clovenhooves The Personal Is Political General Resource vexxed.org, a successor to Ovarit

Resource vexxed.org, a successor to Ovarit

Resource vexxed.org, a successor to Ovarit

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Oct 9 2025, 6:52 PM
#91
To YesYourNigel's post and Chernobog's post:

(Oct 4 2025, 11:17 AM)YesYourNigel
(Oct 3 2025, 11:49 AM)Clover In hindsight, maybe the delay in having a feminist-oriented circle was what accelerated the right-wing slant of Vexxed. 
Near Ovarit's end, I was already hearing many women (especially non-straight non-white ones) talk about what a dumpster fire the site has turned into, and how many feminist women were getting banned left and right. I imagine in an atmosphere like that, the conservative women rushed to the new site to complain some more about TIMs giving their poor pwecious Nigels too many unwanted boners, and the actually normal women were just...done. Or at the very least not motivated enough to make new accounts. It seems just that no-one was that excited about another GeNdErCrITiCaL cesspool than the conservatives who were having a grand time.

Aside from being unable to get those women back, I also don't think you can really cure a space from the conservative menace once you let them overtake it, normalise their rhetoric, censor rhetoric that is offensive to them and also let it get so bad that it's basically recognised by everyone for what it is. It's not that the whole place accidentally turned into a conservative cesspool while no-one was looking, it's that years of worsening double standards and policing of feminism turned feminists away, and the conservative women were let loose to infect it further.

Let's say Vexxed ends up with a feminist circle - what is the benefit? Sharing space with the usual conservaturds who'll rush in with their usual dumbass straight white woman takes and start screaming for the mods when the meanie hostile feminazi tells them in no unclear terms to fuck off? So...basically every other internet space in existence? There is no benefit to feminists for sharing their space with conservatives. It's not even an interesting thought experiment, because feminists spend every waking moment engulfed in regressive patriarchal bullshit, and there is nothing to be gained from talking heads parroting the same surface-level claims that feminism has tackled decades ago. There is only benefit to conservatives, because they have the confidence of the whole patriarchal society combined with exploiting the agreeable female socialisation, and they will lower the quality of any sort of discussion into the ground with their authoritative stupidity.

And unless you somehow attract libfems (unlikely both due to the conservative domaninace and also the fact that the forum does nothing to accommodate any of the plethora of circles that might be derived from liberal feminism) you're never going to have a variety of opinions there, you'll just have old straight women stinking up the place by acting as their Nigels' representatives, alongside radfems who have to walk on eggshells and be willing to play nice with conservatives...which means they're not actually radfems. The result is just a space that superficially pretends it's feminist in order to funnel skeptical or moderate women into conservativism, which makes it worse than no space at all.

You raise valid points. I think that because Vexxed aims to be a community for "all women", that is means leftist women and radical feminist women deserve to have a place to call home there. I would hope that the creation of a women's liberation circle might attract more libfems, though I do understand how it's generally an uphill battle -- there are plenty of communities for libfems already established, namely Reddit, since it's a completely Brogressive site which generally welcomes libfems ("women who defend porn and prostitution? yes please!"). And even then, even if mainly-libfem women want, they could just wander over to r/fourthwavewomen or some of the radfem-adjacent subreddits, like the antipornography subreddit and such, to get filled in on more radfem rhetoric. However, my main worry with Reddit is that, they've banned r/GenderCritical and I'm sure they won't hesitate to ban any other subreddits that start leaning too far into radical feminist viewpoints, especially if they start getting "too gender critical." (I often worry r/fourthwavewomen is like, on thin ice, but I'm glad they seem to be doing fine.)

So I get it, there is an uphill battle to be fought. However, one other benefit of Vexxed is that it has no scummy/annoying ads, I am pretty sure it is fairly privacy-focused (like, doesn't sell data like Reddit does), and is accessible through many devices. Also, I think there is value in creating an "all women" community, and yeah, I guess that includes right-wing/conservative women having a space to themselves. While I despise right-wing politics, and most of the time I find their takes to be hot garbage (like, literally just poor argument skills), at least their views can be known and analyzed. One of the worst things is silencing or ignoring those one disagrees with, because it makes ones own arguments against theirs weaker. This is exactly what TRAs do with radfems/GCers to their own detriment. I don't have an issue with right-wing women being able to discuss in a community somewhere in Vexxed (I mean, the Vexxed rules probably do a decent job at getting rid of most of the truly abhorrent takes, it's mainly the "sneaky" casual shit that slides), I just have an issue when it feels like the overall suffocating culture, where it feels like lefties have no where to take a break from it. (Which is still why I think Vexxed admins need to permit women to just go and make their own circles/spaces as needed, with their own moderation cultures.)

I did make a joke in one Discord server: I wonder if they're taking forever to get a women's lib circle up and running because they are trying to somehow make it a place for "all women" or something. Like "how do we make a feminist discussion forum which even Phyllis Schlafly would feel welcomed and supported"?

This was in response to a woman who mentioned talking with a Vexxed mod who was apparently told that she was "not to exclude women who are less educated on the subject," and that it was a space for women first and a space for "specific beliefs" second (I don't know who the Vexxed mod is or what circle they mod, so who knows). So... maybe your points on "what is the benefit of a feminist circle" are valid, if the overall leadership of the site wants to prioritize "women first, politics second." THE PERSONAL IS POLITICAL!!! So yeah, if they're going to continue to attempt to shove "WELCOME ALL WOMEN" into every single circle, shit's not gonna work. Racist women are part of "all women", how does that work with women of color? Homophobic women are "all women", how does that work with lesbian and bisexual women? At the moment, I feel like Ovarit and Vexxed are good social media sites to study the "paradox of tolerance" in the digital age.

