@shonalika @Yza @AgathaSorceress this. Without exception, any and all online communities with a “no politics” rule I’ve seen turned out to be a trashfire (usually I see that rule as a red flag and stay away from them in the first place, but there have been some where I’ve been willing to give them a chance, for example because they’re the only community for a niche interest out there). The “no politics” rule always turns out to be “no politics except for those positions which the mods agree with and see as the default” (aka the ones that hold in place/reproduce systems of oppression). I’ve once been thrown out of a guild in a game because I criticized the antifeminist trash of a video someone posted in their discord. Apparently in the mods eyes posting the video was fine (because that’s just discussion of video games! Nevermind the fact that most of it consists of antifeminist talking points and some pretty insidious sexism (the “women can’t make dark and gritty games!” kind), they don’t even recognize it as politics because they agree with it) but my criticism of it, that was making it political, and was also in their eyes, and I kid you not, “sexism against men”. I swear to god these spaces are always moderated by and to a large part consist of the most unreflected people who refuse to engage with anything that could reveal to them or call into question their many bigoted ideas which they remain willfully ignorant of. “No politics” always boils down to a space that is not allowing any criticism, and where marginalized people always have to walk on eggshells and just ignore the countless microaggressions without complaint, while privileged people get to say and do the most ignorant, oppressive and hurtful shit comfortably, without having their feelings hurt by having it pointed out to them what harm they are doing, without shattering the illusion they have that they are not bigoted/racist/sexist/queermisic/ableist/ect, the illusion that bigotry is only done by their idea of bigots, aka a few easily recognizable weird “political” people at the margins of society. Eventually the marginalized people have enough of that shit and either leave quietly or say fuck it and break that “no politics” rule and call out all the bullshit, at which point they are painted as the evil villain who is “bringing up politics” and they get kicked out of the space.
I feel like “no politics” spaces are spaces where necessary conflict is always brewing below the surface, and issues are never acknowledged or addressed. They are full of passive-aggressiveness at best, and echo chambers for the most privileged people… I was about to say at worst but that’s just what they usually are. I have never seen a single one that wasn’t absolutely awful.
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