The few conversations I’ve had there have been unproductive and inflammatory. While even in other instances when I’ve said something someone disagreed with they would at least support their statement. Also no one would tell me why the “Confused Unga Bunga” meme is racist but they keep accusing me of it. I’m all for open discussions but even the comments there are so angry and toxic.
Edit: I’m reading every comment and taking everything people said and considering all sides. My stance on the phrase has changed but I am still hesitant about giving hexbear a chance. I’ll sleep on it though.
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Unga Bunga is racist because of this shit.
The phrase has a long history as a racist dogwhistle, and is deeply tied with “Race Science” horseshit.
Yeah I saw that but only after I added terms like racist and offensive to my search result, meaning if I just type that phrase by itself into Google nothing. I also don’t watch any of that shit because it’s like you said, horseshit.
I will not use the phrase in the future though.
That’s the point of a dogwhistle. If they didnt want to whistle, they’d just yell a slur. The whole point of its racist usage being able to signal racist ideology to those in the know, while hiding behind people like yourself who insist on it being fine.
The preferred response to learning of a dogwhistle for the first time is to go “Oh shit, my bad, i wont use it again.” It costs you nothing and removes camo for actual detestable people.
When you argue to the effect “It not that racist”, you provide screening for racists, and are doing their work. Normalizing crypto racist shit attracts racists. For this reason, you will be dunked by bears.
I’ll chock this up to ignorance then. I will be adding that to my list of things not to say.
It happens to all of us at one time or another. We all live in societies scarred by hundreds of years of brainworms; Grew up with them, internalized them. It takes effort to just see the scope of these brainworms, much less change them.
Most of Hexbear is hyper-vigilant against this sort of thing because we’ve spent a lot of time deprogramming ourselves and others of these particular ideological blinders. We can get pretty defensive when our fash-detectors ping. I’m sorry if we’ve hit you with undeserved ire.
*chalk
Hey mate, I’m glad that we can agree that it’s racist. Whether it’s dated (replaced by other slurs) or not is a moot point, since its current usage as a term meaning ‘backwards’ calls upon the same racist tropes of barbarism and tribalism amongst black people.
If you’ve been able to avoid seeing the term used explicitly in this way til now, consider yourself fortunate, and now you are aware of its racist origins and current usage, please reconsider your advocacy of the word.
You’re right and I understand that now but maybe because I compartmentalized it differently in my head as different from “ooga booga” which is highly racist. Thanks for actually explaining it to me. Language is weird.
Also I have to say, I’m not the only one ‘actually’ explaining it to you. My comrades in this thread appear to have taken pains to unpack what’s wrong with your attitude and word choice multiple times before me. I just rephrased what they have by and large already said, so they deserve credit too.
Gimme 10 minutes, and yeah you put things in terms I could understand.
No worries. I’m glad we could resolve this. Please try to engage with the other comments in this thread with the same approach you afforded me. I assure you that each and every other poster in this thread is motivated first and foremost to dismantle harmful tropes.
We usually resort to ridicule and close ranks after people show no intent to engage with any one of us sincerely, like for example when posters ignore one person’s effortful response, only to take issue with another’s elsewhere in the thread.
I thought I was in a hexbear thread but I kept getting buzzwords thrown at me. It’s awfully jarring and did not help with me understanding the situation. I know it’s not an excuse but sometimes my autism makes it hard for me to see the proper path through the conversation.
All g. We probably wouldn’t call them buzzwords, since that implies that they’re ephemeral or faddish.
More often than not we’re using terminology that is specific to the left, or defined differently in leftist academia and discourse to the common usage (see, liberal, imperialism, etc.).
If you’re unsure about the meaning of a given word, it’s worth searching online first, then asking further in your replies if it still doesn’t make sense. Citing your sources is invaluable so you and your interlocutor can interrogate the same info and talk from the same page. We have a (relatively inactive) comm for these types of questions too, and a space for neurodiverse members too.
I don’t have autism so feel wary giving specific advice on how to navigate. However I do find that signalling -why- you are asking a certain question (as you have done elsewhere in this thread), and providing further context, can help people understand your thinking behind a given comment or post, and may help against them assuming the worst and responding with a knee jerk reaction. We get many people trying to cause trouble (‘wreckers’) and some people consider it better to shoot first and ask questions later, since it saves time if the person turns out to be malicious.
