Lemmy.world reportedly bans people for being anti-Zionist. At the same time, numerous human rights organizations have documented that Zionist policies and actions amount to crimes against humanity (e.g., forced displacement, collective punishment, apartheid).
If banning opposition to crimes against humanity is itself anti-humanity, doesn’t that make lemmy.world complicit? How do you reconcile defending a platform that silences critics while atrocities continue?
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The kind of Bkue MAGA conservative dems who are on .world are the lowest form of scum. They are honestly worse than the trailer trash who vote for Trump and the republicans. I pray for the day we push all these assholes up against the wall.
Zionism isnt judaism and acting like it is is a huge red flag.
A lot of Lemmy.world users sign up because they believe it to be a “neutral” instance, and just want a drop-in FOSS reddit replacement. The truth is that Lemmy.world is highly partisan, particularly of the establishment DNC variety. Liberal zionism, anti-communism, and more are the mainstays of Lemmy.world admins and moderators, but many users don’t realize it until much later. Further, Lemmy.world defederates and censors communist and other leftist instances, creating a walled garden where their users cannot even see opposition.
Which is particularly ironic when they go HURR DURR .ml HURR DURR TANKIE AUTHORITARIAN HURR DURR OPPOSING OPINIONS NOT ALLOWED.
Other than the tankie part what do you do differently?
Yep, agreed!
So, what you’re saying is… It is a drop-in FOSS reddit replacement.
Yes, haha, but in ways more similar than being FOSS would imply. .world isn’t neutral.
As I said when they posted this same thing in hexbear it is very funny and ironic that they are on a piefed instance which was designed to be exactly what .world has become with extra guardrails to ensure it is that.
Yep, that’s a whole other can of woms, haha.
Kinda the same can of worms if you really think about it. The nature of these platforms is that if they don’t have communists in moderation they will inevitably all turn into Nazi bars because liberals can’t even fight fascism in places they control because of their obsession with civility and “free marketplace of ideas” nonsense.
Yep, well-said! That’s why liberalism cannot fight fascism, and instead enables it.
Question. Does it matter which you login to all that much? Many of my subs are not world… but my login is. Has been for a long time. I never really think about it.
Federation matters quite a lot, for example you cannot see anything on Hexbear.net or Lemmygrad.ml, because .world blocks communist instances. If you want a generalist instance, lemmy.zip is often recommended and more widely federated. Alternatively, find an instance that aligns with your interests and scroll locally as you like.
it is an issue if any of the subs that are outside of your instance are defederated
Is that piece of shit admin still around? If so, then the answer is yes.
When the admins themselves take offense to anti-Zionist slogans without them being directed to them, you can take their word for it that they are indeed what they are taking offense for
no
What happens to them when someone comes along who is pro-zion, but anti-genocide, for the prevention and punishment of genocide, against collective punishment, against false flag attacks, against population displacement & forced relocation, against pro-rape state policy, against jingoist expansionism, against ethno-supremacism, against anti-democratic coups, against dehumanisation? Brains get fried? Or carry-on-dogma without nuance as usual?
You can’t be pro-zionism and anti-genocide
Depends on whose definition, which version of the newspeak dictionary, one uses. I try avoid the language of the oppressor, but it’s not easy. Many do not even realise the etymology, let alone the Orwellian perversion that has them throw a baby out with the bathwater.
Zion’s 'sposa be like paradise on earth, right? Zionism, the right for your people to try to make paradise for your nation, right? Nowhere in that necessitates all the false flag attacks, the dehumanisation, the supremacy, the jingoism, the torture, the rape, the … because of course, that’s not even what that is. Paradise cannot be built with bricks of atrocity. There’s no rest on a bed of blood. There’s no paradise being built there. And so when we use the language of the oppressor, we’re truncating our vocabulary, obliterating words, concepts, in the conflations and inversions, depriving ourselves the means out, perverting our good intentions to serve the ills we fight against.
Though, best of luck to anyone trying get back upstream, this deep in the Orwellian hole.
Sadly Zionism always assumed the displacement of other people, so that some could build their paradise, it also gave up on the idea of building paradise together with other people, rather then a walled garden just for a single people. It’s a fundamentally conservative ideology that assumes that the basic principles of the enlightenment that all people are equal, and that people have the ability to change are false. Read Judenstaat by Herzl I found it to be a very cynical take on things and I couldn’t finish it.
you can be all that but the moment you are prozionist everything else stops making sense
israel is genocidal, there are constant reports (with evidence) of state prisons using rape as punishment, and their media dehumanize every Palestinian comparing them to demons
I have high doubts that Lemmy.world bans people specifically for being anti Zionist.
