Blåhaj Lemmy is a Lemmy instance attached to blahaj.zone. This is a group for questions or discussions relevant to either instance.
For the people like me that don't know the term: CSAM is Child Sexual Abuse Materials. It's the term used instead of CP as "pornography" is more commonly used for pleasure or conveys the idea of consent.
As for the porn that uses people that look under age, it's no different than the anime children that are thousands of years old. It doesn't matter how old they are, they look like children and it's gross.
For anyone wondering, this is lemmynsfw's take on the situation.
On a personal level, the vibes are off. Their defense seems really defensive and immediately moves to reframe the situation as body shaming. There's a difference between an adult who looks underage posting porn of themselves and a community dedicated to porn of adults who look underage. Reducing the latter down to body shaming seems like unfair framing to me.
the same community (adorableporn) is also on reddit btw with 2.2m subscribers.
i have no grand moral opinion on this type of content. for me it is the same as femboy content for example, where people also push for a youthful, girly aesthetic.
as long as the content is made by consenting verified adults, i don't care.
it's like adults cosplaying with japanese school uniforms or calling your partner "mommy" or "daddy".
probably not the best move in terms of sexual morals for sure, in the grand scheme of things tho this is just how people express their sexuality i guess.
I think both instance admins have a valid stance on the matter. lemmynsfw appears to take reports very seriously and if necessary does age verification of questionable posts, something that likely takes a lot of time and effort. Blahaj Lemmy doesn't like the idea of a community that's dedicated to "adults that look or dress child-like". While I understand the immediate (and perhaps somewhat reactionary) concern that might raise, is this concern based in fact, or in emotion?
Personally I'm in the camp of "let consenting adults do adult things", whether that involves fetishes that are typically thought of as gross, dressing up in clothes or doing activities typically associated with younger ages, or simply having a body that appears underage to the average viewer. As the lemmynsfw admin mentioned, such persons have the right to lust and be lusted after, too. That's why, as a society, we decided to draw the line at 18 years old, right?
I believe the concern is not that such content is not supposed to exist or be shared, but rather that it's collected within a community. And I think the assumption here is that it makes it easy for "certain people" to find this content. But if it is in fact legal, and well moderated, then is there a problem? I don't believe there is evidence that seeing such content could change your sexual preferences. On the other hand, saying such communities should not exist could send the wrong message, along the lines of "this is weird and should not exist", which might be what was meant with "body shaming".
I'm trying to make sense of the situation here and possibly try to deescalate things, as I do believe lemmynsfw approach to moderation otherwise appears to be very much compatible with Blahaj Lemmy. Is there a potential future where this decision is reconsidered? Would there be some sort of middle-ground that admins from both instances could meet and come to an understanding?
is this concern based in fact, or emotion?
Ada was clear in another comment thread that yes, emotion was absolutely involved in her decision. That isn’t a bad thing. Why is there a social attitude that decision-making is only valid if it’s cold and unfeeling?
Personally I’m in the camp of “let consenting adults do adult things”
Me too. I don’t think anyone is arguing against that. Anyone can still access LemmyNSFW’s content elsewhere, Blahaj Zone simply isn’t going to relay it anymore because some of it is incompatible with Ada’s goals in nurturing this community.
But if it is in fact legal, and well moderated, then is there a problem?
Yes. Legality has nothing to do with acceptability. This instance already bans lots of content that doesn’t actually violate any laws. It’s a judgment call.
Why is there a social attitude that decision-making is only valid if it’s cold and unfeeling?
Probably because everyone agrees that we don't make the best decisions when emotional? In fact we tend to make our worst decisions when emotional? There's a pretty significant difference between society judging people for being emotional, and society disapproving of emotional decisions. Because people making significant choices when they aren't thinking clearly is pretty obviously a bad idea.
Yes. Legality has nothing to do with acceptability. This instance already bans lots of content that doesn’t actually violate any laws. It’s a judgment call.
And yet teen porn is one of the most popular categories around. This sounds like a subcategory confined to a single community, and precisely what the block function is for. There's a pretty big difference between Exploding Heads and a single disliked community.
Edit: After finally seeing a link to the lemmynsfw discussion, it's not a kink community or anything fringe. It's literally a community around cute pornstars.
Yeah, see, it’s that conflation of “emotional” and “not thinking clearly” that bothers me. Those aren’t the same thing, despite the dominant cultural narrative to the contrary. Sometimes they go together, sometimes they don’t.
Are they not..? I mean, thinking clearly and intense emotions genuinely don't go together. Crimes of passion, riots after sports games, getting "carried away" in the heat of the moment. Temporary insanity being an actual legal defense.
There's a reason that a lot of good advice when handling intense emotions is all about taking a minute to step back and breath, clarify what you're feeling, accept it, and then express it safely. There's nothing wrong with being emotional, but arguing that there's nothing wrong with making decisions while emotionally charged is just a really not good idea. The fact that the acronym for managing intense emotions is STOPP should be a bit telling.
Sometimes they go together, sometimes they don’t.
