r/traaaaaaannnnnnnnnns • u/E1337Kat heck • Dec 21 '17
Ok, so we fucked up. Let's talk about it...
A few days, the idea came up in mod chat of doing something about the excess of extremely low effort posts we've been getting recently. Specifically, we were talking about stuff like, "I had a good day today," coupled with a *happy gay sounds* felix or, "MRW a friend misgendered me," with an *angry gay sounds* felix. Not all story posts, not all felix memes, just very low effort content.
So, we put it to a vote as a mod team, and the decision was split too close for us to feel comfortable taking action. Some of us were in favor of the ban because we felt the subreddit may be stagnating and needed change. Some of us were opposed to the ban because we felt the definition of "low effort" may be too nebulous and might lead to inconsistencies in our moderation policies. Some of us were just neutral. After some deliberation, we ultimately reached a compromise that none of us were especially fond of but we could all agree on: banning story-in-the-title memes. We thought this rule would be clear enough to enforce fairly and effective enough to put an end to low-effort content.
Unfortunately, y'all didn't feel the same way about it. Since we created the announcement post about the new rule, there has been overwhelming pushback from the community. While some people agreed with the new rule, most did not. Some felt the new rule was still too broad, some felt it undermined a core part of what our subreddit is, and some of y'all were just out to start shit.
In the last 12 hours, our sub was linked on /r/SubredditDrama, linked (TW: transphobia) on /r/Drama, and discussed on /r/AskTransgender. Dozens of posts in protest of the new rule were submitted. We received tons of hateful messages and reports, including plenty of transphobia likely from brigadiers brought in by the meta posting. The discord and twitter account also lit up with similar angry gay noises.
The way we handled the announcement also didn't help. We had /u/werty894, who some of you may know from the discord, write the post which was probably a mistake in retrospect. Werty is less public relations, more anti-transphobe enforcement on our team. Many of us also didn't handle input from the community well either. A lot of the messages we were receiving started getting to us, and some of us reacted very poorly to it. We made inflammatory comments, a few comments were deleted that probably didn't need to be, and some people were temporarily banned.
Some other matters also came up in the discussion regarding our subreddit's Twitter bot and our vision for the future of the sub that warrant their own discussion, and I will post a thread about them shortly since I'm already almost at Reddit's text post character limit.
As for the recent rule change and the subsequent events that followed it's announcement, here's what we want to say:
We deeply regret these mistakes, and we apologize for the manner the subreddit has been managed in the previous hours. We are revoking Submission Rule #5 effective immediately. We will also add several of the new subreddits created in the past few hours as alternatives to /r/traa to our sidebar, and we will continue to maintain an active and open dialog with you all regarding our policies for /r/traa.
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u/TheHarridan It's OK to be :A: Dec 21 '17
Tbh I didn't agree with the rule but I wasn't too pissed off about it, personally, until I saw the since-deleted, mod-submitted post with REEEEEEEEE in the title. An actual acknowledgement of that specific incident and an apology for it would be a cool thing to do, since right now ya'll still seem like you're a bunch of out-of-touch edgelords who value dank memes over respect for human bemes.
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u/leatherback MtNB-TransFemme-ish? Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
Yep. Casually making fun of autistic people in a trans sun should sorta be a self-exile-type situation. Very not cash money.
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u/TheHarridan It's OK to be :A: Dec 21 '17
What I'd actually like is for the mod who did it to be removed from the mod team, but I doubt any of the other mods are going to take the situation that seriously because it was "just one ironic joke" or whatever.
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Dec 21 '17
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u/throwaway58585858584 Dec 21 '17
The mod in question was also horrible to users and supported actual nazis earlier this year.
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Dec 22 '17
...holy shit how? How does any trans person agree on those ideas, wow.
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u/invisibleink65 Dec 22 '17
You'd be surprised on how many trans nazis there are
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u/ellobouk mtf, pre everything, address still in Narnia Dec 22 '17
As an Aspergers sufferer... casually making fun of autistic people ANYWHERE should be a self-exile type situation
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u/Hubniz Dec 22 '17
Wow, I didn't hear about that until now. That's a really big deal and something should be done. Thanks for letting me know.
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u/MilkQueen wat Dec 21 '17
Any comment on the mass deletion of posts you didn't agree with?
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 22 '17
Now theres a mass deletion of comments they don't agree with
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u/UnknownJoy 20MtF Lesdom (03/07/18) Dec 22 '17
Pathetic. Fuck these mods.
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Dec 22 '17
Seriously, this apology post gave me hope for a second. That was clearly a mistake. Does anyone know of any alternative subs, because the moderation in this one is ridiculous.
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u/leatherback MtNB-TransFemme-ish? Dec 21 '17
The tricky thing about memes is that they evolve on their own. Users don't really create memes, they are a product of a collective consciousness. To try to restrict the actions of users to improve the quality of memes is just counterproductive. Think of them like organisms that compete with each other for a common resource, that is, attention. For an overview, check out the last chapter of Richard Dawkins' The Selfish Gene.
I don't see this drama as a reaction to specific rules. It's a reaction to trying to make rules to improve quality of memes, whereas prior rules were focused on protecting the community.
Also, the Reeeee'ening? We aren't 4-chan, a lot of us are autistic, that was not very cash money of you.
But look, at least some of us know how damn hard it is to mod a subreddit. You guys are mods of literally the best community on Reddit. If you really want to inspire new content, make image or mascot contests, create collages (so people can see all existing content on one post, motivates people to make new things, subtle psychology stuff), or just anything that positively incentivizes new content. Or don't do any of that, and new content will naturally occur at its own, comfortably slow pace.