(Oct 4 2025, 6:33 PM)Chernobog Yeah, in the vein of what YesYourNigel said, you fail to appropriately shut down certain kinds of content a few too many times and you're going to be stuck with it forever. I have a nostalgic appreciation for the minimalist approach to moderating that any kid who got taken in by 4chan does, but Ovarit/Vexxed wasn't even doing that! They were decidedly allowing certain perspectives and banning the counterarguments (or, probably more often, selectively enforcing the rules so those of us making counterarguments would get discouraged). The biases were painfully obvious and not in alignment with the written rules, but something you had to feel out and often learn the hard way. At least in many of the lefty spaces where they'll clap you for, like, using the word "dumb", they'll be upfront about that kind of thing.

The selective rules enforcement drives me up the wall. It's what caused me to snap and be a troll for a bit lol. It does feel like they'll bend over backwards defending whatever egregious vitriol-of-the-day some women manage to conjure up. I'd be impressed if I wasn't so disappointed.

I... "jokingly" :meowknife: requested to a Vexxed mod to ask the Vexxed admins:

Quote:Can u suggest an o/politics with no rules so we can just enjoy a good old fashioned proper shitshow
I think this is what we need to heal this divide. A shitshow. Let us fling literary feces at each other like God intended
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Oct 9 2025, 6:52 PM #91

To YesYourNigel's post and Chernobog's post:

(Oct 4 2025, 11:17 AM)YesYourNigel
(Oct 3 2025, 11:49 AM)Clover In hindsight, maybe the delay in having a feminist-oriented circle was what accelerated the right-wing slant of Vexxed. 
Near Ovarit's end, I was already hearing many women (especially non-straight non-white ones) talk about what a dumpster fire the site has turned into, and how many feminist women were getting banned left and right. I imagine in an atmosphere like that, the conservative women rushed to the new site to complain some more about TIMs giving their poor pwecious Nigels too many unwanted boners, and the actually normal women were just...done. Or at the very least not motivated enough to make new accounts. It seems just that no-one was that excited about another GeNdErCrITiCaL cesspool than the conservatives who were having a grand time.

Aside from being unable to get those women back, I also don't think you can really cure a space from the conservative menace once you let them overtake it, normalise their rhetoric, censor rhetoric that is offensive to them and also let it get so bad that it's basically recognised by everyone for what it is. It's not that the whole place accidentally turned into a conservative cesspool while no-one was looking, it's that years of worsening double standards and policing of feminism turned feminists away, and the conservative women were let loose to infect it further.

Let's say Vexxed ends up with a feminist circle - what is the benefit? Sharing space with the usual conservaturds who'll rush in with their usual dumbass straight white woman takes and start screaming for the mods when the meanie hostile feminazi tells them in no unclear terms to fuck off? So...basically every other internet space in existence? There is no benefit to feminists for sharing their space with conservatives. It's not even an interesting thought experiment, because feminists spend every waking moment engulfed in regressive patriarchal bullshit, and there is nothing to be gained from talking heads parroting the same surface-level claims that feminism has tackled decades ago. There is only benefit to conservatives, because they have the confidence of the whole patriarchal society combined with exploiting the agreeable female socialisation, and they will lower the quality of any sort of discussion into the ground with their authoritative stupidity.

And unless you somehow attract libfems (unlikely both due to the conservative domaninace and also the fact that the forum does nothing to accommodate any of the plethora of circles that might be derived from liberal feminism) you're never going to have a variety of opinions there, you'll just have old straight women stinking up the place by acting as their Nigels' representatives, alongside radfems who have to walk on eggshells and be willing to play nice with conservatives...which means they're not actually radfems. The result is just a space that superficially pretends it's feminist in order to funnel skeptical or moderate women into conservativism, which makes it worse than no space at all.

You raise valid points. I think that because Vexxed aims to be a community for "all women", that is means leftist women and radical feminist women deserve to have a place to call home there. I would hope that the creation of a women's liberation circle might attract more libfems, though I do understand how it's generally an uphill battle -- there are plenty of communities for libfems already established, namely Reddit, since it's a completely Brogressive site which generally welcomes libfems ("women who defend porn and prostitution? yes please!"). And even then, even if mainly-libfem women want, they could just wander over to r/fourthwavewomen or some of the radfem-adjacent subreddits, like the antipornography subreddit and such, to get filled in on more radfem rhetoric. However, my main worry with Reddit is that, they've banned r/GenderCritical and I'm sure they won't hesitate to ban any other subreddits that start leaning too far into radical feminist viewpoints, especially if they start getting "too gender critical." (I often worry r/fourthwavewomen is like, on thin ice, but I'm glad they seem to be doing fine.)

So I get it, there is an uphill battle to be fought. However, one other benefit of Vexxed is that it has no scummy/annoying ads, I am pretty sure it is fairly privacy-focused (like, doesn't sell data like Reddit does), and is accessible through many devices. Also, I think there is value in creating an "all women" community, and yeah, I guess that includes right-wing/conservative women having a space to themselves. While I despise right-wing politics, and most of the time I find their takes to be hot garbage (like, literally just poor argument skills), at least their views can be known and analyzed. One of the worst things is silencing or ignoring those one disagrees with, because it makes ones own arguments against theirs weaker. This is exactly what TRAs do with radfems/GCers to their own detriment. I don't have an issue with right-wing women being able to discuss in a community somewhere in Vexxed (I mean, the Vexxed rules probably do a decent job at getting rid of most of the truly abhorrent takes, it's mainly the "sneaky" casual shit that slides), I just have an issue when it feels like the overall suffocating culture, where it feels like lefties have no where to take a break from it. (Which is still why I think Vexxed admins need to permit women to just go and make their own circles/spaces as needed, with their own moderation cultures.)

I did make a joke in one Discord server: I wonder if they're taking forever to get a women's lib circle up and running because they are trying to somehow make it a place for "all women" or something. Like "how do we make a feminist discussion forum which even Phyllis Schlafly would feel welcomed and supported"?

