Context: https://tranistan.com/post/tranistan.com/17190

I don’t think my previous post was realistic at all.

I have been talking to Yash and we agreed that we can’t realistically enforce the no minors rule at the extent that I first wanted to.

We feel like it is unreasonable to expect from us a complete vetting process of all the DMs someone feels like leaking in which they caught a random user disclosing their age. We can’t realistically verify that they are real, and we can’t be expected to verify them by hand.

Additionally, we both agreed that this server is becoming way too big to handle for the two of us. This is why I would like to announce a couple of changes regarding our role as server admins:

1. We won’t be issuing server-side bans for any user, except if they are posting illegal content or if they are a bot spamming.
2. We delegate the responsibility of moderating legal content to the moderators of the communities. If you as a user have a problem about the kind of content posted here, talk it out with the respective moderators of the community it is being posted on.
3. We will rat limit the server if we find that things are getting out of hand. We urge moderators to take action in their respective communities first so that we don’t have to rate limit the server.

This is all regarding our role as administrators. To reiterate, we won’t be banning minors site-wide from now on, so please don’t message us regarding this. If you’re a moderator of a community, take it upon yourself to ban minors from it.

It is not because we don’t think the rule is important, it’s because we literally don’t have enough time or energy to enforce it. It is impossible for us to be attuned to every under 18 that creates an account here and every subsequent alt account after being banned. It’s simply not realistic.

For adult users this means that:

1. Always assume that a minor will be able to see your posts. Post accordingly.
2. Assume the person you’re interacting with could be a minor. Act accordingly.

For moderators:

1. Assume that minors will be able to see your communities. Please clearly disclose by either tagging it as NSFW and/or displaying on the sidebar that your community is for adults only.
2. If you don’t want accounts from minors to access your community, ban diligently. Keep in mind that banning known minors does not guarantee that your community won’t be visited by minors.

For minors:

1. Please don’t browse or create accounts on this site. It is against the rules.
2. If you decide to create an account regardless, take steps to be safe. Don’t visit communities clearly tagged as adult only. Don’t interact with posts tagged as NSFW.

We can’t do this without your help. We urge each and every member of this server to take it upon themselves to create a community they feel safe in and to curate their own browsing experience.

This is a passion project made by two people that just want this community to have a space in which they can speak and exist freely. We can’t make this the perfect online space. It’s simply impossible. If you expected perfection from this site, we were doomed to let you down sooner or later.

We understand that some users might feel uncomfortable with this decision. We could have taken steps in a different direction, but we decided to opt for something that both Yash and I feel is more sustainable for us.

We also both acknowledge that our response could have been better. We take accountability and apologize. We believe this post and the decisions that accompany it are proof that we’re taking steps to improve as administrators.

If you want a completely minor-free experience, this was never the place for it, and I now realize that it was foolish of me to suggest it could ever be. A discord server might be better suited for the level of access control a truly no-minors space requires, so we understand if you decide to leave this server. If you decide to stay, rest assured that we’re as committed as the first day to keeping it running.

Thanks again for your patience and cooperation.

And please don’t forget that we are both human and very tired from today’s drama. Please keep the conversation civil. Love you all.

Edit: We won’t be adding any more admins to the team. An admin role in lemmy is very serious and if we gave it to the wrong person they could leak all the personal information stored here. I only trust Yash with that power and Yash only trusts me. For now, expect no changes on the admin team.

Edit 2: If a minor has publicly posted on tranistan.com their exact age, then we will ban them site-wide. What we cannot do is respond to leaked screenshots of DMs from a third party.