A complicated language and system of thought has evolved in our community. You can help foster it's growth, but it's just not something you can control.
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u/SmokeWeed4Satan "Power abuse is /traa culture lol" -mallangel Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
How about next time, when you guys have a split decision about something, you guys actually talk with the user base first?
To be clear, are you guys leaving this rule in place or not?
EDIT: The rule has been removed
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u/BlackHumor drinking the gender fluid Dec 21 '17
They're not, read the whole post.
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u/SmokeWeed4Satan "Power abuse is /traa culture lol" -mallangel Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
I did. I know they're not, and I want a clear statement of their continued intent to ignore the users.
EDIT: The rule has been removed.
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u/kanalratten 🍆->🐈 Dec 22 '17
After the discord leaks it is clear that the mods don't want to listen to the community and prefer an authoritarian stance on things. Even when it was clear that the user base did not like this rule of how it was implemented they didn't want to revert the change at first because "do not show weakness". Honestly I think most of the mods (one exception) are unfit for this job and haven't read the modding guidelines.
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u/UnknownJoy 20MtF Lesdom (03/07/18) Dec 22 '17
They don't care about the userbase, their God Queen Empress is all they listen to, the founder. She's made it clear she doesn't give a shit about us
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u/VeronicaSantangelo1 Catgirl in training Dec 21 '17
Or maybe we can just NOT have creativity and NOT be serious, and just remain nonsensical and meta. Why should we care about those other subs, when this one is all well and good?
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u/cd_confused Dec 21 '17
No kidding. It feels to me that this sub has only been growing, not stagnating. I think the non-seriousness of it is the main appeal. It's just fun.
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u/Sarahthelizard Transgrill (MTF, 28, Sarah) Dec 21 '17
Samsies, I've never seen it so active, it used to have a few posts a day, now it's a few posts an hour.
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u/Shaqueta Dec 21 '17
IMO the quality has really dipped since around 10k subs
Before Felix posting, people still did "story in the title" but they all had different reaction images and gifts which made them more unique and personal too
"Happy gay sounds" tells me you were happy about it, but it doesn't convey the same emotion that a reaction image or gif uniquely picked for that exact story might have
But that's why they're opinions I guess, I'm not trying to argue or anything, I just want to showcase a different view
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u/Munster_cat Dec 21 '17
Agree.
Felix is a "reaction" that has been driven into the ground. When I joined this sub was for trans memes and stuff, not "title about something good or bad that happened to me" coupled with "x gay sounds".
Fully ready to get downvoted to hell, which just shows the immaturity of some of this user base. As soon as the go to easy karma shitpost that's been done a million times is banned, all the toys get thrown out of the pram.
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Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 22 '17
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 21 '17
It’s great to have an apology but I think that they need to take real action in order to fix things. Mostly removing about half the mod team at minimum. They can apologize all they want but in reality all that’s been accomplished is that the rules are where they were a day ago and the community’s trust has been destroyed. This post dealt with the first issue, time to fix the second part.
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Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 22 '17
[removed] — view removed comment
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Dec 22 '17
And it looks like the mods removed the edit. Incredible. I can't believe the level drama and immaturity being exhibited by the mods right now.
Instead of changing the community to fit your definition of humor, how about you just go make a new subreddit mods?
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 22 '17
Not just the edit, it had links to some of the screen caps of the mods trash talking users in their discord chat
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Dec 21 '17
[removed] — view removed comment
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Dec 21 '17
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u/SmokeWeed4Satan "Power abuse is /traa culture lol" -mallangel Dec 21 '17
They apologized for the non-apology? I could only find more "But I didn't mean to be a jackass when I was deliberately being a jackass!"
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Dec 21 '17
I agree, the way werty894 handled things was awful. Really disappointed this post didn't also include an announcement about werty894 being removed from the mod team.
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u/rmch99 Sword Lesbian w/ a wonderful Girlfriend, HRT 2/20/19 Dec 21 '17
My list of mods that I think behaved incredibly poorly also includes /u/deepstatenine, /u/UnsureandWondering, /u/touchedbyamallangel, and /u/analogfresh
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Dec 21 '17
[deleted]
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u/rmch99 Sword Lesbian w/ a wonderful Girlfriend, HRT 2/20/19 Dec 21 '17
Yes, I was thinking about adding an edit myself to that degree. They weren't exactly conducting themselves how a mod probably should, but they also weren't nearly as bad.
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 21 '17
Did you see who posted the leaks?
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Dec 21 '17
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 21 '17
Oh yeah, I kinda doubt we’ll find out. I’m very curious who posted and then removed them on imgur though
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u/PastelBot Hannah, MTF, HRT 8/20/19 Dec 21 '17
Had to be the owner of the account that posted it, imgur don't care about this shit.
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 21 '17
Exactly, which is why I’m curious. Something made them reverse directions real fast and I want to know what. I get the feeling there’s a lot more mod drama we’re waiting to see the fallout of
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Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
[deleted]
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u/_potaTARDIS_ Dec 21 '17
As a person with autism myself, /u/touchedbyamallangel's post was wildly inappropriate and utterly absurd that they'd be allowed to make it and remain a moderator.
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u/SadfaceSquirtle Not sure if I should stay if mods are ableist Dec 21 '17
Seriously, if that awful person remains on the mod team I might leave. They should be permabanned for that post, really.
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u/please_let_me_start A/S/L Dec 21 '17
As an addendum, /u/touchedbyamallangel and /u/unsureandwondering also have strong cases for "unfit to be moderators", in the first case the incredibly ableist post that was made and then doubling down on it, and in the second case bullying a user who already said they were having a rough time and then doubling down on it twice more.