This was in response to a woman who mentioned talking with a Vexxed mod who was apparently told that she was "not to exclude women who are less educated on the subject," and that it was a space for women first and a space for "specific beliefs" second (I don't know who the Vexxed mod is or what circle they mod, so who knows). So... maybe your points on "what is the benefit of a feminist circle" are valid, if the overall leadership of the site wants to prioritize "women first, politics second." THE PERSONAL IS POLITICAL!!! So yeah, if they're going to continue to attempt to shove "WELCOME ALL WOMEN" into every single circle, shit's not gonna work. Racist women are part of "all women", how does that work with women of color? Homophobic women are "all women", how does that work with lesbian and bisexual women? At the moment, I feel like Ovarit and Vexxed are good social media sites to study the "paradox of tolerance" in the digital age.

(Oct 4 2025, 6:33 PM)Chernobog Yeah, in the vein of what YesYourNigel said, you fail to appropriately shut down certain kinds of content a few too many times and you're going to be stuck with it forever. I have a nostalgic appreciation for the minimalist approach to moderating that any kid who got taken in by 4chan does, but Ovarit/Vexxed wasn't even doing that! They were decidedly allowing certain perspectives and banning the counterarguments (or, probably more often, selectively enforcing the rules so those of us making counterarguments would get discouraged). The biases were painfully obvious and not in alignment with the written rules, but something you had to feel out and often learn the hard way. At least in many of the lefty spaces where they'll clap you for, like, using the word "dumb", they'll be upfront about that kind of thing.

The selective rules enforcement drives me up the wall. It's what caused me to snap and be a troll for a bit lol. It does feel like they'll bend over backwards defending whatever egregious vitriol-of-the-day some women manage to conjure up. I'd be impressed if I wasn't so disappointed.

I... "jokingly" :meowknife: requested to a Vexxed mod to ask the Vexxed admins:

Quote:Can u suggest an o/politics with no rules so we can just enjoy a good old fashioned proper shitshow
I think this is what we need to heal this divide. A shitshow. Let us fling literary feces at each other like God intended

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Oct 9 2025, 6:55 PM
#92
(Oct 5 2025, 7:15 AM)dobby Omg I agree with all of this completely, and I had been wanting to figure out a good way to reach out to the Vexxed ideas to pitch it as well tbh. Like just allowing more users at a certain level or perhaps if some of us were trusted enough to help with recruiting new members who are mods/admins/group leaders of their own various different niche circles, whether it's a feminist book club or a group for preppers or various different lesbian groups on other sites, or for different radfem group leaders to each be able to make their own circles and curate the content their way if they wanted to, or for feminist influencers, content creators, and youtubers had the ability to create their own circles for their followers to chat in and discuss about the feminist topics that these influencers post videos about, etc — all of this would definitely benefit Vexxed as a website! 

And I completely agree with you; I've been wanting to pitch the idea of allowing conservative women and liberal/leftist women and women of other political parties (across the world) to be allowed to make their own circles and put in the work to get it active and keep it smoothly moderated to their own liking tbh, and for members to have the ability to branch off and make their own circles if they don't like the way a circle is modded. (And maybe each new circle could be given certain minimum requirements for activity each week or months and number of active mods that they would have to meet in order for their circle to be allowed to remain on the site, or else other members can apply to request to mod the circle, the way that reddit allows it maybe. I feel like the ability to create and mod new circles for members at a certain level benefits everyone in keeping the site feeling like it's for "all" women. There's so many different female-run subreddits on different topics that keep getting banned, so if those well-modded groups had the opportunity to re-start their group on Vexxed, that would definitely also help in the site organically growing to include more diverse viewpoints from feminist/GC women. 

If you haven't pitched this idea to the Vexxed admins yet, you totally should! ❤ I would've reached out to them myself to ask, but I was wary about accidentally writing out a wall of text that could overwhelm them since I wrote out too much when I had attempted to describe this same idea lol. It would be amazing if the Vexxed admins are open to trying out this idea! If they need more site members to volunteer to help make it work, I'd honestly love to volunteer to help, and I feel like so many others would too.

Thanks, dobby. :catblush: So a Vexxed mod did forward my suggestions to the admins/other mods. The admin response was, well, it was generally that they wanted to slowly incorporate new circles while Vexxed is still starting out. They also mentioned the general-ish consensus was that they didn't want to entertain a conservative women's circle, because they felt it'd make the conservative appearance of Vexxed worse or something. And I mean, yeah, if they keep doing the "gradually create circles" thing, and they choose a right-wing circle as one of their first circles... yeah that's not gonna be a good look. But if they just allow women to go make their own communities as they want, it is mostly out of their hands, besides enforcing site-wide rules. Well, it's their website, they can run it how they best see fit.

(Oct 7 2025, 12:34 PM)skunk
(Oct 7 2025, 11:05 AM)ILoveKaleJustSoDangMuch Yes, that's correct. I'm a mod at Vexxed.

Yes, I know there are a lot of rightwing opinions happening over there. Trust me, I don't condone it and neither do most of the mods. Sure, if you'd like to compile a post with links to the propaganda you've seen there, I'd love to read through it. Right now, we're all recognizing there's a culture issue and trying to figure out a solution. If I had better answers, I would share them, but honestly that's where we are right now.

I'm genuinely surprised to hear that most of the mods don't condone it considering there's definitely a bias towards the right leaning women there. There have been a number of rule breaking posts and comments from the right leaning women that never get deleted, but as soon as the left wing women start calling them out, the posts get locked. There was at least one post in the last week that was clearly attacking left wing women, but, as always, the right leaning woman got a pass for.... some reason. Her post should have been deleted and I know for a fact that if a left wing woman posted something similar, it would have absolutely been deleted. 