Context and number of incidents of ban is required.
Obligatory ‘Israel is a piece of shit country.’
I was banned there for saying Ukraine is just a meat grinder for the rich
Literally banned me for calling Kaplan a Zionist.
And then they unbanned me, unprompted.
Your doubts are unfounded.
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Modlog is public, they were banned for calling Kaplan “Zionist scum”.
https://lemmy.ml/modlog/view?page=1&actionType=All&userId=15127012
Fair enough. I was guilty of assuming their disinterest in the truth elsewhere was part of a larger pattern. Blocked them though so I won’t make the mistake again.
Got it. Next time you’ll do the same mistake with a different user. One person at a time!!
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I’ve found some evidence and posted it here:
Lemmy.world Is Anti‑Humanity. How Its Admins Weaponized Defederation to Silence Palestine Solidaritythis has been deleted. lol
Maybe I’m missing something, but that post just has a ton of claims and no screenshots or links to what it’s talking about.
We need to ask the rationale for the decisions. I am very much opposed to any genocide, whether by direct action, a third party or inaction. If Zionist practices are leading to genocide then I need to call it out. If Israels current practice is to create genocide then I need to call it out. I can do all that and not be Anti-Semitic or anti Israel.
If any Lemmy instance removes the debate, they need to be left in the cold or closed down.The problem is, Israeli far-right groups and Zionist advocates have spent decades turning “antisemitic” into a shield. You call out forced displacement, apartheid, collective punishment—all well documented by Amnesty, B’Tselem, and Human Rights Watch—and they call you an antisemite. It’s an old trick, and it works.
So when a platform like lemmy.world bans “anti-Zionists,” they’re buying into that same smear. They’re not separating bigotry from basic human rights criticism. That means you literally can’t speak out against genocide there without being branded an antisemite. The only way to say “stop the genocide” is to wear that label as a badge of honor. And that’s exactly the point: any platform that forces you to accept a false accusation just to state the obvious is complicit.
The term is broken and should never be used by anyone outside of their fascist bubble. Arabs are a semitic people too I would add. If they don’t give the exact details of the offense, ignore. And if they do give the details, call it what it is, anti israel, anti zionist, anti fascist, or anti jewish. No country represents a race of people.
It’s all in bad faith anyway, it’s not about the plausibility of the argument, it’s about bullying you, and as such they come hard and fast at the first provokation to dissuade others before an organized resistance can form.
I completely agree. There was an analogy used at work some years ago. If we decided to call a dogs tail a leg, would that mean that all dogs have five legs? The answer is ridiculously simple. Dogs have four legs and a tail. The names used make no difference. In this case, if Israel is committing genocidal acts, then that is just a straight fact. Renaming objection as anti-Semitic does not take away the fact of the genocide.
That isn’t limited to right wing or far right groups. Plenty of liberal Zionists who are still hiding behind the anti semitism claim. I guess admitting that you spent most of your life shilling for apartheid and genocide must be tough.
Is lemmy.world anti-humanity for banning anti-Zionists?
The quick answer is: probably no. You claim this is the case, provide no receipts, and most importantly don’t place these terms into enough context. And context matters.
I don’t know if you’re right. You might be. I’m not excluding that possibility.
No instance is under any obligation to tolerate all opinions. Other admins may defederate, users may move away and block. All moderation decisions are shit. It’s much easier to have principles than to apply them equally everywhere and without fail.
If they have indeed chosen to err on the side of what I’m going to call something like antisemitic caution and remove stuff more broadly than you are comfortable with, it’s not just a question of values. It’s could also be a reflection of their experience with this topic, the resulting workload, and lack of moderation manpower. It’s much easier to ban all boobs than having to differentiate with each post if they’re breastfeeding or not, to put this in the context of past moderation problems. Facebook isn’t opposed to breastfeeding as a function to suckle our offspring but as the proprietors of their platform they can ban all boob related posts. And while this is of course within the realm of apples to oranges comparisons, I don’t think it’s justified to leap to the conclusion you did based on moderation decisions alone.
The last I’ve seen was this, but I remember before lemmy.world’s admin defederated from an entire instance over one user’s “death to all Zionists” display name. That user stepped down. The damage was done.
This was a political act. When a platform punishes critics of documented apartheid and ethnic cleansing more harshly than it punishes the apologists for those crimes, yes—that’s anti-humanity in practice. Complicity doesn’t require intent, just silence and a ban hammer.
edit: I’ve found more evidence and posted it here:
Lemmy.world Is Anti‑Humanity. How Its Admins Weaponized Defederation to Silence Palestine SolidarityWait, givesomefucks got promoted to mod? I haven’t specifically seen pro-Zionist comments from them, but this is the user that regularly comments trying to convince everyone how the Democratic party has seen ‘major reforms’ by electing a new leader months ago despite us continuing to see them capitulate to Republicans at nearly every turn.