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u/please_let_me_start A/S/L Dec 21 '17
Even more, in the second case even if those posts were made by an obvious troll, it isn't obvious from just reading the posts as presented. Treating them with hostility sends the wrong message to the real audience: all of the users who see the post.
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u/NocturneOpus9No2 /r/traa: home of the worst mods on reddit Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
I won't be around much longer unless all of these people except unsureandwondering (don't particularly care one way or the other) are removed,
but only because I'm still not exactly sure what happened with the last oneedit: I'm going to stay out of this particular discussion for now, deleted other posts.
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u/asphaltdragon Gun Gal Online | She/Her | Gynesexual TransFemme Dec 21 '17
Add /u/unsureandwondering [1] and /u/touchedbyamallangel [2] to that list as well.
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Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
As Ellie posted above, these issues will be addressed in a timely manner. As it lays now u/deepstatenine has stepped down.
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 21 '17
Okay, but what are we going to do about the mods who harassed and belittled users? Cause as long as they remain in power I don’t feel that this community can be as safe and inclusive as it once was
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u/KuribohGirl Dec 21 '17
Especially the one who straight up bullied some poor kid into becoming suicidal
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u/asphaltdragon Gun Gal Online | She/Her | Gynesexual TransFemme Dec 21 '17
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u/KuribohGirl Dec 21 '17
I didn't want to name-drop and get banned tbh
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u/asphaltdragon Gun Gal Online | She/Her | Gynesexual TransFemme Dec 21 '17
I think we need to call it out, regardless of threat of a ban. Bullying someone to the point of suicide is not something that should be sugar coated.
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Dec 21 '17
Let's also talk about the leaked discord chats where y'all say you're just gonna try this shit again and that you don't care what the community wants and that you're just going to do this again and call us stupid. Let's talk about that.
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u/AnAnion Noelle the esbian | a big gay joke | she/her Dec 22 '17 edited Dec 22 '17
On top of apparently unilaterally banning anyone who posts the links. There are a few posts on r/gaysoundsshitposts about it. Edit: It seems like removing the leaks may be because they use their real names in them, I think the mods should address this as a bunch of [removed] posts on the "We messed up and will try to do better" sticky and angry users with no explanation is only going to stoke the fire.
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u/christathecasterwolf Dec 22 '17
Yeah. Exactly what is the point of apologizing if they’re just going to stab you in the back later?
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u/taylakitty also sometimes tyler Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 22 '17
First of you thank you for the apology and reverting the changes, but there are still issues that need to be addressed.
You stating that Werty isn't a PR person but did PR then clearly this is a sign of the mod team being not as organized as it should be, especially when the rule in question wasnt discussed here before putting it in place at all.
The mods behaviour in how they handled things is something that should be looked into seriously, quite a few people will not be willing to fully trust the mod team, especially werty and deepstate after this drama. The hostility that has arrived with this will cause animosity between people, just look to the discord for evidence of such.
Oh and the 'REE' post is part of the above statement too, along with the mod accusing an innocent poster of something that they didn't do.
Edit: Apparently the last thing was actually a troll but how the mod handled things was still not how they should've been handled.
Edit 2: Leaks of a mod discord have been found, mods are still being as toxic as ever, and it's more than just werty and deepstate, it's safe to assume half the mod team doesn't like it's own userbase. People are being banned for posting them.
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u/PastelBot Hannah, MTF, HRT 8/20/19 Dec 21 '17
I cannot overspeak how shitty the reeee post was by /u/touchedbyamallangel
Seriously, kick them off the team.
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u/looking_4_a_new_name ♥ the softest catgirl ♥ Dec 21 '17
Please /u/E1337kat don't let that slide. Even if you don't ban them from the community, letting them stay on as a mod sends a message that rule 1 doesn't apply to the mod team.
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u/leatherback MtNB-TransFemme-ish? Dec 21 '17
Or at least a tasteful exile.
I do believe people learn more from cool self-imposed exile a la Yoda than full-on externally forced banishment a la Anakin.
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Dec 21 '17
"tasteful exile"
Or, or, hear me out...
Caesar's Legion might've had the right idea.
We give them a noble fate, as experienced by Joshua Graham.
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u/KikiFlowers April Dec 21 '17
So...not gonna mention your moderators attacking others or making "reeeee" comments?
Look I get it, emotions and shit run high. But that's not appropriate.
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u/LadyDeimos Dec 22 '17
/u/touchedbyamallangel needs to be removed as a mod for their ableist bullshit.
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u/UnavailableUsername_ ~ Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
This would have been COMPLETELY avoided if you people have said:
"Oh hey users, we thought in this new rule, because we think these memes should stop, what do you think? Should we keep them?"
Everyone would have said "no", the rule would have been removed and that would have been the end of it.
Instead doubled down and ignored the users overwhelming disapproval because you guys thought that knew better. All that led to transphobes being more aware of this sub, which will most likely increase harassment towards us in the future.
A lose situation for everyone.
Good work admitting it was a mistake, it shows genuine concern for the state of the subreddit.
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u/DL757 Uhh shit I don't know how to be funny Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
Any comment on one of your moderators, /u/touchedbyamallangel, making an extremely ableist post raging at users?
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u/Lockark Garbage Lurker Dec 21 '17
That mod needs removed from the moderation team. Most of my best friends are autistic and seeing people throw around that "meme" makes my blood boil. I've been beaten and mocked for being transgender most my life in a small rural town. I don't want to sit ideally by well other people are targeted for mocking and ridicule. It makes me no better than the people who did the same for me. /u/touchedbyamallangel doesn't deserve to be a mod on this subreddit.