This isn't necessarily directed at you, I don't think you'd be here if you were right leaning, but I am finding it hard to believe that a number of the mods/admins there aren't teetering into right wing territory.

I personally have a bit of experience with this kind of thing, in terms of witnessing an online community shift further and further to the right under the guise of making it a place for "all people" (which of course is always a noble goal). I don't want to go into detail, just in case it makes me easier to identify. But because of this, I kind of feel like I can "see" what happens over time with Ovarit and Vexxed. I don't know all the mods and admins, and even the ones I do know, I wouldn't say I know them super-duper well. But I think I trust Kale when she says the admins/mods aren't like, interested in condoning the right-wing culture. The issue is, as Kale writes later "free speech vs censorship." Well, on that note, I will quote myself from the "certified tinfoil hat club members only" section of one of my long rambling posts:

(Jan 12 2025, 5:53 PM)Clover Several months ago, I ranted about the stuffy conservative vibe I had been increasingly sensing on Ovarit on a leftist Discord server. A trusted radfem from said server shared this article with me, and from all my experiences with being terminally online and witnessing "free speech" communities form and then devolve into right-wingery/alt-right ideology, I really felt like "ah fuck this feels like what is happening." The article is titled The Rhetoric Tricks, Traps, and Tactics of White Nationalism and it's about how "crypto-conservatives" manage to infiltrate online leftist spaces.

This point is key:
Quote:“Leftists will recognize dog whistles and know we’re crypto[fascist], but normies won’t listen to them.”
I fear this is what is happening, and I don't want to be a pessimist, but I worry it's a bit too late. Judging by the "elephant in the room" thread the answer was "SOURCE???" and "nahh Ovarit is fine" so... Okay then, I guess.

I'm too tired to go on about this (it makes me feel sad to think about how much I tried to counter right-wingery on Ovarit months ago and it felt like a constant uphill battle and now looking at how it seemed futile :catcry:), but I'll conclude with this informative article called Types of Propaganda, Propaganda Techniques, and Propaganda Strategies that may be of use for leftist-feminist women who still want to go up against with right-wing rhetoric on Ovarit (or elsewhere on the internet). It goes over how propaganda works in general (so it also can apply to neoliberal/gender woowoo propaganda as well) and strategies to counteract it.


(Oct 7 2025, 2:21 PM)dobby After I had sent the mod mail, the reply I had got back from admins was to just let others know to join Vexxed first and then propose their circle in that new circle thread. The thing is though... a lot of these feminist women aren't going to join Vexxed or trust the site or feel as if there's any point in proposing to run their groups there, since the way the site sort of looks currently – in terms of what comments are posted by some rightwingers and those who hold rightwing opinions that get upvoted highly – it honestly doesn't look very welcoming at all to any of the different, diverse groups of radical feminist women I've seen who would be happy to have an actual radfem-run website to re-form their groups on — let alone to other GC women who'd benefit from joining, such as some of the GC libfems, GC TIFs and ex-TIFs, WOC, lesbian women, 4B women, disabled women, working-class white women, etc. I feel like so many women from all sorts of backgrounds have been feeling alienated, especially like all non-Americans. Even adding circles for British women, Irish women, Canadian women, Australian women, etc, (and especially an American circle to maybe quarantine/limit some of the ignorant American propaganda to one circle lol) could do so much in helping tbh, and I'd be happy to help with any of these circle ideas, and convincing experienced mods who are radfems and belong to these demographics to be hyped about the idea of modding these circles, if they knew that those sorts of nationality-specific circles would be allowed on Vexxed. Black women and ex-Muslim women especially have been really difficult to recruit to Vexxed, because a lot of them notice so much hate, disdain, and racism towards them. :( Especially also true with lesbian women, childfree women, and 4B women.

And I feel like my efforts to make all these different groups of women and girls on Vexxed to feel more welcome and comfortable with posting more (or at all) or to feel comfortable in joining, haven't been working enough, without us having more inclusive circles existing on Vexxed, to at least provide a safe space for some women and some positivity and kindness and support. Idk if the Vexxed admins and mods would be open to it, but I'd really love to help mod some of these types of diverse, inclusive circles for increasing allyship between women and more solidarity, and I'd be happy to help with recruiting and finding better replacement radfem mods for each circle idea, if the admins are concerned that I'm not suited enough to be a good long-term mod for any circles, if I had the opportunity to maybe try to get a circle or two started to add a few safe spaces for radfem women to be able to have some positivity and support with the more hostile or rightwing comments forbidden from the circle or something? 

This kinda circles back to what I mentioned in response to YesYourNigel's question on "what would it matter if they make a feminism circle?" I think I more hope that they'll just allow a lot of circles for many different women. And since many women lean left, I'd hope there'd be more circles to reflect that. Then that could encourage more left-leaning women to join and change the overall atmosphere of the site. But yeah, just allowing women to make circles. I guess it confuses me, it's a place for "all women", but... not all women feel like it is, so how does that work? It seems like "having one's cake and eating it too." An online space for "all women" would mean there would need to be... unique spaces for the groups of women that compromise "all women." I think the Vexxed admins need to decide on if it's going to be a place for "all women," which would include 1. women they don't agree with and 2. women who might want to moderate a community differently than they would.

So the admins need to decide what they want to do. I think this is a similar issue with Ovarit, where it seems like the admins are trying to have a grasp on both administrating a website dedicated to making women's communities, but also controlling the communities on it via more moderation-like behavior. Doing both is going to wear them out. The good news is that the steelwoman admin did mention in a comment she wanted people to step up and offer to moderate more circles, it was related to the new "child-free" flair in o/Women. So I think that is promising.
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Oct 9 2025, 6:55 PM #92

(Oct 5 2025, 7:15 AM)dobby Omg I agree with all of this completely, and I had been wanting to figure out a good way to reach out to the Vexxed ideas to pitch it as well tbh. Like just allowing more users at a certain level or perhaps if some of us were trusted enough to help with recruiting new members who are mods/admins/group leaders of their own various different niche circles, whether it's a feminist book club or a group for preppers or various different lesbian groups on other sites, or for different radfem group leaders to each be able to make their own circles and curate the content their way if they wanted to, or for feminist influencers, content creators, and youtubers had the ability to create their own circles for their followers to chat in and discuss about the feminist topics that these influencers post videos about, etc — all of this would definitely benefit Vexxed as a website! 