I was fortunate to have lurked for a very long time, way back to r/srs and the r/srs rehab equivalent comm. It’s been a long journey but I’m glad you’re asking the same question I had around then, as it shows self awareness.
Have a good one.
Tomato tomato, alternatively, if it walks like a slur, talks like a slur etc. etc.
Still waiting for you to block this instance.
It is 😚
Good.
Go away.
What the actual FUCK? I’ve never seen that shit before, and never want to see that shit again. Offensive.
Interesting, I haven’t personally had any run ins with Hexbears, but everything I’ve read from them in non-Hexbear communities has generally looked fine to me. Sure, they argue hard and in detail when it comes to anything political and they can also be a little edgy, but I haven’t seen any of them be assholes, abusive, argue in bad faith, etc. So far I have appreciated their contributions. It probably helps that I generally agree with (many of?) them politically as far as I can tell, but despite that, if I saw them being assholes I would make notice because I don’t believe in defending the people in your team even when they’re doing wrong. I would be more likely to call them for taking the wrong approach instead. Do you have any example threads that demonstrate what you’re describing?
What I’ve personally seen is that the moment they’re mentioned they descend en masse on a thread. Most comments are fairly innocuous but there’s always a few that are overly aggressive, and if nothing else the sheer volume can be overwhelming.
They don’t and they never do
Not really. Since we don’t have the ability to instance block ourselves yet I changed instances to one not federating with them to avoid them and similar authoritarian instances like lemmygrad and exploding heads. I swing pretty far left on the political spectrum myself, but there’s a difference between that and simping for dictators, genocide denial, and other problematic things. I don’t even get it, China and Russia can hardly be described as leftist by any definition but they’ll bend over backwards to defend anything they do, and try to change the subject to another country instead if they can’t.
I really don’t understand the defense of Russia. Like if you are claiming to be communist, it’s arguably the worst example of exploitative capitalism going right now. Or they claim it’s because of colonialism while ignoring Russia’s history of conquering and controlling any nation near them.
Hey everybody, here’s the very first usage of “unga bunga”
Only those toxic Hexbears could possibly criticize this
Vile.
Edit: Yeah I see your point.
I assure you, racists have not forgotten.
Really, you don’t have to defend it.
Edit: removed the snark because you do appear to be taking criticism, which is something someone with terminal reactionary brainworms does not do. Self criticism helps us grow and get better opinions, and I hope you’ll reevaluate Hexbear differently now that you see where we’re coming from
Racist tropes don’t have an expiration date what are you talking about
It has more lasting relevance than your “my wholesome
buddies totally were just talking about a caveman video game from the 90s that never actually says Unga Bunga in it” claims.
EDIT: Seems a 90s video game may have had a racist dogwhistle in it. Which absolves all uses of a racist utterance forever and ever!
https://youtu.be/itnahhfiu0c?t=129
Looks like you lied, again.
You didn’t block this instance if you’re still scrambling to cover your ass.
I can’t with my app on mobile(unless it’s a recent)☠️ I’ve just been manually blocking each community as I see them. Being wrong is not the same as lying.
You can be wrong and lie in alternating fashion, and that’s what you’ve done here so far.
Go away already.
I showed you where in the game he said it, and didn’t change anything I said though, not counting editing my original comment. I’m willing to no longer use the phrase I just couldn’t stand you jumping on me with buzzwords and accusations. I do try to be a decent human, but I’m just some internet stranger to you. I was genuinely confused wanted help understanding it and you just dogpiled me.
It was a racist utterance from way before that and your pretenses of innocent wholesome smol bean gamerness run awfully thin if that’s what the entirety of your case to keep uttering it comes from.
Again, you haven’t blocked this instance yet. And you should.
Uhh, I’m trying to apologize and grow from this, I’m explaining my position and where the statement came from, not justifying it. I needed you to know where I came and I wanted to know where you came from so we could reach an understanding. I can’t block instances in voyager. At least I tried.
if you’re legit and you want to grow and reflect, from now on in this thread, only ask questions and do not argue, digest what you read and learn for a while, and then you can argue like, tomorrow or whenever, if you still want to. anything else would be reactive and unhelpful for your growth, and likely result in you digging in and growing stubborn on the issue
For real, this is not going to be healthy if you keep posting at this rate, if you’re being genuine
I was replying to your reply in another thread and thought Id check your post history only to see youre in like 5 interactions at once, thats now how you self crit or reflect chief
What if ‘log off and touch grass’ but actually constructive and well-intentioned advice.