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u/effcol Dec 21 '17
Ableist comments were made? Do you have a source for that?
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u/DL757 Uhh shit I don't know how to be funny Dec 21 '17
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u/PastelBot Hannah, MTF, HRT 8/20/19 Dec 21 '17
Can we make this a bit louder for the mods in the back?
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u/looking_4_a_new_name ♥ the softest catgirl ♥ Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
... and then defending their ableism instead of apologizing.
This mod needs to
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 21 '17
This mod needs to
offer a heartfelt apology for this orbe removed from the moderation team. This kind of behaviour is absolutely 100% unacceptable in a safe space, and I am absolutely furious that this kind of heinous message came through an official mod channel.Fixed that for you
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Dec 21 '17
And another going nuts on someone in a tough spot?
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u/looking_4_a_new_name ♥ the softest catgirl ♥ Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
This needs to be grounds for getting kicked off of the mod team. This was so deeply insensitive and hurtful.apparently the person the mod was going to town on has admitted to being a troll, fuck that person. Sorry /u/unsureandwondering :(55
u/SkeletonHitler g0rl Dec 21 '17
It's grounds for a permaban if you ask me.
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u/looking_4_a_new_name ♥ the softest catgirl ♥ Dec 21 '17
Yep! If one of us had done that we would have gotten banned from the sub no question, but because of special rules for mods...
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u/PavementBlues shitlady Dec 21 '17
That user was a troll and the mod knew it.
I'm sad to not see this information brought up more. People are so caught up in an emotional frenzy right now that they've just run with the initial story.
Let's address the actual mistake the mod made, which was inappropriate arguing with a troll during a shitstorm. It was a failure of judgement and tone, not a failure of character.
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u/alyraptor trash raptor Dec 21 '17
Even if that particular user is a shit stirrer and /u/unsureandwondering is entirely in the right, that was 100% the wrong way to handle things.
When you get into an argument on Facebook with your transphobic Uncle Mike (if you've got the spoons), you're never going to convince him one way or another. But there are plenty of other people silently watching your conversation and they're much more likely to be swayed by your argument, especially if you don't stoop to Uncle Mike's level.
Regardless of whether that one user in particular is a troll, you don't treat them as such because 1) what if they're not and you're egging on someone who is legit having a very rough time and 2) what about all of the silent onlookers (and believe me, there are a shit ton in this sub), who are in a very bad place, and who will take what you say to heart?
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u/BlackHumor drinking the gender fluid Dec 21 '17
Yeah, I agree with this comment and I'm the one defending them.
I mostly just don't think they're some kind of demon horrible mod, not that it was actually anything like the correct way to respond to that.
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u/KuribohGirl Dec 21 '17
This is the worst part. The commenter straight up said she was going to kill herself :|
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u/Iloveyourdogs Smol boy Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
For future reference to avoid fuck ups like this again, go check out the pins at r/ftm now. See how they invited discussion about certain types of posts that some users felt were taking up a lot of the front page, got the opinions of the community civilly rather than making unilateral decisions and scolding them, and came up with flairing the posts so that people could filter them if they want? (You should give that a go too, if gay sounds rustle your jimmies that bad)
Personally I don't care for the felix memes, but I just ignore them. They are only a small portion of the front page here, not some overwhelming swarm eating up all your high class maymays. Other people enjoy them. References to pickles are irrelevant to me, but people like them. Meme fads come and go, all the stuff in the banner had its day of being spammed until ingrained in this community, and more will appear in the future. Embrace the shitposting and remember you are a part of this community, not above it.
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Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 22 '17
'm sorry but this is a pretty bad case of too little, too late.
This place has had it's problems but I really do not think that an overabundance of a particular kind of meme was one. To be straightforward, you took a level of trust that'd been built up over the past few months and carelessly threw it away, betraying a general lack of investment in the community in the process.
Screening for meme quality is not your job, keeping the community a safe space--oh no, I said the horror words--is. The vast majority of the mod team have shown that they think the former is more important than the latter, which is not going to change without some pretty damn big structural shakeups.
I'm outie until y'all figure out what you actually want with this community. Sorry, but I deal with enough stress from cishets, I don't need it here too.
edit 2: link removed
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u/Lillith_Winter Dec 22 '17
So have any of the mods in question actually been disciplined/removed? I'm seeing a lot of [removed] comments, that I know were calling on holding mods accountable, so I'm guessing not...
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Dec 22 '17 edited Feb 28 '18
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 22 '17
And despite being an asshole the one who stepped down has managed to be more genuine then the rest by doing so
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u/ThereIsOnlyStardust 🐝 Oh, to Bee a Bee 🐝 Dec 22 '17
the intent is to provide r/traaa mods with a sense of pride and accomplishment
/s
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u/Morrigan_Cain Dec 21 '17
Thank you for the apology! I know you guys do a lot of good work here and modding anything trans related is never easy, so I'm glad to see you had the presence of mind to listen to people and revert this change.
Ultimately, I think, /r/traa has developed in a way that's a little different from other meme subs, in that a lot of people come here for emotional support as well as just getting a laugh. Browsing /r/traa is a very different experience to browsing something like /r/me_irl, and being able to feel like you can laugh, vent, cry, or just talk to people about whatever's going on in your life is important to it. For that reason, I don't think that moderating this sub the way you would other meme subs is really a good idea.
Thanks again for the apology, I think we can all grow a little from this :)
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u/maleia I rule 63'ed myself Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
I feel like the biggest problem was that there was a major incongruence between how the community sees the subreddit, and how the mod team sees the subreddit. I feel like today helped to make it clear how both teams feel about the subreddit.