And I completely agree with you; I've been wanting to pitch the idea of allowing conservative women and liberal/leftist women and women of other political parties (across the world) to be allowed to make their own circles and put in the work to get it active and keep it smoothly moderated to their own liking tbh, and for members to have the ability to branch off and make their own circles if they don't like the way a circle is modded. (And maybe each new circle could be given certain minimum requirements for activity each week or months and number of active mods that they would have to meet in order for their circle to be allowed to remain on the site, or else other members can apply to request to mod the circle, the way that reddit allows it maybe. I feel like the ability to create and mod new circles for members at a certain level benefits everyone in keeping the site feeling like it's for "all" women. There's so many different female-run subreddits on different topics that keep getting banned, so if those well-modded groups had the opportunity to re-start their group on Vexxed, that would definitely also help in the site organically growing to include more diverse viewpoints from feminist/GC women. 

If you haven't pitched this idea to the Vexxed admins yet, you totally should! ❤ I would've reached out to them myself to ask, but I was wary about accidentally writing out a wall of text that could overwhelm them since I wrote out too much when I had attempted to describe this same idea lol. It would be amazing if the Vexxed admins are open to trying out this idea! If they need more site members to volunteer to help make it work, I'd honestly love to volunteer to help, and I feel like so many others would too.

Thanks, dobby. :catblush: So a Vexxed mod did forward my suggestions to the admins/other mods. The admin response was, well, it was generally that they wanted to slowly incorporate new circles while Vexxed is still starting out. They also mentioned the general-ish consensus was that they didn't want to entertain a conservative women's circle, because they felt it'd make the conservative appearance of Vexxed worse or something. And I mean, yeah, if they keep doing the "gradually create circles" thing, and they choose a right-wing circle as one of their first circles... yeah that's not gonna be a good look. But if they just allow women to go make their own communities as they want, it is mostly out of their hands, besides enforcing site-wide rules. Well, it's their website, they can run it how they best see fit.

(Oct 7 2025, 12:34 PM)skunk
(Oct 7 2025, 11:05 AM)ILoveKaleJustSoDangMuch Yes, that's correct. I'm a mod at Vexxed.

Yes, I know there are a lot of rightwing opinions happening over there. Trust me, I don't condone it and neither do most of the mods. Sure, if you'd like to compile a post with links to the propaganda you've seen there, I'd love to read through it. Right now, we're all recognizing there's a culture issue and trying to figure out a solution. If I had better answers, I would share them, but honestly that's where we are right now.

I'm genuinely surprised to hear that most of the mods don't condone it considering there's definitely a bias towards the right leaning women there. There have been a number of rule breaking posts and comments from the right leaning women that never get deleted, but as soon as the left wing women start calling them out, the posts get locked. There was at least one post in the last week that was clearly attacking left wing women, but, as always, the right leaning woman got a pass for.... some reason. Her post should have been deleted and I know for a fact that if a left wing woman posted something similar, it would have absolutely been deleted. 

This isn't necessarily directed at you, I don't think you'd be here if you were right leaning, but I am finding it hard to believe that a number of the mods/admins there aren't teetering into right wing territory.

I personally have a bit of experience with this kind of thing, in terms of witnessing an online community shift further and further to the right under the guise of making it a place for "all people" (which of course is always a noble goal). I don't want to go into detail, just in case it makes me easier to identify. But because of this, I kind of feel like I can "see" what happens over time with Ovarit and Vexxed. I don't know all the mods and admins, and even the ones I do know, I wouldn't say I know them super-duper well. But I think I trust Kale when she says the admins/mods aren't like, interested in condoning the right-wing culture. The issue is, as Kale writes later "free speech vs censorship." Well, on that note, I will quote myself from the "certified tinfoil hat club members only" section of one of my long rambling posts:

(Jan 12 2025, 5:53 PM)Clover Several months ago, I ranted about the stuffy conservative vibe I had been increasingly sensing on Ovarit on a leftist Discord server. A trusted radfem from said server shared this article with me, and from all my experiences with being terminally online and witnessing "free speech" communities form and then devolve into right-wingery/alt-right ideology, I really felt like "ah fuck this feels like what is happening." The article is titled The Rhetoric Tricks, Traps, and Tactics of White Nationalism and it's about how "crypto-conservatives" manage to infiltrate online leftist spaces.

This point is key:
Quote:“Leftists will recognize dog whistles and know we’re crypto[fascist], but normies won’t listen to them.”
I fear this is what is happening, and I don't want to be a pessimist, but I worry it's a bit too late. Judging by the "elephant in the room" thread the answer was "SOURCE???" and "nahh Ovarit is fine" so... Okay then, I guess.

I'm too tired to go on about this (it makes me feel sad to think about how much I tried to counter right-wingery on Ovarit months ago and it felt like a constant uphill battle and now looking at how it seemed futile :catcry:), but I'll conclude with this informative article called Types of Propaganda, Propaganda Techniques, and Propaganda Strategies that may be of use for leftist-feminist women who still want to go up against with right-wing rhetoric on Ovarit (or elsewhere on the internet). It goes over how propaganda works in general (so it also can apply to neoliberal/gender woowoo propaganda as well) and strategies to counteract it.


