It may not be that long compared to some of yours out here. It stings because that account was my main account, so many memories in it and I even met my wife through it. Unfortunately, I have recently experienced what I can only describe as sabotage on my account.
I don’t know much about how Reddit and moderation works behind the scenes but recently everything I post in different subs keeps getting auto-removed without any explanation whatsoever. If I message the mods of those subs, then there are only three responses: 1) no response whatsoever, 2) sarcasm and unkindness without actually assisting me, and worse 3) a permanent ban without further elaboration.
Googling “how to report abusive Reddit mods” comes up with a bunch of threads all saying the same thing: there is no way to report them. Additionally, I have encountered individuals who dismiss or deny the existence of moderator abuse within the platform. I’ve decided it’s just not worth my mental stress to put up with this circus and just start anew and keep a low profile. I’m also trying out here in Lemmy, maybe this is better.
Please be better.
Just a heads up, Lemmy is not immune to the same problem. If there are rogue moderators, just like Reddit the only option you have is to message the instance admin or other moderators. If theyre all on the same team and the instance admin doesnt respond or agrees with their behaviour, then you’re in the same place you were with Reddit.
Also, Lemmy might have a chance at this being worse. AFAIK, on Reddit reports are anonymous. Moderators didnt know who reported what content. But on Lemmy, reports are NOT anonymous. While some argue this is helpful for identifying trolls/superfluous reporters, for the same reason it can also easily be weaponized by rogue moderators. The only thing Lemmy really has going for it is that its relatively small right now. But as its userbase grows, it will likely fall victim to the same user issues that Reddit has.
But mod actions are also available in the modlog, aren’t they?
I haven’t been here that long, but I’ve seen people question moderator activity a few times in ways that are not options on reddit at all.
Yeah, they are. But modlogs don’t mean anything if the other mods and instance admin agree with what the mod is doing. Or if they even know, or have enough time to logon and deal with it.
We’re talking about rogue moderators, though. Instances have their own separate moderation rules and that’s the intent behind how things are organized in the fediverse.
What OP experienced on reddit can’t happen here due to modlogs, and rogue moderation usually is called out here publicly.
Consistent issues with an instance also have the defederation option.
There are for sure problems with this all, but I wouldn’t say that rogue moderation is as easy here as it was on reddit.
Except you can get banned for something not in the rules. Some subs saying stuff like “no rules” and then keep banning people for memes. “No rules except don’t be a dick” and lots of regular people get bans anyway. There was even drama between startrek subs because that was happening. I managed to get a permaban on a community with an explanation saying “ACAB”. A public modlog doesn’t mean shit. A user can’t do much against powertripping mods. It absolutely is as easy as it was on reddit, even moreso because there is more of the same community on different instances.
Except on reddit you don’t even know you’re banned half the time, and have no way to find out.
All of what you’re describing happens on reddit and you wouldn’t even know for sure if your ACAB comment was the thing that got you banned.
I’m not saying that it’s fixed here. But it is improved more or less compared to reddit.
… What’s your point. OP said “lemmy isn’t immune to this problem”. I don’t care about whataboutism, we are talking lemmy now.
I didn’t get banned for saying “ACAB”. I got banned with the reason saying “ACAB”.
First, sorry I misunderstood your ACAB statement. It’s an unhelpful modlog comment to get, especially in a ban comment. Your experience sounds similar to OP’s and my response was rude to not acknowledge that.
I’ve been more responding to the upstream comment that “lemmy has a chance to be worse on this.”
What drove OP away from reddit wasn’t just that moderators abused their power. It was that abuse plus the complete lack of feedback and/or rude feedback.
I didn’t pick my phrasing carefully before as I meant to argue that lemmy only has the chance to be the same or better due to the modlog. Specifically it offers an option of transparency in moderation that reddit doesn’t.
Lemmy still has people who abuse power as mods. And it clearly has rude feedback as an option as you experienced. But for when it’s used appropriately that is better than what reddit can offer.
The original comment also claimed that reporting to the instance admin is your only recourse. But creating an account on another instance is a more drastic option that OP can take on lemmy and it’s not available on reddit.
And instance admins can use the federation system to block instances that aren’t compatible with their values or for other reasons.
My ultimate reasoning for arguing any of this is two parts.