You may be right, I just felt the strong need to defend my reasoning. I’m just trying to learn and I’m reading every comment and considering my response and even went back and changed some of my statements that looking back are dumb.
You don’t have to fix everything right this second, in fact trying to is likely to break everything worse. If you really do reflect and grow here, you will be welcomed and encouraged, but not if you go down swinging on a hill you “felt a strong need to defend”. I am not saying that in any way disparagingly, I’ve been there. You may not be wrong for feeling this way, but acting on it may very well be a mistake in retrospect
If you decide to take my advice, edit your post here to say: I’ve been given a lot to reflect on, I’m going to disengage and do that" or similar (include the word disengage though) and then no one will pile on, and may even reach out
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/itnahhfiu0c?t=129
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
The N word had its first documented use in the early 17th century so it’s clearly okay to use nowadays
Historical usage informs modern usage. There are still people very negatively affected by outdated concepts that have carried through into modern language.
Like women being associated with the word “hysterical” based on the idea that “hysteria” was a “wandering uterus” and caused behavioural problems. That idea is first found four thousand years ago in ancient Egyptian documents - yet still has influence on our language and thinking today.
Time is not always enough to make poison innocuous.
You could probably argue something like that, but perpetuating something so deeply rooted in racism isn’t worth it when the payoff is… Meme funnies.
Here is an alternative Piped link(s): https://piped.video/watch?v=ifv-3aSEckA
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source, check me out at GitHub.
this thread is on the front page of hexbear now, it will be a fun one
I don’t understand all the hate. They’re just fucking funny. I have a great time there.
Maybe if you’re not a Leftist then there’s no appeal.
They do a lot of harassment and say some hateful shit. It’s not all jokes.
we have fun here
we do a little trolling
skill issue
We have my hampter. His name is Biggs. His favorite hobby is biting my fingers and calling me a virgin on the internet
That’s crazy, does he have a friend named wedge.
I don’t think we’ve got Wedge but we’ve got
and I’m pretty sure Barrett’s around somewhere too
Not that I know of but you’d have to ask the man himself
@Biggs@hexbear.net, GET IN HERE
Yes, we have the best emojis and also movie nights
Movie nights?
https://live.hexbear.net/c/movies
Playing now in fact!
Tonight is “The Craft”(1996) & “John Wick:Chapter 4”(2023)
Tomorrow is Anime night & Sundays are Cheesy Slop Night. Not sure whats been queued for those tho, not my current wheelhouse.
The heck, this sounds dope as fuck haha.
We watch movies together online 🤫
Dammit, you got me with the froggy chair. I don’t care for politics whatsoever, but as long as you come in with the froggy chair you’ll have something worthy.
I subbed !urbanism@hexbear.net and honestly, it’s too much image and not enough text for my druthers, but the kids are all right.
I’m still tripping on how the phrase “seizing the means of production” doesn’t sound good to most of y’all, but if a mf said “give the billionaires the guillotine treatment” there’s a lot of people like “hell yeah bro.”
Its less the socialism that users have a problem with and more the genocide apology and dictator simping.
Any examples of genocide apology by hexbear users?
People invariably point to the Uyghurs and apologisms about China in general. I’m sure that stuff exists, just as it does in any leftist space, but I’ve never interacted with it so I highly doubt it’s some great cause people pick up torches for. Then again maybe it is and I’ve just never seen it.
The question itself is inflammatory but there has generally been a good discussion. Locking instead of removing.
In my experience? No.
There’s nothing productive from over there
Literally during the time they were federated with Blahaj I ended up blocking almost 4 dozen of them for their absolute toxic behavior including being dismissive of genocide, simping for dictators, and who could forget their stance on Ukraine. Their stance basically boils down to letting Russia steam roll them.
There’s nothing productive from being federated with them.
No, they’re bad people. Their whole point with federation was to troll other instances.