is probably someone unfortunately winding up in a situation that makes the cops look at me. I don't want that. Monero and a venmo account I've acquired which can be funded anonymously.
I feel like allowing meta posts is going to seed witch hunts and struggle sessions with real monetary stakes which feels gross. The post you're responding to is already fairly obviously some offline drama between a constellation of users. If the mods/admins want to take charge of "protecting the good people of mutual_aid" and allow people to report scammers, I think that's your guys prerogative, and whatever level of transparency you want to give to that is fine.
In general it's incredibly difficult to judge these kinds of things in an online anonymous board, and it would not be our place to moralize who is deserving of aid based on what will inevitably be internecine drama. Allowing for even the hint of purity testing is going to endanger the long term ability for people to access aid on the site, and create an even more unfair advantage for people who are known quantities which they could then also quite easily exploit.
In short, because we can't know, we shouldn't care and it's not our place to. Caveat emptor.