This is not a request for new rules, as Deimos has made it clear that is not going to happen. This is not a callout post for any individual, including our esteemed admin, or any one user.

This is an honest, earnest plea. I like to joke on Tildes, so this is quite hard to write.

I've been on Tildes for a few years now, under various usernames. This site has consistently lost great users because people come into ~life.women and ~lgbt to say versions of 'I haven't seen that', 'that's not my experience', or 'I don't think this is a big issue.'

We lost another user today over this issue. People aren't aware of it, because by the time people are so disgusted they leave, it's usually just a PM notification to their closer contacts who tend to be in a similar headspace, not a dramatic announcement on the front page.

Tildes is for discussion. It is not for 'let me tell you why you are wrong', no matter what wording you use. This type of action is explicitly against the core ethos of the site.

If you are struggling to imagine ways in which you can hold back from bringing negativity to a space you are not welcome, here are two examples from my experience of using the site. The following are two things many users care passionately about:

• 1. AI. I do not believe the conversation about it is interesting. Sometimes, the way it's talked about makes me actively angry. But many users of this site find conversation about AI enriching and enjoyable. Instead of me following my instant reaction and commenting to say 'I think this is boring, and this never impacts my life', I filter the posts, or do not read them.
• 2. I don't know what it's like to be a programmer. The plight of programmers is foreign to me. From the outside, looking in, I could make a bunch of assumptions about the hardships experienced by programmers, or system adminstrators, or software engineers are often saying they are experiencing on this site. Instead of saying 'have you tried finding another job?' or 'Well, I've never seen that', to call into question your experiences, I do not comment, because I know nothing about it.

The experiences of women, who are a minority on this site, are things that the vast majority of users do not have first-hand insight into. The same goes with gay users, asexual users, intersex users, gender non-conforming users, and users who are queer in a way I may never have come across before.

The pile-ons in these two groups are persistent, ongoing, and I have observed them for enough time to know it's generally not intentional, and it is relatively user-churn agnostic. This site attracts more cisgendered heterosexual men than it does women or queer people. That's how it is.

I am not asking for a verification system where you have to prove your bona fides before commenting. I am not asking for these groups to be quarantined off, because that further marginalizes minority groups on the site.

I am asking for users who are not women, or identify as queer, to think very carefully before posting comments that (regardless of the intention) are perceived time and again as invalidating the real experiences of people you do not know, and cannot experience yourself.

I am very sad that a lot of the people I have made close connections to on Tildes have left due to the prevalence of this issue. We know now that the site is feature-complete. You either try and set the culture, or you end up with one.

I would like us to set a culture that is more respective of the spaces intended for women and queer people to discuss issues pertaining to their lives. I am very upset that this continuously is a challenge, especially for members who post, comment, and lurk in those groups.

If you constantly feel the need to 'challenge' or 'dispute' articles and posts made in those groups, please examine why. This cycle of members of these groups having to explain sexism and oppression to people who have not experienced it in the same way women and queer people do is exhausting, and puts the emotional labor on the minority groups on this site.

The majority of the site is very welcoming to heterosexual men. Regardless of your intention, please do not 'just ask questions' or feel the need to say 'You know, I've never seen that!' or 'This reminds me of when my Project Manager called me out at a scrum unfairly.'

We are losing valuable intellectual, cultural, and gender diversity over the persistence of the issues outlined above. If you don't care about this, that sucks, but it makes Tildes a much better place for me and many others who are sadly no longer here.

TL;DR: If you're inserting yourself into Tildes groups about women's lives and the discussion of LGBT issues without being a member of either group in your actual life, please think twice before posting quick reactions to content that may have made you defensive, or content that you (for whatever reason) feel the need to disprove.

Assuming good faith, your unsolicited opinion about a topic you have not experienced personally is consistently not welcomed by the contributors, commenters, and lurkers who use those groups to discuss issues impacting them directly.

If you find the content annoying or feel the need to debate its veracity constantly, simply unsubscribe. It is not hard. It is the base level of respect this community relies on to survive.

I am sorry if this is coming across as aggressive, mean-spirited, or me taking on airs above the station of a normal user. That's not my intention, but I hope these words perhaps help other men on Tildes to think about the issues raised here in a different way.

I am a user, asking others like me to be kind and thoughtful. If you need help in how to unsubscribe from groups, or how to set up topic tag filters, please ask in this thread and many users will be able to assist you. It is a system I didn't initially find intuitive and am still learning about.

Thanks.