Ash

tumblr just added an update that requires you to verify your age in order to view "mature content". I'm not sure how they do the verification (haven't yet checked), but given recent similar updates from things like Discord, it most likely involves sending them a photo of either your face or your ID.

In addition, over the past few months, and also years in the long-term, tumblr has been incorrectly marking things as mature content. These include:

Notifications about missing persons and requests for help

Posts about youth liberation

Posts about sex education

Posts about how the mature content is poorly implemented

Posts about being trans, more specifically about trans women and transmisogyny by both tumblr and users on tumblr

Non-sexual selfies by trans women/transfems

Trans womens'/transefems' ENTIRE BLOGS even if the blog contains no sexual content

Reblogs made by various blogs, mostly trans women, which add no additional content but somehow are marked as containing mature content, when the original post is not

Posts talking about racism and antiblackness both on and off tumblr

Posts by black people, especially black trans people, that are non-sexual

And likely many more I haven't seen

In essence, this update has mandated that a majority of users (within the UK and Brazil) must either a) submit their personal information to tumblr, a website whose moderation has been EXTREMELY biased against marginalised people and who I would not trust with my ID, or b) be excluded from absolutely all conversations tumblr decides are "mature content", whether they are actually sexual in nature or not. Furthermore, anyone not over 18 will also not be allowed to take part in these conversations, or even see them, or interact with many trans women or people of colour on this site, as tumblr decides.

This update is complete bullshit designed to censor and exclude marginalised people, poorly hidden under a guise of "protecting teenagers from sexual content", and they know it.

Its similar to why you cannot put bad people in a class of their own. The moment you do that you stop being able to see the bad things that the people closest to you do a la "my best friend couldn't have said that racist thing, they're not evil."

The moment you think you are immune from this type of backslide into right wing nonsense is the moment you stop questioning yourself enough to keep yourself from backsliding into right wing nonsense a la "I mean im not antiscience, im vaccinated, I just think that fluoride in our water supply is imparting children's ability to learn as fast as they otherwise could without it."

It's really easy to stop paying attention and suddenly find yourself surprised and confused by new things, new ways of things, what the kids these days are up to. And it's pretty human to react by saying "oh well, that's stupid, I hate these kids, things were fine the way we did them." And that's sorta the first step. That first kneejerk "I don't understand this and therefore feel negative about it."

But spending time around younger people, spending time online with people younger than you, people in different communities, it's a vaccination against that.

The secondary useful thing is to learn to research and assess data, this stuff thrives on kneejerk reactions. Does an article make you angry, is a person listed as being xyz without saying what the actual issue is? Check. Confirm it. Try to understand the u familiar in more detail and ask people who are experts in the subject with lived experience to help you if needed. Be immune to clickbait even if it is designed to affirm your anger. This emotional reaction is often targeted algorithmically to up engagement and polarise arguments.

You can absolutely still be angry and still have beliefs to fight for. That is important and valuable because anger informs justice. But it needs to be backed up by accurate info or you risk fruitlessly expending your energy on simply doing the media's work for them.

I do agree that spending time with younger people is wise. I read as quite childlike myself and I also don't have the supposed bad experience with Gen Z that get constantly thrown about, they are mostly much nicer than the boomers and better informed. I would say this is also important the other way around.

But this is just one example of not getting polarised by groups, people get radicalised and dehumanise others when they get marooned in one demographic. They also are typically happier because being scared and hateful towards others is not typically a pleasant state of mind. This also means if it is safe we might need to occasionally interact with people who make us annoyed or a bit uncomfortable for this reciprocity to happen, but that is much safer as part of a varied community as that will dilute the ability of that person to cause harm.

Is the best part that he got doxxed? No.

Is the best part that he got tracked down by a local and beaten? No.

Arrested on state at federal charges, looking at up to 5 years and 50K? Nope.

The best part is the local city council's reaction.

After the incident, another video went viral showing what appeared to be that man getting a beating. The Maui Police Department said they had no record of any reports of disorderly conduct or assault related to the monk seal incident.