Hello comrades. In the interest of upholding our code of conduct - specifically, rule 1 (providing a friendly, safe and welcoming environment for all) - we felt it appropriate to make a statement regarding the lionization of Luigi Mangione, the alleged United Healthcare CEO shooter, also known as “The Adjuster.”
In the day or so since the alleged shooter’s identity became known to the public, the whole world has had the chance to dig though his personal social media accounts and attempt to decipher his political ideology and motives. What we have learned may shock you. He is not one of us. He is a “typical” American with largely incoherent, and in many cases reactionary politics. For the most part, what is remarkable about the man himself is that he chose to take out his anger on a genuine enemy of the proletariat, instead of an elementary school.
This is a situation where the art must be separated from the artist. We do not condemn the attack, but as a role model, Luigi Mangione falls short. We do not expect perfection from revolutionary figures either, but we expect a modicum of revolutionary discipline. We expect them not simply to identify an unpopular element of society 
, but to clearly illuminate the causes of oppression and the means by which they are overcome. When we canonize revolutionary figures, we are holding them up as an example to be followed.
This is where things come back to rule 1. Mangione has a long social media history bearing a spectrum of reactionary viewpoints, and interacting positively with many powerful reactionary figures. While some commenters have referred to this as “nothing malicious,” by lionizing this man we effectively deem this behavior acceptable, or at the very least, safe to ignore. This is the type of tailism which opens the door to making a space unsafe for marginalized people.
We’re going to be more strict on moderating posts which do little more than lionize the shooter. There is plenty to be said about the unfolding events, the remarkably positive public reaction, how public reactions to “propaganda of the deed” may have changed since the historical epoch of its conception (and how the strategic hazards might not have), and many other aspects of the news without canonizing this man specifically. We can still dance on the graves of our enemies and celebrate their rediscovered fear and vulnerability without the vulgar revisionism needed to pretend this man is some sort of example of Marxist or Anarchist practice.
And now it has been removed. The most cogent, materialist, consistently communist position gets removed and the user banned. Will my comment get removed for expressing how ridiculous I think that is?
Ok I’m honestly furious that this comment was removed for being “inappropriately dismissive of valid concerns.” This was the best comment in the entire thread and clearly the community agreed with that. What kind of paternalistic bullshit is the mod team on?
It’s the fact that once again a small portion of the mod/admin team has unilaterally decided what the whole community’s “line” is, in this case on the CEO-killer. Anyone who says something just a little too contrary to that line gets their comment or post removed (and possibly banned) even if most users agree with it, and even if it was a perfectly reasonable, well-thought-out, analytical, and intelligent argument that was devoid of any negativity towards other users. It was just a little too positive about the person who did a thing we all in our heart of hearts wish we could do en masse. But that person has been deemed “of the enemy” by the people with the ban hammer, so any positivity towards him is now off limits. “You wouldn’t want to be caught siding with the enemy, would you?! That’s a bannin’!” Even in the thread where we are discussing this unilateral decision based on a non-majority-view and the consequences of going against it, where presumably we could at least present arguments against it, the comment with the highest number of upvotes gets wiped from the discussion.
I want to say also that I’m furious about it too, like you. And I think anyone who cares about this community, regardless of which side of this issue they’re on, should be angry about that comment removal as well.
Since you’re relatively new, I’ll note that this is an ongoing problem, it’s not unique to this recent disagreement over the merits of adventurism and the subsequent Luigi-posting. A few people who have a lot of power here have a vision for what they think hexbear should be and are steering it and curating it through user bans, comment removal, and I strongly suspect sockpuppetry. But this vision is in direct contradiction with what the majority of the users on this site want. We keep running into this contradiction and it has never been resolved.
be real lol it was vulgar un-marxist shlock. “he’s our guy” is just plain LARP. the left actually isn’t in a position where it’s politically viable to wage class war by killing people! glad she caught a 7 day and i won’t have to see her awful takes for a bit.
Look I’m new to this site and you are clearly a very popular poster here so I will choose my words carefully but let’s just say you and I are not in agreement on this issue. I thought this reply was thoughtful and nuanced and apparently so did 80 other users before the mods removed it.
If the reply simply said “He’s our guy,” I would agree. But it was actually a whole, complete thought. Apparently it was a thought you didn’t agree with, but IMO a post that doesn’t perfectly align with your (or the mods’) Marxist ideals does not warrant removal.
I cannot speak to that poster’s history on this site or 7 day ban as I am a relatively new user and generally just pop in and out.
i don’t really wanna get into this if it’s alright with you, we can just say we disagree and leave it there. this is all ultimately quite meaningless and i don’t really want to spend much more energy on it. for what it’s worth though, her 7 day ban was for DM harassment of another user who had previously asked her to disengage on this topic because Awoo was being hostile (which is what netted her the 3-day ban). she DM’d this user immediately after getting her 3-day ban overturned by leveraging her power user status. regardless of the disagreement, the way she talked to that user was extremely gross and to then move onto DM harassment is very over the line to me and deserving of the ban she got.
That is fair, I mod a large-ish leftist subreddit and I would also ban a user for DMing another user after being asked to disengage. IMO a 7 day ban is justified, removal of the comment was not.
It is clear to me now that nothing was truly resolved during the last struggle sesh
Correct, there was never any real resolution to the last several site-related struggle sessions. With that big one, there was some appeasement to make it seem like all was good again, but truthfully the big problem was just quietly set on the back burner, and surprise surprise, here we are again.
They made a matrix channel, which is hard to gain access to and has like 50 people in it. Anything agreed in the channel is non-binding and again, it’s on a separate platform. Ugh.
for real, this is getting ridiculous lately
They fucking banned awoo? Oh my god fuck you people
Just let people fucking talk, you posted a bait thread for people to disagree with you let them do it
It was a very good comment too, hers usually are. Find it in the modlog if you haven’t already.
How do i do that?
This link should take you there. For future reference though, just go to https://hexbear.net/modlog and where it says “filter by user” just start typing in the name you want to see the modlog entries for and click the right one when it appears.
I see, thank you
EDIT: Omg they did her so dirty, this reads like someone who has a lot of power and no accountability abusing it because they disagree
It was a reasonable comment and well articulated, and now theyre demanding she bends the knee after the ban expires?!
Didn’t even know about that part
it was vulgar tailist nonsense and i’m glad she’s banned. british people shouldn’t be allowed post on here
Is this supposed to be a joke? Its hilariously funny for the majority American user base here to say this shit with a straight face. I guess you can say whatever nonsense when you think you got the mod team on your side lol.
i am not amerikkkan, there are actually more than two nationalities! hope this helps:)
The point is that the people on this site are overwhelmingly living in the West, so if Westerners can’t post here then the site would be like 3 people and no owls