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Do you browse hexbear or have an account in hexbear?
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this post was submitted on 12 May 2025
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Asklemmy
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hexbear is just fine. the "problem" with them is that they are leftists. same with lemmygrad or to a lesser extent lemmy.ml
i predict some people will hate a lot on them here, but you should simply just go talk to them and decide for yourself what you think of it.
The other "problem" is that they were their own isolated place for a while which had an attitude of just laughing at or insulting libs instead of engaging (which is perfectly fine for an isolated website, where liberal intruders aren't welcome), and upon federation suddenly became the largest instance at the time and many kept up that same shitposty dirtbag attitude, like posting PPB or just telling people to fuck off in reply to pro-capitalist arguments. So they quickly earned a collective bad reputation as rude trolls.
I was forced to "talk to them" when they were still federated and it was horrible. It's totally fine to have a political opinion, but it's another to turn every comment section into a warzone. Even responses to random memes would somehow turn into a political debate and due to their high user count and black and white thinking this quickly turned into them attacking anyone who disagreed even slightly with their views. Hexbear were making sure that anyone who isn't a tankie had no reason to be on Lemmy because they'd be haunted every time they'd share their opinion.
I'm all for having a normal exchange of thoughts, but this is like sitting in a room with 90% extreme leftists and getting swarmed and called a stupid lib the moment you dare to introduce some nuance. I'm still more left wing than probably 70% or 80% of the Netherlands and yet I'd relate better to the average center-right voter than to these nuts
What a crock. They're "leftists" in the same way that MAGA people are just "free thinkers." I can't say I've ever even see a hexbear user make any leftist comments or points of view. From what I've seen, they mostly push Chinese and Russian government propaganda under with the facade of being 'communist' (again never have I seen any mentions of actual communist economic philosophy from any of their users just anti-western, pro Russian/Chinese government talking points). I don't even have any issue with anti-western sentiment but when you're trying to pretend to be the 'good guy' while being Putin's mouthpiece, similar to Trump, I'm going to call you on your bullshit.
i'm literally seeing they say leftist things all day every day.
for some reason i knew this thread would derail very quick, hence why i called op to see it for themself and at least get the idea from someone who isnt an anticommunist like yourself.
(also you gotta admit its pretty ironic that trump is uniting the whole world against the us empire while also destroying it from within)
You knew it would derail very quickly because that was your intention with your previous comment trying to paint these people as if they're a bunch of innocent victims being marginalized for being 'leftist'. They're not victims, and they're not leftist. They're the same people you would have seen hanging out in /r/The_Donald or 4Chan ten years ago, who only leave their cave to stir up crap, spread disinformation, and brigade others, only now they're cosplaying as leftists on a new platform.
I'm not surprised that you're pleased with Trump as him, Putin, and Xi are all birds of a feather who want to control all the power and wealth of the world. These sure don't seem like the type of icons communists would flock toward if you ask me.
Is this AI generated? Hexbear was around before the Lemmy fediverse even existed. They were on a forked version of Lemmy without acitivitypub for the longest time. If their sole desire was to brigade, isolating themselves doesn't seem the way to go. Also, they were the first large Lemmy community so who is really brigading, the new people from Reddit or them?
We also know where they were close to 10 years ago it was /r/chapotraphouse lmao
Also, about half their community is trans. Do you really think so many trans people are Trump fans?
Authoritarian leftist things.
A lot of people on non ml/grad/hexbear instances are both anti-authoritarian and leftist, so they see hexbear as just as bad as capitalists in terms of being pro-opression
Those are called enlightened centrists and moral relativists, friend.
Not wanting to lick the boots of either the government or corporations makes you a centrist?
That's news to me
Lmao, what?
The problem I have with hexbear leftists is the same that I have with all the other ones and it is because they are all talk and no action.
If I'm included in there, I don't post online about actions I take because I can legally get fired due to my volunteer work in a socialist political party, and some of the community actions I have taken involved dozens of arrests. So I have good reasons to avoid disclosing info and getting dox'd.
I suppose this applies to many others.
I know for a fact that they've housed many trans people. They also had a shipment of grain with with their logo on it in Gaza. Pretty dope.
That's a big bag of wheat. Did they send a big spoon to go with it?
What size is "big" for wheat bags? Itcs 25kg, so about the same as dirt bags, IIRC.
They are the only instance I know of with an active mutual aid comm.
Me and some other hexbears meet weekly and provide free food to our community but we never post about it online. Idk, just feels wrong to brag about it or constantly bring it up so this is the first time I've ever mentioned it on lemmy
You have no idea what people get up to on the otherside of the keyboard. It's silly to think people would chronicle everything they do on a Lemmy instance
On the other hand, there's nothing wrong with encouraging and normalizing productive behaviors, like actions and reading theory. I've seen some communities normalize the whole "you're just an armchair posting online!" as a counterargument, or take digs at how they think most of the community don't read any theory. And I've seen a touch of the second on Hexbear, esp. when some bears visited Lemmygrad during the domain registration issue.
I don't brag about my antifascism and org work on Lemmy, but I really should start, to be honest. It's the little things behind the scenes that people don't realize gets done. Just make sure you're careful with what information you share, because fash could be looking.
Fash is looking, and cataloguing.
How the hell would you even know if they're "no action"?
most leftists i know have organized, wants to organize, or currently organize in a marxist organization. because thats pretty central to most leftist ideologies.
i understand that might be harder in the us, because its the epicenter of capitalism and all anticommunist propaganda, but thats generally kind of a strawman.
Organizing and wanting to organize are two entirely different things.
I want to be a billionaire with a large dick.
Elon, is that you?
thats ok, people are allowed to plan ahead for something they can't do right this second, its hard work you need time and energy for. participating in politics doesn't have the same barriers to entry as being born rich or with big genitals.
not having time, energy or money to pursue what they want is sometimes what radicalizes people in the first place.
You and the rest of the West, my friend, but there are only so many Congolese penises (ethically sourced, of course...) to go around!
How, exactly, does one ethically source a penis?
Huh? Take your commie concerns somewhere else!