We, the admin team, decry all forms of settler-colonialism, and we recognize that Zionism is a pro-settler-colonialist position.
Therefore we propose that should no longer be accepting of any Zionist accounts on our instances.
Please upvote for agree, downvote for disagree.
Note: we only count votes by instance members of dbzer0 and anarchist.nexus, plus a few vouched-for external users.
Hi mateys, I've kept things simple in the above text, for brevity, but in fact it took the admin team quite a while to get to this stage. We have discussed the policy change extensively, and a variety of different perspectives emerged. I will attempt to sum them up below as best I can:
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The "this isn't that complicated" school of thought goes something like this: If someone is consistently posting comments that mirror Hasbara talking points (e.g. justifying the genocide in Gaza, consistently painting Palestinians as terrorists and Israel as the victim), then they should be instance banned. It's just not acceptable for Zionists to be allowed on our instances.
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The "slippery slope" / "purity test" school of thought is that banning people for having an "unpopular" political opinion would potentially mean banning half the fediverse, if more and more of these policies were enacted over time. To attempt to mitigate this we are keeping the scope of this rule as narrow as possible, and I also don't think many of our users will be affected. Also, we typically don't have frequent policy changes, and I have no reason to expect that to change moving forward.
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Another important discussion point was "how do we decide whether someone is pro-Zionist or not?" We can't always be 100% sure of someone's true intentions, we can only go on what they have posted and that is subject to interpretation. I don't feel there is an easy answer to this one, except to say that we would have to be pretty certain before issuing a perma-ban.
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The "geopolitics don't matter" school of thought is that trying to be on the "correct" side of every issue is kind of pointless because nothing that happens in lemmy chat forums will ever make an ounce of difference in the real world. Don't bother moderating users over political/ideological differences, just let people argue if they want. While I can totally empathize with this sentiment, I can also see the case for taking a clear stance on this topic in accordance with our values and the overwhelming support for the Palestinian cause among our users. Personally, I am advocating in favor of the resolution.
Please add your comments below if you want to provide your own thoughts on the topic, or have any questions.
expiry: 7
This does not seem like a reasonable stance to me. There is no peaceful Israel, and zionism is about greed not need. Zionists dont want peace, and zionism is a choice, not an ethnicity. Zionists dont see Palestinians or any other non-jewish person as worthy of basic human rights, as evidenced by their refusal to sign the UN declaration of universal human rights, and their multi-tiered justice system, and their adoption of Israeli basic laws that spell out Jewish supremacy and non-jewish lack of citizenship in lands they control. Their racist supremacy not just an idea, its enshrined in their law, and practiced in their state sponsored, and wildly publicly supported actions.
To support Israel as you do is to support that legally enshrined apartheid, and also who they are now (genociders) and what we all know they will continue to do. They will not change because they fundamentally disagree with the idea of ever changing. Jewish people have another homeland they could have chosen if they really need to rule themselves (a tenuous idea and not a need backed up by facts) called the jewish Autonomous Oblast. Or they are also perfectly safe in the US, or countless countries across the world. There was never a need for a homeland to be in the middle east which was already populated-- just a desire. There was no need for the nakba, which was ethnic cleansing, murder, and terrorism-- nor has zionism admitted that was wrong, or that they will ever make ammends. Balfour stipulated that Jewish settlers would respect the local population and live sperately form them, and zionists unilaterally destroyed that idea with the nakba. There is no redeeming zionism and it is an ongoing crime spree with massive numbers of real victims.
And why should Israel be "entitled" to "demand" a say (your words) in the governance of the Palestinian people they have so brutalized? Palestinians are not your people to make demands of. They are not your subjects or citizens. Your demand is backed by murderous force and war crimes, exercised daily. You display the same desire for brutal reinforcement of your own views that the rest of the zionists do. You should be on your knees begging for forgiveness and reconciliation, not making "demands" that you feel "entitled" to, after innocent Palestinians have suffered a genocide and terrorism at zionist hands. -- terrorism which you still openly support, despite your professing to the contrary in your statement.
I think your support for zionisms colonizalism and murder -- and your demand to dictate the future of Palestinian governance should disqualify you from remaining on Lemmy, and I find your stance to be appalling and grossly immoral. You cant seperate zionism from terrorism and colonizalism, no matter how well spoken you are. And your demand to dictate the governance of palestine is concrete proof of your not belonging here.
Dezionise Israel like Germany was denazified. Then we won't need to equate Israel with Zionism by default, and their existence can be justified
This is exactly what insane right-wing fundamentalists in Israel are saying about Palestine.
under 80 years of massive violence and apartheid done by Israelis, you seek to draw equivalence between the two groups?
Fascists projecting their evil onto their victims and trying to muddy the waters via darvo is nothing new.
There's no difference between wishing Palestine is eliminated and wishing Israel is eliminated. It's the exact same genocidal insanity. Just as there are peaceful Palestinians, there are peaceful Israelis.
Just shoot Netanyahu and his cohort, shoot Hamas, job done, peace and prosperity achieved.
Zionist freak
Me: "Just shoot Netanyahu and his cohort"
You: "Zionist freak"
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