I have been banned from unpopularopinion for exposing person defending genocide and use of human shields by IDF.
One of the users in unpopularopinion thread was complaining about someone calling him a āfascistā
https://feddit.uk/comment/17531487
In response I did paste a screenshot of his comment claiming IDF are not using human shields, it is Hamas who do that:
https://feddit.uk/comment/17529782
ā¦ And the mod of unpopularopinion banned me. I can only guess he is a another genocide apologist.
BPR.
You did the right thing by calling out OpinionHaverās hypocrisy. And you did it the right way - exposing why they were called a fascist, in a thread they do Reddit style āI dun unrrurstandā sealioning and āackshyuallyā red herrings over and over to defend ethnic cleansing. If you only posted that and walked away, Iād be saying āPTBā.
However that is not just what you did. You were consistently aggressive in that thread, and your mod history shows entries like āuncivilā, āDerailingā, ācivilityā, āRude/toxicā, āhistory of netiquette violationsā, āconsistent history of toxic behaviorā across multiple instances. So even if the target was justified, youāre still a problem user, and if a mod lets this sort of hostile user (like you) go rogue in a comm, the comm becomes a shitfest.
Plus youāre a single āI can only guessā away from witch hunting = calling the mod āgenocide apologistā on weak grounds (removals from a single thread). If you want to accuse someone, do it like you did towards OpinionHaver.
You, sunzu2 and OpinionHaver were derailing the thread. The mod shouldāve either nuked the whole comment chain or left it alone; by selectively deleting you+sunzu2ās comments but not OpinionHaverās, the mod is arbitrarily giving them a political voice in an allegedly āno politicsā comm, but not you or sunzu2.
If an admin donāt want to be called a genocide apologist he should ban genocide apologies
People enabling fuckheads are obviously bad, but should not be assumed to be themselves fuckheads. āA is shitā and āB is shitā does not mean āA is Bā.
This is important, because otherwise we end not blaming the enablers properly - they arenāt like the thief who steals your junk, theyāre more like the braindead muppet who keeps the door open.
EDIT: ā¦nevermind, I retract my point. Weāre talking about LW; Zionist apologia goes rampant there. Even if OP themself didnāt bring this up, itās common knowledge already.
What is this gibberish?
Did you see the edit? Now, hereās your answer: no, it is not gibberish. Iāll explain the reasoning.
If we stick to that thread alone, there are at least two possible explanations for why the mod acted that way:
There are more, but letās stick to those two. Both enable someone whoās doing genocide apology. In both, the mod is being an enabler. But only #2 counts as condoning that genocide apology. #1 is simply being damn sloppy.
However, based on the mod actions in a single thread, we have no grounds to know if itās #1 or #2. And we shouldnāt assume. You donāt accuse people based on assumptions.
Hereās where the edit comes in. What I said above doesnāt apply because itās common knowledge that the LW admins+mods do jack shit against Zionist apologia. Thatās why I retracted my point - because it isnāt how the mod acted in that thread, itās a consistent behaviour across multiple threads.
Is this clear now? TL;DR: I was saying āOP, bring up more evidence before you accuse someoneā, then ānevermind, the evidence is public knowledgeā.
I did paste verbatim screenshot and mod was well aware about the content - defending IDF using human shields cannot be mistaken with anything else.
So yes, we have grounds - he was well aware.
Fair.
See edit.
OpinionHaver was making claims that did not pass basic scanning of his comment history.
I linked up his comment for context. I donāt think thatās derailing. Thatās how good discourse happens. In fact, it is my opinion, that these ārulesā are generally used to censor content, which is what happened here at least in my opinion.
But sure, if entire comment thread got nuke, it would be harder for me to make these claims.
But week in, week out around here we see these patterns of censorship around topics that are sensitive to the regime but we still pretend as if these āmodsā are āmoddingā and not censoring.
By far your comment is the least problematic of the bunch, and itās only a problem because itās in the middle of that ruckus - it is further derailing the discussion, even if not the one starting it.
Personally Iād keep it on, because I agree with you. For me itās a matter of transparency - if you remove stuff here and there suddenly nobody knows who said what. But I still see grounds for nuking the whole comment chain (including the top comment), to avoid a flamewar and make sure the rules are enforced.