(Oct 7 2025, 2:21 PM)dobby After I had sent the mod mail, the reply I had got back from admins was to just let others know to join Vexxed first and then propose their circle in that new circle thread. The thing is though... a lot of these feminist women aren't going to join Vexxed or trust the site or feel as if there's any point in proposing to run their groups there, since the way the site sort of looks currently – in terms of what comments are posted by some rightwingers and those who hold rightwing opinions that get upvoted highly – it honestly doesn't look very welcoming at all to any of the different, diverse groups of radical feminist women I've seen who would be happy to have an actual radfem-run website to re-form their groups on — let alone to other GC women who'd benefit from joining, such as some of the GC libfems, GC TIFs and ex-TIFs, WOC, lesbian women, 4B women, disabled women, working-class white women, etc. I feel like so many women from all sorts of backgrounds have been feeling alienated, especially like all non-Americans. Even adding circles for British women, Irish women, Canadian women, Australian women, etc, (and especially an American circle to maybe quarantine/limit some of the ignorant American propaganda to one circle lol) could do so much in helping tbh, and I'd be happy to help with any of these circle ideas, and convincing experienced mods who are radfems and belong to these demographics to be hyped about the idea of modding these circles, if they knew that those sorts of nationality-specific circles would be allowed on Vexxed. Black women and ex-Muslim women especially have been really difficult to recruit to Vexxed, because a lot of them notice so much hate, disdain, and racism towards them. :( Especially also true with lesbian women, childfree women, and 4B women.

And I feel like my efforts to make all these different groups of women and girls on Vexxed to feel more welcome and comfortable with posting more (or at all) or to feel comfortable in joining, haven't been working enough, without us having more inclusive circles existing on Vexxed, to at least provide a safe space for some women and some positivity and kindness and support. Idk if the Vexxed admins and mods would be open to it, but I'd really love to help mod some of these types of diverse, inclusive circles for increasing allyship between women and more solidarity, and I'd be happy to help with recruiting and finding better replacement radfem mods for each circle idea, if the admins are concerned that I'm not suited enough to be a good long-term mod for any circles, if I had the opportunity to maybe try to get a circle or two started to add a few safe spaces for radfem women to be able to have some positivity and support with the more hostile or rightwing comments forbidden from the circle or something? 

This kinda circles back to what I mentioned in response to YesYourNigel's question on "what would it matter if they make a feminism circle?" I think I more hope that they'll just allow a lot of circles for many different women. And since many women lean left, I'd hope there'd be more circles to reflect that. Then that could encourage more left-leaning women to join and change the overall atmosphere of the site. But yeah, just allowing women to make circles. I guess it confuses me, it's a place for "all women", but... not all women feel like it is, so how does that work? It seems like "having one's cake and eating it too." An online space for "all women" would mean there would need to be... unique spaces for the groups of women that compromise "all women." I think the Vexxed admins need to decide on if it's going to be a place for "all women," which would include 1. women they don't agree with and 2. women who might want to moderate a community differently than they would.

So the admins need to decide what they want to do. I think this is a similar issue with Ovarit, where it seems like the admins are trying to have a grasp on both administrating a website dedicated to making women's communities, but also controlling the communities on it via more moderation-like behavior. Doing both is going to wear them out. The good news is that the steelwoman admin did mention in a comment she wanted people to step up and offer to moderate more circles, it was related to the new "child-free" flair in o/Women. So I think that is promising.

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Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM
#93
(Oct 8 2025, 6:44 AM)YesYourNigel
(Oct 7 2025, 12:34 PM)skunk I'm genuinely surprised to hear that most of the mods don't condone it considering there's definitely a bias towards the right leaning women there. There have been a number of rule breaking posts and comments from the right leaning women that never get deleted, but as soon as the left wing women start calling them out, the posts get locked. There was at least one post in the last week that was clearly attacking left wing women, but, as always, the right leaning woman got a pass for.... some reason. Her post should have been deleted and I know for a fact that if a left wing woman posted something similar, it would have absolutely been deleted. 

Yeah, you don't get a cesspool like Ovarit or Vexxed with most of the mods being unaware of what's going on (and, at this point, most of the userbase either). And they were certainly not asleep at the wheel, considering the amount of censorship the radfem women have been getting there.

What sounds likely to me is that the conservative-leaning mods started seeing a bit too much of the really extreme levels of bigotry and fascism now that it's gotten THAT bad, and like the enlightened centrists that they are, realised being too mask-off doesn't bode well for their image, instead of doing the work of weeding out the subtler norms in their community that emboldened and encouraged such opinions in the first place. But just because you recognise that saying "Genocide Gaza with rusty knives!!!! ✊" might sound a little gauche doesn't mean you're not a conservative.

Yeah, frog boiling in a pot. It's related to the The Rhetoric Tricks, Traps, and Tactics of White Nationalism article I mentioned earlier. I truly don't need to believe that the mods are conservative-leaning, they just need to be unaware of how alt-right ideology spreads and naive about how much right-wingers see any place that allows any sort of "controversial takes" as an avenue to encourage politicized prejudice and bigotry, or in disbelief it could happen. And tada.

(Oct 8 2025, 9:05 AM)Wrongtoy In some ways, what has happened to the gender critical movement is akin to the porn wars of the 1980s. Maybe even worse, really.

Nancy Mace, Riley Gaines, Jennifer Sey, Sophia Lorey, Beth Bourne etc all describe themselves as pro-woman because they disapprove of men in the can. I guess Trump is pro woman then. I guess the taliban is too.

Yep. It kinda reminds me of what terfies said about female solidarity versus feminist solidarity.
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Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM #93

(Oct 8 2025, 6:44 AM)YesYourNigel
(Oct 7 2025, 12:34 PM)skunk I'm genuinely surprised to hear that most of the mods don't condone it considering there's definitely a bias towards the right leaning women there. There have been a number of rule breaking posts and comments from the right leaning women that never get deleted, but as soon as the left wing women start calling them out, the posts get locked. There was at least one post in the last week that was clearly attacking left wing women, but, as always, the right leaning woman got a pass for.... some reason. Her post should have been deleted and I know for a fact that if a left wing woman posted something similar, it would have absolutely been deleted. 