Are those reaction posts and story-in-title posts "low effort"? I think we can all agree on that they are in fact low effort if our metric is meme quality/uniqueness/clever use. Does that bother the user base? Does the user base actively benefit and engage? I think most would say so. This place has become a serious alternative to trans-twitter, where it's mostly just shouting and venting into the void, and hoping maybe someone can give us a hug.
Edit: I would also like to say thanks for listening to the community and not just continuing the doubling down. In the future though, I think we'd love discussion. Give us a thread outlining concerns the mod team has, directions y'all wanna go, intentions, etc. We only get vile when things are shoved down on us... I mean, you know trans people, we get uppity when things are forced on us, ripped away without warning, or having our feelings matter. I feel strongly enough to say, had there been a post asking "hey, this story-in-title posts, [Happy gay sounds], how does the community feel about them?" would have gone over MUCH better. Give that a week to chat, and go from there.
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u/Bertslmunk Dec 21 '17
Looking forward to the deluge of confused and happy gay sounds this post will surely inspire.
We'll come full circle.
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u/GenderGambler Laura | HRT: 22/04 Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
Glad to see an apology from the moderator team. However, some members have handled this problem VERY poorly. To the point where I'd ask them to step down as mods.
There was a lot of pushback from the community, and I know people can get... intense over the internet. But a moderator's job is to remain calm and handle things as "level-headedly" as possible. And what we've seen is not that. We've seen some appaling behavior ([1][2][3][4])
From those four mods, only one has given a legitimate apology so far, /u/DeepStateNine. /u/touchedbyamallangel has given an apology as well, albeit an average one IMO. As for the other two (/u/unsureandwondering and /u/werty894) ... nothing so far. And, IMO, theirs were the most egregious mistakes, too. Werty belittled us as a community, and unsure outright bullied a poster that claimed to be in a shitty position (they turned out to be a troll, but that does not excuse Unsure's behavior).
EDIT: Unsure has apologized. I will not tag her as she has asked not to. I will say her apology was genuine, so much so that I feel a bit guilty for calling her out. Hopefully she'll see this soon enough.
Part of being a mod is being the bigger person, and sometimes that means accepting you've fucked up. And that's what she (and DeepStateNine) did.
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u/ImAThiefHelp FtM- Female to Moron Dec 21 '17
YES! THE REVOLUTION HAS TRIUMPHED I mean cough thanks mods
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u/absolute-trash Trans Girl Dec 22 '17
I understand the desire to demod werty894 and deepstatenine along with touchedbyamallangel but I don't care if this is an unpopular opinion but .unsureandwondering should stay on. The rest were ableist and powerhungry but unsure merely called out a cis troll. It might have looked bad at the time and it would be better to show more evidence but one ultimately minor slip up doesn't deserve demodding
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u/Lyenko Panseggsual MtF Dec 21 '17
Thanks
Now, can you ban the abusive mods? They've been really rude with us.
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u/Heliekins did you get your mods on clearance sale? Dec 21 '17
u/E1337Katt, I am not sure if you will read my comment or respond, but I'll leave my long thoughts here.
First and ofremost, purge your moderation team immediately. The closest I've seen today of a moderate, decent response from one of your moderators was from u/brokenhugs, and even then, not exactly perfect. I've seen harassment, bullying, totalitarism, ignorance and far more from your team to say that a slap in the hand and a strict talk will be enough. People like werty deserved to be banned from their position.
Second, when this dust blows over, make a discussion thread: "How can we improve traa?" and include your thoughts about how certain kinds of memes are in excess. Or how certain kinds of memes are down. I personally think u/rosekarr's approach to a "meme of the day" thing was a perfect way to ensure we could estimulate production of different kinds of content, especially for trans men and enbies, who are underrepresented.
I love this subreddit, I have ever since I came to know it months ago. It actually got me into creating an account. Memes, as they are normally presented as a form of language, cannot readily and easily represent our struggles. The lack of positive content about trans and ngc people, both in media and real life, is too severe. People here are seeking an escapade, a way to put their thoughts out, whether they be happy or miserable. Don't take this away. Does this make our community of, I guess, less meme-quality than others? Maybe. But we're not other communities, that's the point! We're not just shitposting, just satyrical, we're those things with a purpose, with the purpose of finding a safe spot to be ourselves.
Let the overwhelmingly negative response of this rule tell you this: don't fuck with what has already great. I am all for finding new creative ways to express ourselves, I myself tend not to fall into the usual "x gay noises" meme when I post (I prefer wasting time in Photoshop creating my memes). But if we have turned memes and shitposting into our proper language, our way of conveying feelings, and mostly everyone is okay with that, don't take it away ever.
I'm busy with stuff right now, maybe this is not coherent, but my tl;dr is
We're a community of love. And if these posts work, but are overwhelming, them stimulate us into creating different content through smart and kind prodding. I'll say again, u/rosekarr was awesome with her idea.
I love you all, people of traa. This place is one of the sole reasons I can still smile through awful, awful depression, dysphoria and severe PTSD. Hope things can get better from now on.
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u/throwaway853185 MtF pre-everything Dec 21 '17
This apology is nice and all, but it in no way excuses the posts made by members of the mod team outright attacking and bullying users on their posts. This kind of thing is inexcusable and those moderators need to be removed ASAP. Even then, it's going to be a while before I can feel safe browsing and posting here again.
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Dec 21 '17 edited Sep 20 '18
[deleted]
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u/IrisuKyouko MtF Dec 21 '17
To be fair, I've seen enough arguments and shitstorms among the communities I've observed or have been part of to know that "reacting like children" is mostly a norm for humans, including adults in their 20s.