Just a personal anecdote. I have intense emotions when dealing with transphobia but I think I'm able to think clearly. I think there absolutely are times where intense emotions can cloud thoughts but I beleive the converse isn't true.
"Intense emotions can interfere with clear thinking" does not imply that "clear thinking is impossible when there are intense emotions"
It's rough that you have to deal with that, and I applaud the restraint and poise that goes hand in hand with operating while under intense emotional strain. That said, emotional biases are problems precisely because their influence can range from the subtle to the obvious, and they're a lot harder to see from the inside. It's one of the reasons why STOPP has self analysis when experiencing powerful emotions. Most people don't need it, but it's always good to take a breath and evaluate every now and then.
For one, I think I speak for everyone when seeing a huge guy flip out and start screaming in public is alarming because you no longer trust that they will make decisions based on the normal rules of public interaction. I'm not saying that we shouldn't listen to our emotions, they exist for a number of very important reasons, and paying attention to them is linked to better decisions. That said, making decisions while emotional is tempting because it often narrows attention and jumps to actions with immediate effects, which often feels like clarity when it's really just expedience.
To sum everything up, intense emotions push for quick, immediate actions to deal with whatever is causing said emotions (a simplification, but it works). This is really great when startled by predators or protecting someone, but not when presented with complex situations lacking easy solutions. So I wouldn't say that clear thinking is literally impossible when experiencing intense emotions, but I'd say there's a very strong reason that emergency drills and procedures are set up so that people in high stress situations don't actually need to think. I spent a bit of time reading up on it to provide a more complete argument than just appealing general wisdom, so apologies for the pile of words.
The reason I brought up emotion in my reply was because I've felt that the lemmynsfw admins have been able to explain their decision quite reasonably and seemed to be open to conversation, wheras Ada was set on one goal and upon finding disagreement, wasn't in the right mindset to continue a constructive conversation. Which, to be fair, due to the nature of the content, is understandable.
If the content that the Blahaj Lemmy admins are concerned about are limited to certain communities, and part of the issue is the concentration of content in said communities in the first place (at least, as I speculated in my original reply), then I don't quite understand why blocking these communities only isn't something that was considered, rather than defederating the entire instance. I do respect Blahaj Lemmy's decision not to want to host such content. Or is there some technical limitation that I'm not aware of?
I don’t quite understand why blocking these communities only isn’t something that was considered, rather than defederating the entire instance
Because I am not ok federating with a space that is ok with content that looks like CSAM. "It's technically legal" isn't sufficient in this case.
But whether it's technically legal is exactly what does or doesn't make it CSAM. "Looking like" is going to be highly subjective, and I don't understand how the admins of the other instance are supposed to handle reports, other than to verify whether or not it actually is the case or not.
Are petite looking people not supposed to make explicit content while dressing up cute? Should a trans man not share explicit pictures of himself, because he might look like an underage boy? Do we stop at porn that gives the appearance of someone being young? What about incest or ageplay? Like, what if you or someone else was made sufficiently uncomfortable by some other kind of porn? How do you decide what is and isn't okay? How do you avoid bias? What would you be telling a model when they ask why you removed their content?
Apologies for going on with this when I'm sure you're already sick of dealing with this. I had just felt like some of the points I brought up (like in my original reply) were entirely overlooked. Putting effort into an (attempted) thought-out reply doesn't mean I get to receive a response I was hoping for, but I was at least hoping for something you hadn't already said elsewhere.
but I was at least hoping for something you hadn’t already said elsewhere.
There is no more to this. I don't have a list of endless reasons.
The reason is that it looks like CSAM and appeals to folk looking for CSAM. I'm a CSA survivor myself. A space that appeals to folk looking for CSAM isn't a community that I'm willing to share space with.
I guess the core of the disagreement is that one side values safety higher while the other does expression? It could be argued that moderation can take care of anyone stepping over the line. People can be unwelcome creeps regardless of what they're into, who would be attracted to other dedicated communities. I imagine someone could have the same concerns you do for similar reasons, when it comes to consensual non-consent roleplay. Interestingly enough, this actually is temporarily restricted on lemmynsfw, which could be because an appropriate moderation policy has not yet been agreed upon.
I guess Trans Littles can just go fuck off then? One of the biggest Trans comics artist is openly a little. Why are we in the business of regulating what consenting adults do?
No one is looking at a little and thinking that they're physically 15.
I wrote a comment but got more aggressive than I intended. My overall point though is there are young looking adults, there are old looking kids. Making a sweeping statement like you did is just wrong
Young looking adults also aren't the issue.
The issue is a community that focuses heavily on models that are framed to look like they're not adults.
Not adults roleplaying. Not adults that incidentally happen to look younger than they are.
But they are adults, no?
Again, the issue is a community with models that are framed to look like they're not adults.
There is no scenario where something that can be mistaken for CSAM will have a space here.
And again, these are adults on an instance that was explicitly designated for NSFW works. Defederating was entirely within your right but these justifications seem really poorly thought out, and could have unintended consequences.
Should we shun non consensual play? Should we defederate from anything that shows BDSM? Because I can't see any reason why your justifications wouldn't apply to them