Yeah, you don't get a cesspool like Ovarit or Vexxed with most of the mods being unaware of what's going on (and, at this point, most of the userbase either). And they were certainly not asleep at the wheel, considering the amount of censorship the radfem women have been getting there.

What sounds likely to me is that the conservative-leaning mods started seeing a bit too much of the really extreme levels of bigotry and fascism now that it's gotten THAT bad, and like the enlightened centrists that they are, realised being too mask-off doesn't bode well for their image, instead of doing the work of weeding out the subtler norms in their community that emboldened and encouraged such opinions in the first place. But just because you recognise that saying "Genocide Gaza with rusty knives!!!! ✊" might sound a little gauche doesn't mean you're not a conservative.

Yeah, frog boiling in a pot. It's related to the The Rhetoric Tricks, Traps, and Tactics of White Nationalism article I mentioned earlier. I truly don't need to believe that the mods are conservative-leaning, they just need to be unaware of how alt-right ideology spreads and naive about how much right-wingers see any place that allows any sort of "controversial takes" as an avenue to encourage politicized prejudice and bigotry, or in disbelief it could happen. And tada.

(Oct 8 2025, 9:05 AM)Wrongtoy In some ways, what has happened to the gender critical movement is akin to the porn wars of the 1980s. Maybe even worse, really.

Nancy Mace, Riley Gaines, Jennifer Sey, Sophia Lorey, Beth Bourne etc all describe themselves as pro-woman because they disapprove of men in the can. I guess Trump is pro woman then. I guess the taliban is too.

Yep. It kinda reminds me of what terfies said about female solidarity versus feminist solidarity.

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Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM
#94
To Kale: thanks for participating and taking the time to read what the women on here have to say on this matter. 💜 I don't think any of us have any definitive answers or guarantees on how to solve whatever the issue with Vexxed, if the Vexxed admins even think what the issue is what women here think the issue is. But I hope it gives at least a more whole view of criticisms these "community for all women" attempts at social media. It's one thing to laugh and dismiss criticisms of Vexxed and Ovarit when they come from places like r/GenderCynical, it's another when it's coming from women who actually used to actively participate and contribute on the sites.


To everyone here, my opinion: please participate on Vexxed if you can. I have invite codes I can give. Be the change you wish to see. If you get frustrated with the content, take a break. If you see other radfem-aligned women who seem to be getting frustrated on Vexxed, recommend clovenhooves to them lol. :meowknife:

I also want to mention some observations I have on how a "block culture" on Ovarit and subsequently Vexxed have probably contributed to making the "right-wing culture" problem worse, ala lefties not being able to downvote, report, or reply to shitty comments. Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed to some friends I'd made from Vexxed/Ovarit or some radfem Discord chats, just as a way to vent or share my annoyance. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users. It is understandable why one would not want to see garbage takes all the time. The thing is though, it allows right-wing rhetoric to build up. If you don't see a shit low-effort garbage take, you won't downvote it. You can't reply to it, even if you know you have something to say that negates it. You won't be able to share the stupid take with other women who might have the energy to reply to it. You won't be able to report it if it breaks the rules. In hindsight, I remember the admins/mods of Ovarit saying "please report rulebreaking content!" and now I'm wondering, how many users weren't reporting content because they blocked all the shitposters that are more likely to test the rules..? How many comments are left unchallenged, right-wing-leaning posts upvoted to appear like they're "accepted" viewpoints, all because the users making them have been so consistently insufferable they've been blocked? Idk, just something that made me think.


Okay I'm done posting for now, thanks for putting up with my novels! :megacatweary:
Edited Oct 10 2025, 10:13 AM by Clover. Edit Reason: clarifying about block culture
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Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM #94

To Kale: thanks for participating and taking the time to read what the women on here have to say on this matter. 💜 I don't think any of us have any definitive answers or guarantees on how to solve whatever the issue with Vexxed, if the Vexxed admins even think what the issue is what women here think the issue is. But I hope it gives at least a more whole view of criticisms these "community for all women" attempts at social media. It's one thing to laugh and dismiss criticisms of Vexxed and Ovarit when they come from places like r/GenderCynical, it's another when it's coming from women who actually used to actively participate and contribute on the sites.


To everyone here, my opinion: please participate on Vexxed if you can. I have invite codes I can give. Be the change you wish to see. If you get frustrated with the content, take a break. If you see other radfem-aligned women who seem to be getting frustrated on Vexxed, recommend clovenhooves to them lol. :meowknife:

I also want to mention some observations I have on how a "block culture" on Ovarit and subsequently Vexxed have probably contributed to making the "right-wing culture" problem worse, ala lefties not being able to downvote, report, or reply to shitty comments. Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed to some friends I'd made from Vexxed/Ovarit or some radfem Discord chats, just as a way to vent or share my annoyance. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users. It is understandable why one would not want to see garbage takes all the time. The thing is though, it allows right-wing rhetoric to build up. If you don't see a shit low-effort garbage take, you won't downvote it. You can't reply to it, even if you know you have something to say that negates it. You won't be able to share the stupid take with other women who might have the energy to reply to it. You won't be able to report it if it breaks the rules. In hindsight, I remember the admins/mods of Ovarit saying "please report rulebreaking content!" and now I'm wondering, how many users weren't reporting content because they blocked all the shitposters that are more likely to test the rules..? How many comments are left unchallenged, right-wing-leaning posts upvoted to appear like they're "accepted" viewpoints, all because the users making them have been so consistently insufferable they've been blocked? Idk, just something that made me think.


Okay I'm done posting for now, thanks for putting up with my novels! :megacatweary:

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Oct 10 2025, 7:19 AM
#95
(Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM)Clover Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users.