Maybe the account is run by Chuck Schumer and OP here is completely correct.
I got into it with that account too now that you mention it. That person is a tool.
I won’t be quite so harsh toward someone who now has the power to ban me, but I will agree that it seriously calls their judgement into question and they remind me a lot of FlyingSquid who also regularly made seriously questionable claims and was eventually demodded.
I read through that last link and then the first comment is asking why this AI wall of text. There is also very little evidence meat on that bone. A user did this, a user got that. That’s not receipts, that’s just more claims.
The claims of censorship are non sensical to me. You can still post most of that stuff, just not on that instance. An instance isn’t a democracy and no one has the right to be heard there no matter what. Your right is to go elsewhere. It’s a living room sofa problem. If you came to my house and took a dump on my sofa, I’d kick you out too. As it is my house, I get to decide what constitutes a dump. You thought it was just a fart, I smelled a shart - you’re out anyway. You are free to go sit on somebody else’s sofa. Go somewhere else, vote with your feet. Sure, tell others about my tight ass sofa rules. You still haven’t convinced me of your OG conclusion.
I’m still not excluding the possibility that there is something rotten in the state of Lemmy dot world. Maybe that admin is indeed on a power trip. What a decade on reddit and now a few years on Lemmy have shown me is that most bans are not shot from the hip. “I just said maybe Israel isn’t so nice and got banned IMMEDIATELY,” professed the user innocently. And then the admin comes back with three documented community violations including threatening the moderators with violence. Exceptions are rare. If you had a “no violence” rule, then “death to Zionists” would be functionally the same as “death to all little old ladies,” a no-go. You don’t get to decide what constitutes a dump and since the fediverse is larger than Lemmy dot world you’re also not being censored.
Yup
Restricting certain forms of speech can be interpreted in two ways: As suppression of legitimate political critique. Or as boundary-setting to prevent generalizations or escalation.
Whether specific political positions are restricted depends not on how you see them, but on how moderators classify them. “Anti-Zionism” is not a single, defined category. It ranges from policy criticism against Israel, to positions that some moderators may interpret as targeting jews.
Give an explicit, specific example of anti-zionism that can be interpreted as “targeting jews”.
First of all, I’d say we’re on the same side. Israel is acting like a disgusting piece of shit. Also, many Israelis are abusing the term “antisemitic” to discredit people that they dont like. But I think we still need to differentiate. Therefore let me answer your question:
If the vanalism is against Israeli officials/buildings/state institutions, thats fine! Like ambassies, consulates, (international) representatives, politicians, economic figures, IDF members, etc… They are waging war and genocide, they deserve our anger + protest.
But If it hits religious institutions, private folks, jewish communities, holocaust memorials, etc. with no Israeli state background or links to the IDF, then maybe dont attack them, because otherwise it really is nothing but antisemitism. And that’s the point. If it was really only about the state of Israel, then why do so many “protests” explicitly target Jewish religious institutions (like synagogues, cemeteries, schools) rather than Israeli ones? It is not even rare thing to happen, thats why I wonder why you are asking. Examples:
Moldova, Kasauti. A Holocaust memorial was vandalized with ‘free Palestine’ graffiti.
Ukraine, Uman. A swastika was painted on a Jewish café.
UK, Glasgow. “Free Palestine” and “Fuck the no really Jews” were painted on a wall.
Italy, Milan. A man shouted “murderers” in front of a Jewish nursing home.
Italy, Milan. An elderly Jewish man, wearing a hat with a Star of David, was walking his dog, when a man tore off his hat, trampled it, and called the elderly man “dirty Jew.”
Italy, Milan. An Orthodox Jewish man was insulted on his way to a synagogue by an Italian couple who said to him, “F—king Zionist! You kill children!” On his way home he was shoved by a young man who shouted antisemitic epithets at him.
Germany, Oldenburg. An incendiary device was thrown at the door of the Oldenburg synagogue.
Belgium, Fleron. The home of Belgian Holocaust survivors was vandalized with “Gaza Free” and a swastika.
Munich, Germany. A man stood in front of the main synagogue, shouted antisemitic insults and give Hitler salutes.
Montevideo, Uruguay. A doll depicting a Jewish women with a Star of David and a spear piercing her forehead was displayed during a march for International Women’s Day.
Paris, France. A man wearing a kippah was attacked as he left a synagogue.
Babenhausen, Germany. A Jewish memorial column was smeared with paint.
