Hello World,
following feedback we have received in the last few days, both from users and moderators, we are making some changes to clarify our ToS.
Before we get to the changes, we want to remind everyone that we are not a (US) free speech instance. We are not located in US, which means different laws apply. As written in our ToS, we’re primarily subject to Dutch, Finnish and German laws. Additionally, it is our discretion to further limit discussion that we don’t consider tolerable. There are plenty other websites out there hosted in US and promoting free speech on their platform. You should be aware that even free speech in US does not cover true threats of violence.
Having said that, we have seen a lot of comments removed referring to our ToS, which were not explicitly intended to be covered by our ToS. After discussion with some of our moderators we have determined there to be both an issue with the ambiguity of our ToS to some extent, but also lack of clarity on what we expect from our moderators.
We want to clarify that, when moderators believe certain parts of our ToS do not appropriately cover a specific situation, they are welcome to bring these issues up with our admin team for review, escalating the issue without taking action themselves when in doubt. We also allow for moderator discretion in a lot of cases, as we generally don’t review each individual report or moderator action unless they’re specifically brought to admin attention. This also means that content that may be permitted by ToS can at the same time be violating community rules and therefore result in moderator action. We have added a new section to our ToS to clarify what we expect from moderators.
We are generally aiming to avoid content organizing, glorifying or suggesting to harm people or animals, but we are limiting the scope of our ToS to build the minimum framework inside which we all can have discussions, leaving a broader area for moderators to decide what is and isn’t allowed in the communities they oversee. We trust the moderators judgement and in cases where we see a gross disagreement between moderatos and admins’ criteria we can have a conversation and reach an agreement, as in many cases the decision is case-specific and context matters.
We have previously asked moderators to remove content relating to jury nullification when this was suggested in context of murder or other violent crimes. Following a discussion in our team we want to clarify that we are no longer requesting moderators to remove content relating to jury nullification in the context of violent crimes when the crime in question already happened. We will still consider suggestions of jury nullification for crimes that have not (yet) happened as advocation for violence, which is violating our terms of service.
As always, if you stumble across content that appears to be violating our site or community rules, please use Lemmys report functionality. Especially when threads are very active, moderators will not be able to go through every single comment for review. Reporting content and providing accurate reasons for reports will help moderators deal with problematic content in a reasonable amount of time.
?? So, discussing jury nullification by itself, or suggesting ‘crimes that have not yet happened’ - itself is not a violation (i.e. someone should disturb the peace) but suggesting that “someone should disturb the peace and everyone on the jury, should they be prosecuted, should advocate for jury nullification” is a violation of the ToS?
I’m not understanding that part.
Specifically where it relates to violent crime.
Essentially it is supposed to make statements like the following a rule violation:
“If someone murdered [fictional person] they would totally get acquitted because any jury would just nullify the charges.”
While the following sentence would not be a violation of TOS:
“The murderer of UHC CEO Brian Thompson should get acquitted via Jury Nullification because [reasons] and this is super dope.”
The first example could be read as a call to violence, while the 2nd is not calling for a crime.
As I understand it “All future jurors in money laundring cases should nullify, because tax evasion is… like… super cool” would also be legal, because money laundring is not a violent crime.
Mods could still remove it though, not for instance ToS but community rules.
They could remove it by flip of a coin
this was already covered. this is not a new change. if you write “someone should kill person XYZ” this is clearly a call for murder that we do not tolerate here. discussing jury nullification in the same context where murder or other violent crimes are suggested is what was clarified to be subject for moderator action.
It’s generally better to use generalized statements
Like “Nothing will meaningfully improve until the rich fear for their lives”
That’s just a historical fact
How’s this one?
“Thousands of families are crying tears of joy thanks to The Adjuster, who was wrong to save all those lives and improve society.”