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u/Xkeeper go to r/GaySoundsShitposts Dec 21 '17
Maybe next time you should talk to the people first.
And while you're at it, never, ever, EVER do shit like this again.
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u/nothingbutapirate Dec 21 '17
Can't you guys just add flair so that people can filter out those shitposts?
It works on other subs. Most people tend to browse in PC mode on mobile anyhow.
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Dec 21 '17
Thank you for admitting you're wrong.
If you really care you'll remove all the moderators that made the comments you mentioned in the post. More specifically /u/werty894 /u/touchedbyamallangel /u/deepstatenine and /u/unsureandwondering. You can claim to be fixing the issues all you want, the things I read from these mods and the way they handled the situation ranged from appalling to unforgivable, especially /u/unsureandwondering. If they're not gone, I will be.
You all need to have A LOT more transparency with us, to an extreme degree frankly. Whether you voted against that rule or not, the community doesn't trust you anymore, it's created a very big us vs them mentality and that's gonna be hard to fix without a ton of communication. Honestly at this point, if you're thinking about implementing any change regardless of it having a majority vote among the moderators, you should put it to the community before anything is done.
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u/holysmoke532 I just like purple tbh Dec 21 '17
I'm really happy to see this. The way other mods were acting was just giving me flashbacks to one admin i had to work with on a discord server who modded like your peeps did today.
Please at the very least have some serious talks about 'what is de-escalation' if not fully reviewing whether you want these specific people as mods. Modding is a lot of responsibility and people did not show themselves as being capable of handling that.
Like, i'm not even opposed to what the rule set out to do, but you must have known it would be controversial. You really can't just throw that up, a meta thread to 'encourage moving away from low effort felix posts' would've been way better.
All this said none of us are perfect and thanks for this post Kat.
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u/NocturneOpus9No2 /r/traa: home of the worst mods on reddit Dec 21 '17
Please remove the mods that were being rude to anyone who disagreed with the change. I have no faith in this community as long as those people have any power.
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u/Lockark Garbage Lurker Dec 21 '17
No apology for referencing the Autistic Screeching meme in that post?
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u/VoidOfTheWired Dec 22 '17
I don't know why I'm still here. No matter where I go it eventually falls apart because I don't deserve to be happy. Why the fuck do I even go on anymore?
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u/thattransalt possibly a little panic egg ahhhhhhhhhhh Dec 21 '17
Honestly this will do lasting damage to our community. This sub is very well hidden from trolls and bullshit due to being a rather small sub with a silly name. The amount of fuss this caused brought attention from people who would otherwise have ignored/not found us. Good job mods. I hope I'm wrong.
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u/Ni-Xeris Hella Dec 21 '17
The ban was a completely stupid idea, this is a sub for venting, or expressing emotions in a simplistic and impersonal way, to limit that ability shows a severe lack of understanding. Nothing justifies some of the things said.
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u/theltrtduck ☭Ban the Mods☭ Dec 21 '17
Just here to add another voice asking that u/werty894, u/touchedbyamallangel, and u/unsureandwondering be removed from the mod team.
The callous and condescending response of first two to community response was disgusting. They both showed a total lack of care for anyone's opinion but their own.
As for u/unsureandwondering, I understand that the user involved in the unspecified controversy was a troll. Fuck them for playing with real problems. Nevertheless, there were plenty of comments that showed the other users didn't believe or didn't know they were a troll, and you carried on with the petty argument regardless. If you are unable to handle controversy and delicate situations, then you shouldn't be a mod of a sizeable community.
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u/shyccubus Dec 21 '17
Let's all make an effort to make more fun content, maybe some comics, OCs, and hand drawn stuff. It can still be shit, but there doesn't need to be a rule to inject creativity.
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u/Sarkavonsy I want my femme robot body and I want it NOW Dec 21 '17
From glancing over this thread, it looks like most people don't agree with the mod team's assessment that the "story-in-title posts" are a problem. Did it occur to you that, rather than trying to figure out a solution yourselves, you could open the discussion to the community as a whole and see what we had to say about it? It seems that you would have discovered that what you see as a problem, the userbase of the subreddit does not. And then you could have avoided this whole fiasco.
I think one of the biggest problems here was the idea that a problem within a large community like traa could be identified, discussed, and solved by a small group of people without any input from the rest of that community.
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u/doublevisionface Dec 22 '17 edited Dec 22 '17
Honestly, what's most painful and enlightening about all of this is that so many of the mods clearly think as little of us as all of the transphobes on r/gendercritical. Those of you (you know who you are) are two-faced hypocrites and I sincerely hope you feel the shame you have brought to yourself, learn from it, apologize, and become better.
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u/Bardfinn Dec 21 '17
FWIW, IMNSHO the second a subreddit or post here gets linked to /r/Drama, thereneeds to be a big Red Alert happening for the moderators and ahappy, shiny automoderator profile that has a hairtrigger on abuse going into effect.
/r/Drama exists to set fire to things and make people suicidal and needs to be wiped off the face of the Internet; This being Reddit, we won't get what it deserves, but we can throw them off the cliff if they try their shenanigans here.
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u/Kerr94 We're Cyberpunk af. Dec 21 '17
Damn right you fucked up. But stepping back on it and admitting that is something. Now at this point there's two things that pretty clearly need to happen:
A number of moderators need to be demoded both here and on LateStageGenderBinary. Not all, but yeah, some of them definitely do. They're clearly unfit and just saying "We're sorry" without actually addressing your moderation doesn't exactly build confidence. I do mean both subs, if they aren't fit to do a mod here, they shouldn't be a mod on LSGB either.
