this post was submitted on 01 Apr 2025
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MeanwhileOnGrad

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"Oh, this is calamity! Calamity! Oh no, he's on the floor!"

Welcome to MoG!


Meanwhile On Grad


Documenting hate speech, conspiracy theories, apologia/revisionism, and general tankie behaviour across the fediverse. Memes are welcome!


What is a Tankie?


Alternatively, a detailed blog post about Tankies.

(caution of biased source)


Basic Rules:

Sh.itjust.works Instance rules apply! If you are from other instances, please be mindful of the rules. β€” Basically, don't be a dick.

Hate-Speech β€” You should be familiar with this one already; practically all instances have the same rules on hate speech.

Apologia β€” (Using the Modern terminology for Apologia) No Defending, Denying, Justifying, Bolstering, or Differentiating authoritarian acts or endeavours, whether be a Pro-CCP viewpoint, Stalinism, Islamic Terrorism or any variation of Tankie Ideology.

Revisionism β€” No downplaying or denying atrocities past and present. Calling Tankies shills, foreign/federal agents, or bots also falls under this rule. Extremists exist. They are real. Do not call them shills or fake users as it handwaves their extremism.

Tankies can explain their views but may be criticised or attacked for them. Any slight infraction on the rules above will immediately earn a warning and possibly a ban.

Off-topic Discussion β€” Do not discuss unrelated topics to the point of derailing the thread. Stay focused on the direct content of the post as opposed to arguing.

You'll be warned if you're violating the instance and community rules. Continuing poor behaviour after being warned will result in a ban or removal of your comments. Bans typically only last 24 hours, but each subsequent infraction will double the amount. Depending on the content, the ban time may be increased. You may request an unban at any time.


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[–] [email protected] 51 points 1 week ago (5 children)

It's already turned into a shitshow, they've been brigading enmasse, downvoting and trolling just like they used to. Guess some things never change, eh?

[–] [email protected] 23 points 1 week ago

Boy, I sure do remember when the beehaw admins were fussing with the Lemmy developers (which for the record I actually kind of take the Lemmy devs’ side of), and the Lemmy devs held up Hexbear as an instance that has been with us since the beginning, the ones who were really worthy of honors of being true believers as far as what Lemmy should stand for. Unlike beehaw and their moderation philosophy. That was a super normal and defensible thing for them to say.

[–] [email protected] 19 points 1 week ago (1 children)

at least the hexies do it with their hex accounts unlike the ml lot that smurf as other instances

[–] [email protected] 10 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Don't worry, they'll get banned on their Hexbear accounts and switch back to their .ml and lemm.ee sockpuppets to continue their shitty behaviour soon enough.

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Please pray for those of us who mod political communities that Hexbear federates with πŸ™

[–] [email protected] 39 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (3 children)

Get them to ban your account. Then their users will not be able to see your posts or comments, to reply to. Ironically, the best gift they gave me.

EDIT: Goddamnit! They unbanned me just now.

[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 week ago (4 children)

Fair warning: You need to actually be dangerous to their thought bubble to eat a ban. Just insulting them won't suffice, they'll leave that up to make criticism of their position look irate and irrational, what you need to do is to go to asklemmygrad or such and get both up- and downvotes. Make them question.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

They were really chomping at the bit to ban me for months, because I constantly criticize "left unity" and deny that anarchists can collab with MLs with any systematic significance. (You should see how mald they got at some of my memes. Talking about 1000+ comment pile on!)

As a result, they kept posting "dunks" about our instance in their subs full of bad faith and hypocrisy, which I felt compelled to defend against, but I stuck to the subject at hand, so they had no excuse to ban me. Eventually they just banned me from one of their dunk comms for "liberalism" and deleted all my defenses of our instance that I had been writing for hours. That injustice triggered my ASD and I called that mod a "hypocritical PoS" in one DM, so they finally had an excuse πŸ˜….

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[–] [email protected] 17 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's actually an awesome idea. Not having to deal with another childish ML screaming "anarkiddie" when you point out that China isn't communist. Or the breathless "but-but-but someday they will be!!!!! 1!" Because as we all know, those with power love to give it up.

[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 week ago (1 children)

You misunderstand them. For many such campists. China is already perfectly fine.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 week ago

Oh no I understand it. And campism is 100% the right word for it. 100% childish and lacking in critical thought. Being a pragmatist I tend to rub ideologues the wrong way regardless. But at least some of them you can understand and respect. Campists should not get any.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I do have to ask, if the admins here are banned from Hexbear, why are we (dbzer0) federated with them?

Not an attempt at a gotcha, I'm just curious why we are.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 week ago (7 children)

Because I'm not trying to be a BDFL. If people want to defed from hexbear, they can ask for a defed vote.

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[–] [email protected] 25 points 1 week ago (2 children)

I instance banned that person for 2 weeks (13 days expiration). Told blaze to kill himself because... he criticizied ML moderation. Oh the horror.