Sadly youāre right.
No. I mostly only posted this genocide denier his own words. Calling someone defending use of human shields a āgenocide apologistā is factual, not aggressive.
Firstly, this is irrelevant. Secondly when you get to the details, most of these comments are made by infamous feddit.org mods - who very recently came out of the closet and started banning reasonable criticism of Israel. Fill your gaps.
I am who I am. I say what I think.
See my other comment. I did paste screenshot of his disgusting defence of IDF, verbatim. This triggered the mod who called it āsmearā and he doubled down on calling it āsmearā again in this very thread. If calling a guy like this a āgenocide apologistā is a smear for the mod, thatās very telling about mod own views.
Youāre omitting the part where you call a third party āan idiotā, and that your answers to the genocide denier were both passive aggressive as fuck. (Source, modlog.. For the pass-aggro Ctrl+F āsweetieā)
Itās arguable if your aggressiveness in this specific case was justified. But by claiming that you werenāt being aggressive you are simply lying. And calling people stupid by proxy - do you expect them to buy your lie?
No, it is not. It shows that youāll likely to behave like an arse in any community that allows it. Mods can and should use a userās history to know how to handle them, once they violate the rules of a community.
Modlog, again:
None of those involves either the feddit.org mods or the Zionist Reich, but in all of those youāre being aggressive towards other users. I could post another thousand examples, that modlog is full of that.
You are lying yet again.
You are a fucking arsehole, and someone without the dignity to admit theyāre a fucking arsehole.
The problem is how you say it. Youāre a fucking arsehole, clearly unable to voice your views without sounding like a pissy manchild. And also a liar based on the comment Iām replying to.
Please do a favour for everyone and go back to Reddit, youāll be in more suitable company there.
Well documented comment
Wonderful retort!
Again, this is irrelevant. Not part of the exchange I have been banned for and it was a reply to him calling me an" embarrassment". For the context, it was a guy defending genocide denier. He also posted in this thread - I suggest you have a look.
Firstly I disagree with that. Secondly this is again irrelevant - being āpassive aggressiveā is not a bannable offence.
I completely disagree with that. None of my comments were aggressive.
It is completely and utterly irrelevant. You may be an angel in one community and the devil in another. If there was a Israel/IDF supporting community the guy I was responding to would be an angel.
Nope. Now click each of them for a context. I stand behind every single one of them.
Stop accusing me of lying.
Now, my answer to this should be āgo and fuck yourselfā. But since you put your comments so nicely I am going to pat you on your head and just say āyes, sweetieā š
If anyone is aggressive here, including name calling it is you. Now, disengage.
deleted by creator
I donāt see the hypocrisy youāre accusing me of here, but Iām more than happy to clear up any potential confusion. Iāve interacted with you here before, and I know that - unlike OP - youāre capable of debating in good faith. So if you genuinely see any logical errors in my reasoning or behavior that you think are worth criticizing, Iām open to hearing it.
Geneva:
The source you are discussing:
It is a human shield walking into a house in case there are bombs or gunmen in the house, in order to render the military forces outside immune from military operations.
They either force the bombs to explode or gunmen in the house to open fire on the civilian, thereby exposing the gunmen to counter-fire with minimized risk to the military personnel, or they force gunmen to avoid opening fire at all.
Just because you dress the civilian in military fatigues does not change this. They are human shields.
My understanding is that the correct interpretation of that is youāre not allowed to, for example, strike military targets with missiles if there are civilians around. If one then doesnāt fight fair, they can abuse this by intentionally placing military infrastructure near civilian buildings - even schools and hospitals - knowing that this will, at least to some extent, deter the enemy from striking. In other words, using civilians as human shields.
In my view, whatās being described here is a violation of Part 4, Article 147: ācompelling a protected person to serve in the forces of a hostile Powerā - which, letās not forget, is equally evil and indefensible.
Rendering immune from military operations also involves posing civilians as military personnel for the purpose of distracting enemy combatants and drawing their fire. Think the Jokerās plan from the Dark Knight - if you put fake guns and fake uniforms on civilians for the purpose of having the enemy attack them instead of the real target that is a human shield.