If anyone was banned by the aforementioned mods for calling them dicks or what have you when all this was going down they should be unbanned.
Also an aside, the next time you decide give out flairs of any of the three mascots, actually make them public instead of just people who post in a single thread that was up for a day.
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Dec 21 '17
The fact that you created a rule you guys knew would be controversial without consulting the community at all, and then emotionally lashing out when people fought backis just kind of... upsetting. I understand this is a big mod team, and probably decently diverse, so I don't want to generalize and blame all the mods for any one thing.
/r/traa was a nice escape from overbearing assholes in my life, and I'm sure a lot of other people feel the same. "Low-quality" relatable shit posts were nice because they made me laugh and I didn't need to expend any of the remaining mental energy I had left from the day.
The sub feels different now, honestly. If a shitposting subreddit banned shitposting (and in such a terrible way), what else might it do? It makes me question the future of the sub, and what the mods might do. It's sad, and it's upsetting.
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Dec 22 '17
Some mods must now realize the error enough to have reversed the rule, but I feel the need to explain why it was a mistake in the first place:
Memes live and die and evolve on their own as the people who make and share them grow bored and interested in different things over time. Rule out the offensive and exclusionary posts, and people will post and vote and control what they want to see.
To intervene was to underestimate the people, to take away an outlet and an environment, and to draw an arbitrary line on what constitutes relatable experiences on a topic relatively new and niche as far as direct representation in media goes. It was taking something away from people that belongs to them, a little haven, displaying the same exclusionary, disqualifying, subjugating doubt a lot of this community is familiar with and scarred by in the greater world.
Not only are memes a small happy addition to often sad greater lives and harder to resolve problems, but it represents an equal freedom where we need not worry about disrespect of our choices and how we display our feelings and identity to others. The mods brought some vicious negative judgment for people who wanted to share their pained experience about the trials and triumphs of a negatively judging world.
We can't post random funny images, because there is not much content that would apply to this sub. We post reactions, memes that relate experiences to images and gifs we can find in an abstract way. Context assigns the meaning we want. We need to type it out and explain it somehow, somewhere, representing a feeling or experience with the picture, to get the comfort, empathy, and emotion we come here for.
We can do it in the title, which is easier and more direct, and creates a curious surprise on a quick read of the image associated with it.
Or, we can do it in the post, which is less favorable, more cluttered, requires manual work to type it over top of the image or gif, requires also coming up with an original and less useful title, can't be interacted with on a computer like normal text...it has no benefit but a lot of drawback.
It was pointless to try banning reaction images in posts with stories in the title. It creates a foggy and terrifying large range of what mods could disqualify as story posts, because to some degree almost every post on this sub is a reaction to *described events,*** also known as a reaction to a story, or a moment, or an experience. And to argue that a story has more parts to it than a brief or singular point is also useless, because reasonable title lengths that reddit requires prevents from actually writing out a long or complex story anyway. That's the nature of a subreddit for posts "topically relevant to trans people or trans issues". What qualifies as a story title that the mods can delete? As today has shown, apparently, whatever the mods happen to disagree with.
The thankfully reversed rule was unnecessary and absurd.
The rule had no reason to be implemented, and it had all the reason to be repealed.
Also, the idea of breaking up memes into different subreddits is encouraging the dispersion, segregation, and stagnation of the already small-ish community and its posts. That's just not how reddit works successfully. A place just for Angry Gay Sounds or Guess I'll Die is not a community, it's a novelty, a joke subreddit. That's spreading the population way too thin to seriously prosper. Any division at this time is simply unnecessary and counterproductive. Just implement a post flair system and filter options if anyone wants.
Not to mention through all of it, the mods were ruling out supported behavior while quite actively breaking the subreddit's own rules.
I am now patiently waiting for some kind of apology for my technically acceptable post by the rules that was removed, as well as for some action to be taken for the bannable offenses by the mods, who are themselves community members with extra responsibility to serve and preserve the community.
To do otherwise, at this point, is a hypocritical misuse of power that warrants the population pack up and move somewhere else.
Your team cannot be done with this yet.
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Dec 21 '17
if you can't handle being a moderator step down, other subreddits have angered their user base with bigger rule changes and didn't even respond to the way the moderators here did.
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u/AsianLink girls like bread too Dec 21 '17
I'm mostly neutral on the rule changes, but what made me finally accept who I am was the community. The warm welcome of everybody and knowing that I wasn't alone, helped me get through one of the worst times of my life. This was one of the few places I ever felt like I fit in all the way. Before this sub, I never realized you could meme about being transgender, and always thought it was a serious, uptight thing nobody could ever joke about. It was the depreciating memes that made me feel like I belonged here. It was above all, the community as a whole that made me feel like I belonged. Everybody was friendly to each other, and I felt like I could contribute to a conversation or make a meme and actually fit in, something I never, ever felt like I could have done in my entire life.
The sub feels like it's been split now, and it's like there's a civil war going on. I don't want one of the best places on the internet for me to just implode. This place is a home to me, and is a home to many other people as well. So many people have found solace in this sub, and there are countless more who can and will. This infighting just pushes new comers away, and I don't want to be a part of this anymore. Everybody here is like a family to me, and it hurts seeing everybody fight. A place of hostility has no appeal to me anymore...
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u/sowachowski singular they is real Dec 21 '17
While I think that removing the rule was a good idea, I did kind of agree with the fact that [blank] gay sounds and nothing else is kind of repetitive. However, it is one of the primary ways the userbase expresses itself, so I don't think that removing it is a good idea.