What a fucking ghoul. The hexbear admins do bumfuck-nothing about their users, so we have to deal with their trash. Yes yes i know there are some good users there, but in general it's just not worth it. They have horrible moderation.

I'd love to defederate but a lot of users would like to stay (ie they're bad but have some good content) so i made this issue to remedy the problem: https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/5578 (not just for hexbear, ml or etc; also some other instances but that's besides the point)

(PS: @[email protected] i hope you don't mind me using your screenshot, i can delete if you want)

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Honestly I was kinda sad to see hexbear posts again popping up on my feed, even though I enjoyed witnessing their 🀑 shit before. Just decided that my feed is happier without them and blocked the instance in Voyager app

[–] [email protected] 20 points 1 week ago (2 children)

The problem is, blocking instances still allow their comments to be seen

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's why i made the github issue c; nutomic seems interested, hopefully it will come with lemmy 1.0. It'll be a win-win for all of us.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 12 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (4 children)

Even worse, the instance block still allows them to see your comments and posts (really in it's current implementation it's more of a "mute") and interact with them.

So if you're on a world news article and rightfully comment about Russia being an invader of a sovereign nation or something, it's at risk of being down vote brigaded by Tankie Triad users and they can leave shit talking comments under it that you'll never see so can't defend yourself from

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

If only instance blocking was properly built into lemmy itself. I wonder if summit has that feature.

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[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That one person disagreeing with you has some interesting takes. They don't seem to grasp the concept of users of an instance disagreeing with each other, only of instances disagreeing with other instances like rival hiveminds.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago

No shade to them, but i think we're seeing this from different viewpoints; i see this from a personal preference standpoint, and they see this from some moderation stance, which was not the point at all. This isn't meant to replace defederations.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago (1 children)

I don't know this to be the case, but I've long assumed that the average age on Hexbear is about 15, and have yet to find any reason to assume otherwise.

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[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 week ago

Now these are the friendly interactions I almost started to miss.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Makes me wish I bid on that domain auction...$2000 for some peace and quiet sounds like a nice deal.

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[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 week ago (1 children)

But couldn't they just be defederated? Isn't that how it works?

[–] [email protected] 16 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Yea, and hex and grad of the Tankie Triad are generally pretty widely defederated from. db0 is one notable instance that doesn't and this screenshot is from .ml's side of the modlog who, should go without saying, is perfectly fine federating with the rest of the triad

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 week ago (11 children)

Trust me, we all hate them too. Not even for political positions anymore (eh, i've heard worse).

Personally i'd love to defederate, but i know a vocal minority on our instance like them, so we'll have to cope for now.

Someone's eventually going to initiate a vote on /0 governance to defederate (i know what i'm voting lol) but i also made this github issue if you're interested https://github.com/LemmyNet/lemmy/issues/5578

[–] [email protected] 14 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (5 children)

Someone's eventually going to initiate a vote on /0 governance to defederate (i know what i'm voting lol)

Must. Resist. Urge. To. Make. db0 account.

The block function should definitely be fixed, but when an instances admins are toxic and/or pushing propaganda/political agenda really, wide defederation is the only answer.

My concern is not of the people already here who a) already know of the Tankie Triad and b) makes an informed decision to block/not block based on that, but what kind of damage instances like hex and .ml can do to the wider Lemmy-verse rep on the outside. I don't want this budding place to become tainted with the stigma of being "That Tankie Place" or "Voat 2.0".

I've already come across a few comments out in the wild that Lemmy has a bunch of tankies, and it's depressing

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 week ago

Well i won't stop you ;) You'll probably get harassed to hell for it though. They're very toxic, and if i called the shots i would defederate; but the instance is democratic, and i'm not in the mood to deal with pandora's box πŸ˜„ I already have enough going on, i don't need my inbox blown up with insults along with it :)

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

Must. Resist. Urge. To. Make. db0 account.

Do it. The only reason I'm posting from my shit account right now (I still like this place, don't worry) is because db0 is blocked at work for "PiRaCy" πŸ™„πŸ™„πŸ™„

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago (2 children)

The only reason I’m posting from my shit account right now (I still like this place, don’t worry) is because db0 is blocked at work for β€œPiRaCy” πŸ™„πŸ™„πŸ™„

Nevermind, I guess IT decided to unblock it.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 week ago

I'm surprised we got even noticed enough to be blocked in the first place.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

i use ssh dynamic proxy back to my home "server" (a mid 2010's macbook running debian), and all IT sees is encrypted traffic to a bizarre domain.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Ah haha, the IT/IS department at the last company I worked for saw right through that and nailed me to the wall for "unauthorized VPN usage" πŸ˜‚πŸ˜‚

(a mid 2010's macbook running debian)

Brave soul. My wife has a 2017 A1706 MBP.... We also have a 2009-ish MBP loaded with Linux Mint that the kids use for schoolwork.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

it's a pretty low-stakes business. i'm sure they don't care even if they see the traffic. the IT is outsourced, so i'm sure it's just a CYA contract.

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[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

This person will stop after their 2 week ban expires.

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