They are not serving. That is conscription, and would involve arming the personnel or otherwise having them perform the expected duties of military personnel. They are being placed unarmed intentionally in the line of fire in a way that military personnel would never be used, so they are not being forced to serve.
Fair point - canāt really argue with that. I guess it counts then. I was wrong.
I never heard an hypocrite admiting that is a hypocrite
Refer to this discussion FelixCress linked.
Up to your top comment (āIām not sure āhuman shieldā is the correct term here.ā [ā¦]), you could say that you were just arguing semantics. However, your replies to leftytighty and Keeponstalin show otherwise:
What you said is, effectively, a defence of the IDF, by denying that that specific event counts as a specific war crime, and insistent (~twice) shift of the focus to Hamasā actions. Even if you say āIām not defending IDFā. It does give people good grounds to call you a fascist, so your comment in the other thread is hypocrisy.
Itās still unclear to me where I was being hypocritical. Disagreeing on the definition of a term isnāt hypocrisy, and I would still argue that the example used in the article - of sending Palestinian non-combatants to clear out buildings - doesnāt fit the definition of a human shield under the Geneva Conventions, which is: āutilizing the presence of a civilian or other protected person to render certain points, areas or military forces immune from military operations.ā Rather, it more accurately fits the definition found in Part 4, Article 147: ācompelling a protected person to serve in the forces of a hostile Power.ā
As for the optics of criticizing Hamas but not the IDF - I understand how someone might draw false conclusions about my underlying motives. But to suggest that Iād be fine with the IDF doing something I would criticize Hamas for - let alone the accusations of fascism - is simply untrue. Of course I condemn all mistreatment of civilians, regardless of whoās responsible. That should go without saying. When I said that Iām not defending the IDF I meant that Iām not defending their use of human shields or otherwise mistreating civilians. Not that Iām not defending their broader goal in the conflict. What I got (implicitly) called fascist for that Felix is refering to had nothing to do with the Israeli-Palestine conflict. That happened in this thread.
If someone holds mistaken beliefs about me, thatās one thing - but once they start publicly spreading falsehoods, thatās where I draw the line.
What Felix says in the opening post here is either a blatant lie or a total misunderstanding.
At no point have I defended or advocated for genocide, or for the use of human shields - nor is that the reason they got banned for.
You do realise youāre using here the exact same sealion as you did in that thread, right? As in: āI donāt understandā followed by a gross distortion of what someone else said.
As already explained, the issue is not just disagreeing on the definition.
I donāt. Iām genuinely trying but I donāt.
What gross distortion? What exactly is the issue, then? Itās not hypocrisy or sealioning Felix was accusing me of. I honestly struggle to make sense of what Iām even being accused of here. Everyone just seems to be assuming bad faith, while Iām simply trying to figure out what I did wrong this time.
If itās about me being annoying, pedantic, or whatever - fine, I donāt disagree. But my issue is with claims about me or my beliefs that just arenāt true. And if they are true, Iām sincerely hoping someone would point them out to me.
Given that you claim to not defend the IDF, and I donāt know your āmotivationsā or āintentionsā or whateverĀ¹, Iāll treat you as genuinely confused.
What's "sealioning", in a nutshell.
Sealioning is a debate tactic where someone keeps engaging in a debate through things like this:
Ultimately, a sea lion makes the other side shut up or snap out - not through valid argumentation, but by shredding their patience. In both cases the sea lion can claim a victory.
Now, look at your comments in the linked discussion - because they provide context to this one. And let us pretend that the IDF was indeed committing another war crime than using human shields, i.e. that your āackshyuallyā was indeed correctĀ². Hereās what you see:
The only reasonable way to explain your behaviour there is sealioning: you shift the focus into semantics and Hamas, while claiming that youāre just asking questions, and not addressing what others saidā¦
And before you say ābut my intentionsā - remember, the only person who knows whatās inside your head is yourselfĀ¹.
Now look at this thread. I said that youāre still sealioning because:
You were sealioning back then, claim ignorance, distort what someone else saysā¦
I said those things. FelixCress is claiming that youāre a fascist.
