These are the same people that think 'freedom' is dictating to others how they're allowed to live their lives, 'free speech' is deporting anyone that says something you don't like and that the preacher who gets a little too friendly with the youth group 'cares about the kids'. So assume that everything they say and claim to stand for is doublespeak.

The way I see it, is that the rules and aim of the instance are all written out pretty fucking clearly and people on a platform dominated by longform text don't really have an excuse for not being able to comprehend it. Like seriously, I had been using Lemmy for two days when I checked out Blåhaj, and I feel like I understood then already because it's not hard and English is my native language.

So that said, when I see people complaining about it, I think they're either fucking stupid, or they're probably these 'free speech' people that want the right to go around insulting everyone without consequences (while doing the most epic pearl clutching the moment anyone insults them).

As far as I'm concerned, moderators and admins doing exactly what is clearly fucking written in the description and rules is not power abuse.

move away from the dominance of small dollar donors

I'm not American, so I'm doing some guesswork here. But "dominance" and "small dollar" to me suggests that these are donations from the people (including the working class) that they're wanting to connect with. So to me, this sentence sounds like they're going to 100% embrace big corporate donors and leave the regular people out in the cold.

Interesting strategy.

I was going to say something snarky about how they're going to fail because who would pay for social media, then I remembered blue checkmarks.

Edit: I was a bit mistaken. It was in fact the Observer that was sold by the Guardian group. Still seems like there's smoke which indicates fire but I was not entirely correct here. See one of the replies to my comment for more information.

Based on what I can find, The Guardian was actually sold to a company called Tortoise Media two months ago in December 2024. And according to Wikipedia:

Guardian and Observer journalists voted to strike on 4 and 5 December 2024 in protest over a sale that they said would betray the commitment of the Scott Trust—owner of the Guardian Media Group—to the Observer.

So not even the journalists wanted this company in control. And funnily enough, there was a Guardian article in 2018 that specifically mentioned Tortoise Media while talking about the "increased involvement of private wealth in the journalism industry" and how that is a bad thing. So from what I can tell, it can no longer be trusted.

Wikipedia article on Tortoise Media here.

I knew this kind of shit would happen. This is why it's important to keep an eye on US politics and why US news always kinda fits in 'world' news. Because like it or not, we all seem to be under the spell of the USA's influence.

Take these European variety ass flies following the waft of stink coming from Donald Trump's backside for example. "Make Europe Great Again"? Apparently Europe is joining China in the game of making cheap knockoffs of famous American brands. Or maybe it's just going full circle, considering that MAGA is just a knockoff brand of Nazism. Which was long ago but not long ago enough for everyone involved in it or brainwashed by it to have shuffled off this mortal coil yet.

They signed up to make everyone else suffer and now they're shocked and dismayed that they're probably going to suffer too. I feel for everyone that has to share a country with people that would throw them to the wolves first chance they get while demanding unearned respect for themselves. But if I were religious, I'd tell these people to rot in hell.

Seriously, if sanity ever returns to the world, I hope that the lesson we walk away with is that right wingers, conservatives and religious fundies should never be allowed anywhere near positions of power again. Because when they have it, their whole aim is to uplift themselves and only themselves while fucking over everyone else in society.

Is this guy just a little ass fly hanging around Trump's crappy nappy or something?

Oh look, the kiddie fiddlers and book burners that accuse others of being pedos and anti free speech are accusing people of things again.

As a non-American, it's always looked to me like the Republicans manage to get their shit done whether they're in charge or not and the Democrats are just there to assure everyone they have a choice in voting and not much else.

The whole thing to me looks like a game of good cop / bad cop. Bad cop comes along beats the shit out you, and then good cop comes along to give you a cup of weak shit coffee as a consolation for your black eye and says something unconvincing about being unhappy with bad cop's behaviour, before letting bad cop back in to beat the shit out of you some more.

And for every cycle of that, bad cop achieves his goals while good cop just acts as a glorified tea lady that tries to make sure you don't have any hard feelings about bad cop.

shifted to the point where a double Sieg Heil at your president's inauguration is within normal discourse

Haha thank you. I'm not even American but to me it's pretty shocking to find out that this place, world of all instances, is too 'extreme' for people. Maybe I really am a dirty radical but I think that if people who consider themselves democrats are still fucking clutching their pearls about the left wing being too left wing while Elon Musk does open nazi salutes and trans people get their rights and dignity stripped away, then it's no wonder the USA is so fucked.

You guys clearly need a new political party because your choices are overt right wingers, or spineless right wingers that like to pretend they represent the left.

Edit: maybe the bad men will see the light if we all hold hands and sing kumbaya. I'm sure that all of the people who are already finding themselves victims to this will thank you for taking the high road and not scaring too many centrists.

Yeah but what about the price of eggs?