Geneva, Switzerland. “Exterminate the Jews” and “Death to Zionists” graffiti were found in Geneva after a pro-Palestinian rally.
https://newengland.adl.org/resources/article/global-antisemitic-incidents-wake-hamas-war-israel
https://www.washingtonpost.com/religion/2026/02/13/maryland-synagogue-antisemitism-vandalism/
https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/san-leandro-high-school-lawsuit-22220489.php
Moldova, Kasauti. A Holocaust memorial was vandalized with ‘free Palestine’ graffiti.
Potentially your only half-decent example of what was requested by the other user (assuming the act was indeed committed by an anti-zionist).
Ukraine, Uman. A swastika was painted on a Jewish café.
What does this have to do with anti-zionism?
UK, Glasgow. “Free Palestine” and “Fuck the no really Jews” were painted on a wall.
Honestly, seems like the work of a bad-faith Zionist.
Italy, Milan. A man shouted “murderers” in front of a Jewish nursing home.
For all we know, the nursing home committed malpractice leading to the death of a tenant or something. This story is tantamount to hearsay.
Italy, Milan. An elderly Jewish man, wearing a hat with a Star of David, was walking his dog, when a man tore off his hat, trampled it, and called the elderly man “dirty Jew.”
What does this have to do with anti-zionism?
Italy, Milan. An Orthodox Jewish man was insulted on his way to a synagogue by an Italian couple who said to him, “F—king Zionist! You kill children!” On his way home…
For all we know, the man was sporing the Israeli flag. This story is tantamount to hearsay.
Germany, Oldenburg. An incendiary device was thrown at the door of the Oldenburg synagogue.
What does this have to do with anti-zionism?
Belgium, Fleron. The home of Belgian Holocaust survivors was vandalized with “Gaza Free” and a swastika.
Honestly, seems like the work of a bad-faith Zionist.
Munich, Germany. A man stood in front of the main synagogue, shouted antisemitic insults and give Hitler salutes.
What does this have to do with anti-zionism?
Montevideo, Uruguay. A doll depicting a Jewish women with a Star of David and a spear piercing her forehead was displayed during a march for International Women’s Day.
What does this have to do with anti-zionism?
Paris, France. A man wearing a kippah was attacked as he left a synagogue.
What does this have to do with anti-zionism?
Babenhausen, Germany. A Jewish memorial column was smeared with paint.
What does this have to do with anti-zionism?
Geneva, Switzerland. “Exterminate the Jews” and “Death to Zionists” graffiti were found in Geneva after a pro-Palestinian rally.
Honestly, seems like the work of a bad-faith Zionist.
Additional note: Your framing is somewhat binary, relying on a “if you’re not with me, you’re against me” logic. I understand the emotions that come with this topic, but your logic reduces complex positions to two options despite the existence of intermediate views. Nuanced actors might then be pushed into opposing camps, therefore intensifying conflict.
Edit, for context: Damned be Israel for everything they are doing right now. I am just trying to maintain some discourse quality.
What I’ve seen is that people get called a zionist without just cause frequently so I’m highly skeptical of anyone even using the term without evidence. I myself have been called a zionist a dozen times at least and I have never really even said anything that could be construed that way. The last time I remember it happening was by a user who literally had re-posted a neo-Nazi and was trying to sweep it under the rug. What was my offense? Pointing out that the user was a neo-Nazi. Yeah man sure if you think Nazis are a bad place to get your info you must love Israel and genocide /s
Pot calling the kettle black. Which just further lessens your credibility, if one wasn’t already familiar with your lack of it.
Ooh wow such coolness. A user hates me for cryptic reasons. Must also make me a zionist somehow. I take it I’m less credible than neo Nazis in your eyes
Another bad faith shit take, not answering the critique and playing victim. You have no credibility.
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What a crash out, wow.
Hey buddy. This really isn’t so difficult. I’m going to clarify things for you and make this very simple for you.
Do you believe Israel has a right to exist as a nation state? Yes or no? If you answer yes, you are a Zionist. There is no burden of proof required. It is an ideology, this is not a court of law.
You pussyfooting around the point all but confirms to a scrupulous reader that you’re very likely a Zionist, but I’m willing to be wrong on this. Just tell us you condemn Israel and admit it has no right to exist and we will happily clear your name of the evil Zionist label.
But something tells me deep down inside that you’re going to throw a fit instead.
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Right, if you can’t tell us that Israel has no right to exist, you’re a Zionist. “Fuck Israel” is a weak cop out that scumbags use to hide their Zionism.
Now you can stop acting confused when people label you that way, right? Right?
Zionist trash.