It is not about being pedantic or annoying. Itās about how your words are interpreted.
And, if youāre genuinely not sealioning, a few tips on how to avoid being labelled as one here:
NOTES:
Fair enough. Iāve been a smart-ass my whole life, so Iām not going to argue against that.
No issues with that either. That doesnāt exactly refute my point, however.
This I donāt agree with, and your definition of it seems somewhat strange - especially the part about distorting what others say, which I donāt admit to either.
Sealioning is a type of trolling or harassment that consists of pursuing people with relentless requests for evidence, often tangential or previously addressed, while maintaining a pretense of civility and sincerity (āIām just trying to have a debateā), and feigning ignorance of the subject matter. - Wikipedia
Saying āI donāt understandā isnāt sealioning if I genuinely donāt understand. If someone doesnāt like what Iām saying, I donāt engage with vague accusations - I ask them to be more specific so I can respond to what theyāre actually saying, not what I imagine theyāre saying.
Iāve only claimed that āhuman shieldā doesnāt fit the definition in this specific example, but when people provided examples of other cases, I didnāt claim they werenāt true. I condemn the IDFās use of human shields just as harshly as I do when Hamas uses them.
To me, it seems hypocritical when people criticize one side for something the other side is demonstrably worse at - but Iāll grant you that, in this specific case, Iām assuming bad faith when I really canāt know anyoneās intentions or underlying motives any more than they can know mine.
Also, saying that I ādefend the IDFā is a pretty vague claim. Yes, there are more things I might defend the IDF for than Hamas - but that doesnāt mean I blanket-approve everything they do. I donāt defend the use of human shields, and I donāt defend genocide. You may argue that Iām āeffectivelyā doing so, but since thatās not my intention, I donāt accept that accusation. I could just as easily flip that around and say people here are defending Hamas - which would equally misrepresent their views in most cases.
Now, as youāve probably noticed, I tend to be a bit provocative in the way I comment - thatās intentional. Like trolls, I am baiting for a reaction. The difference is that: 1. I actually believe what Iām saying. 2. I donāt act in bad faith (or at least not with bad intentions). 3. Getting a reaction isnāt my end goal - I use it as a tactic to get people to engage with me. I also intentionally donāt tend to caveat my points because othewise my every response would just be a list of what Iām not meaning/saying.
I still stand firm that Felix has made multiple false accusations against me and has consistently behaved in extremely bad faith from the very beginning. Itās pretty clear to me that this all started when he asked for examples of extremism on Lemmy, and one of the multiple examples I provided was of someone advocating for the abolition of Israel - something he clearly had a strong emotional reaction to. That reaction seemed to prompt him to dig through my post history, looking for anything to support the assumptions he had already made about me.
At no point did it feel like it was about the actual content of my claims - it was a personal smear campaign, not an argument. I think that compairing the lenght of our moderation histories is quite revealing.
Finally, as a side note - I hate responding to multiple points like this in one post, but I donāt see any other way to address everything you brought up. If you still want to continue the conversation, Iād much rather focus on one or two specific claims you feel most strongly about. But if not, I just want to thank you for taking the time to write a thoughtful response - and above all, for your civility. Social media needs more people like you.
Then Iāll focus specifically on sealioning. This instance is heavily politicised (and thatās good), so plenty people here can discuss IDF, Hamas, the ongoing Nakba etc. better than I do.
Those bullet points are just examples of sea lion behaviour. The common elements between all of them is that 1) they arenāt valid argumentation, and 2) they force the āsealionedā to provide pointless explanations, until they lose their patience; and distorting what others say is a way to do it.
You might have done it either āaccidentallyā or āon purposeā, but your claim does distort what I said. Because, again, it is not about disagreeing on definitions; itās that it was obvious why people were calling you fascist, even if your comment shows bewilderment about it.
Wikipedia itself lists multiple definitions. The core is the same, and shared with the definition Iāve provided.
Itās a red flag, you know? On itself it might not be enough to say āthis is a sealion with 100% chanceā but, together with other red flags, you can pretty much spot a sealion with damn good accuracy.