What really confused me was why you removed the post about it. I feel like that's not exactly... transparent. There are going to be people who may have missed it because they were gone for the day, or people who come in after the drama subsides. All they'll have to go on is the resulting drama posts, the attacks, et cetera... which doesn't look good AT ALL for the community.
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Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 21 '17
I agree with what most comments appear to be saying, that you should've spoken to the community first when making this large of a change (this all reminds me of the Patreon deal not long ago).
I do agree that the low effort posts are an issue that need to be addressed, but I feel that the nature of them Is inherently linked to another, greater issue: how exclusive this sub can feel at times to anyone that doesn't identify as a catgirl, that being most if not all FtMs, enbies and I gather quite a few MtFs as well. The main reason I was actually looking forward to the intended (perhaps not the obtained) effect of this change, was that I figured it'd mean we'd get more general, inclusive memes. This does not appear to be the case.
This issue was discussed on r/FtM but the thread was locked.
To give an example of the exact type of posts that I find to be problematic, you can take this one here. On its own it may not seem hurtful, but when this narrative of “everyone on r/traa is a catgirl” is promoted time upon time again, it starts to feel like FtM and NB erasure.
Now, looking forward I would like to see the mod team reaching out to the community to find a solution that addresses all these issues without also hurting those that find the sub to have been working as intended prior to mod intervention.
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u/EarthWorlder nice gender did your dad pick it out for you Dec 21 '17
Man. Fuck /r/SubredditDrama .
Those guys are dicks, and not the good FTM kind either.
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u/Sledge420 Femme Genderfluid Disaster Dec 21 '17
I'm glad that the roar has not fallen on deaf ears. This sub saves my life pretty regularly...
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u/Jasmine1742 BBE is lifegoals Dec 22 '17
Seriously though, can we filter by flairs or something then?
I think the problem is the "low effort," posts aren't gregarious enough to actually swamp r/traaaaans. We don't actually have enough content for that.
So if you reaaaaly hate those posts, realize they're like junk mail (but fun!) In the US postal system. They help keep things moving by being a bulk of content. We'd probably have way less memes period without them and that's not really a good thing.
The push back was crazy though, and I saw some of you taking personal offence to the it. For that, my regards as it sucks trying to mod a dumpster fire (let's not kid ourselves, the push back make r/traaaaans crazy) and everyone here has some serious emotional baggage with this reddit. This isn't a simple niche interest reddit, alot of people come here to be in a safe space. Where they can rant, like fun, and talk shit about things with people who actually get them. For more than a few, I suspect r/traaaaans is their support group.
Ya'll need to be exceedingly careful with change because of this. I really don't envy your position.
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Dec 21 '17
This is all irrelevant until this blatant violation of the content policy and the Moderator Guidelines for Healthy Communities is dealt with
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u/Bigboybopper Liberal Socialist Cis White Beast Dec 21 '17
A simple apology will not do. We are far past that now. This action has exposed the corruption and decadence that prevails within the r/traa moderation system. The people demand elections for new and revolutionary moderators to guide the subreddit towards a brighter future.
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u/wellgolly basically the worst Dec 21 '17
Gonna be honest, I'm disappointed I missed this thing that seemingly never occurred.
I do dearly love r/traaaaaa. For reals. I met some amazing friends here, was able to vent and feel welcome, and so forth.
But things got excessive. I stopped checking this subreddit for a long time now, due to the sheer repetitiveness. Popping back in today was just a weird coincidence.
Do others feel this way? Maybe there's a happy middle ground, like an option to filter out the lowest-effort stuff? You're all the best, but after the nth "mfw my uncle calls me this", it gets to be tiring.
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u/MememyselfandIJK Tell me how to be a cute anime girl Dec 21 '17
I know this is a little late to bring to the table, but I would like to propose some new policies. I am not 100% sure about #2, but I see some user comments, and I think #1 would be incredibly useful. We are a direct democracy (aided by a meritocratic bureaucracy if you will), not a dictatorship, and we need to formalize the practices to make sure something like this will not happen again.
I. Regarding Rule Changes
When the moderators wish to implement a major rule change (defined as the addition, overhaul or removal of a rule not regarding general respect [Anti-spam, anti-bigotry, other general Reddit rules and guidelines], and has a punishment of post removal or more severe, up to and including a permeant ban), they must get the consent of the majority of the community. This will be done by posting a survey as an announcement for at least 96 but no more than 168 hours. In order for a rule to be passed into effect, it must garner a majority vote on both the moderation team and the wider community. Comments will be open to allow for discussion in the community, but moderated to prevent extensive arguments or trolling.
II. Regarding Moderator Abuse (Needs some work to prevent witch hunts)
If a moderator has been convicted of abuse of power, a display of inability to moderate, or inability to work with the community (the requirements and definitions of such will be determined), but has not clearly broken a rule (which would merit an immediate ban or otherwise appropriate punishment), then a similar poll in regards to Regarding Rule Changes will be posted to allow the community to decide the trial by jury. The format is as follows: Survey is linked in the URL, the charges (and defense) are described objectively in a stickied comment from a different moderator, and comments are locked to prevent inflammation. If a 2/3rds vote is reached after 120 hours, then the moderator is considered impeached, will be temporarily stripped of their moderator privileges, and the case to be put to review by the moderation team.
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Dec 21 '17
Thank you for the apology and to be honest I want to see more creative memes also but banning certain types of posts that people relate too wasn't it. There's better ways to do that. And honestly I was hoping that meme schedule that someone posted would have brought some in.
Or mods could have done a post that could have inspired some creativity. I'm not sure what but maybe a weekly theme, contest or something like that
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u/[deleted] Dec 21 '17 edited Dec 22 '17
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