That's ok, I'll judge for you. I've moderated different types and formats of discussion groups/forums in the past, and it used to be understood - at least on the forums I was involved with - that if you're a mod or admin, you don't block participants. You need to be able to see what's going on and have a perspective on whether someone might be a chronic troublemaker vs. occasionally overstepping or forgetting the group boundaries, and you can't do that when you block people and never see what they say.
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Elsacat
Oct 10 2025, 7:19 AM #95

(Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM)Clover Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users.

That's ok, I'll judge for you. I've moderated different types and formats of discussion groups/forums in the past, and it used to be understood - at least on the forums I was involved with - that if you're a mod or admin, you don't block participants. You need to be able to see what's going on and have a perspective on whether someone might be a chronic troublemaker vs. occasionally overstepping or forgetting the group boundaries, and you can't do that when you block people and never see what they say.

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Oct 10 2025, 10:21 AM
#96
(Oct 10 2025, 7:19 AM)Elsacat
(Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM)Clover Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users.

That's ok, I'll judge for you. I've moderated different types and formats of discussion groups/forums in the past, and it used to be understood - at least on the forums I was involved with - that if you're a mod or admin, you don't block participants. You need to be able to see what's going on and have a perspective on whether someone might be a chronic troublemaker vs. occasionally overstepping or forgetting the group boundaries, and you can't do that when you block people and never see what they say.

Oh, sorry, I edited my post to give greater clarity. I was referring to just sharing with friends I'd made on Ovarit/Vexxed or radfem Discord servers I'm a part of, not the Vexxed mods/admins themselves. I would hope the mods/admins don't block users... 🫠 For the reasons you've stated.
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Oct 10 2025, 10:21 AM #96

(Oct 10 2025, 7:19 AM)Elsacat
(Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM)Clover Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users.

That's ok, I'll judge for you. I've moderated different types and formats of discussion groups/forums in the past, and it used to be understood - at least on the forums I was involved with - that if you're a mod or admin, you don't block participants. You need to be able to see what's going on and have a perspective on whether someone might be a chronic troublemaker vs. occasionally overstepping or forgetting the group boundaries, and you can't do that when you block people and never see what they say.

Oh, sorry, I edited my post to give greater clarity. I was referring to just sharing with friends I'd made on Ovarit/Vexxed or radfem Discord servers I'm a part of, not the Vexxed mods/admins themselves. I would hope the mods/admins don't block users... 🫠 For the reasons you've stated.

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Oct 13 2025, 6:34 PM
#97
(Oct 7 2025, 1:32 PM)ILoveKaleJustSoDangMuch One issue we've identified with the rightwing stuff is the issue of free speech vs censorship.

I'm sorry...what? Are mods actually wrecking their brains with how to handle rightwing shit in a FEMINIST space with rules against misogynistic content because the poor baby rightwingers' free speech needs to be maintained? On someone's privately owned feminist-focused website on the internet? Like, it's pretty baffling to have "no promotion of misogynistic practices" in the rules, and then also act like rightwingers, whose entire ideology is dedicated to promoting misogynistic practices, need to be allowed to have a say there.

What about all the men? What about all the TIMs getting censored? The libfems? Where is their free speech? Why only rightwingers? They get endless allowances so long as they don't literally spell out that they're anti-abortion. I can't imagine a libfem being open about her views there and getting the amount of assumed good faith and people acting dumb over what she is saying the way that conservative women are.

Quote:The team is pretty against censorship

For a space that has "no promotion of misogynistic practices" in its rules, it's pretty odd to claim to be against censorship. That already censors a hefty amount of opinions. You can't have a niche feminist anti-prostitution gender critical space without censoring the mountains of normie opinions.

Quote:there have been a number of cases where something was posted that we didn't like, but couldn't justifiably delete as it didn't actually break any rules.

Why are mods acting like their hands are tied regarding this? It's their website. There's clearly an attempt to present it as a feminist space, but the second a misogynist makes the laziest attempt to cover their ass, all of a sudden it's "Well, we see they're misogynists, but we just can't do anything about it unless they literally spell out that they hate women 🤷‍♀️".

And given the amount of radfem takes I've seen get censored and how often I got banned from these "GC" """no censorship""" spaces for saying radfem things, I find the whole "no censorship" shtick very hard to buy into.

Quote:Then when other users call those users out, cases like that have sometimes fallen into rule-breaking territory like discussing downvotes, personal attacks, etc.

I mean...if you're making rules specifically to address feminists complaining about misogynists in a feminist space in order to keep the space welcoming to misogynists, then maybe the rules are the problem? And also the misogynists? And not the feminists being mean to misogynists?

Maybe the rules that are needed are the ones to keep bad faith brainless misogynistic actors out, rather than protecting said bad faith actors for the sake of keeping the illusion of a "no censorship" "everyone welcome" space that's...also trying to roleplay that it's feminist?? Why is it so important for the mods to protect a wilfully ignorant misogynistic audience? Are we really lacking in feminist spaces where most of the arguments are ignorant patriarchal parroting that we need to protect these parrots in yet another one? Do we really need another space where feminists have to sugarcoat the harms of misogyny? How about one single space that isn't that?

Quote:My best advice for responding to those kinds of posts/threads would be to respond with facts from credible sources, stats, and trying to keep the discussion from being about rightwing posters.

The problem here is that reading between the lines, ripping apart misogynistic implications and insulting conservativism (which, again, is inherently against women's rights and holy shit how can any pretend-feminist space act dumb over this?) counts as a personal attack on the conservative women there. All it takes is for one conservative woman to start screaming for the mods because of the emotional injury that she's sustained at her ideology being dismantled and all of a sudden, this "no censorship" "loud and proud" feminist space has to tiptoe around such "divisive" subjects like Charlie Kirk.

And certainly conservatives don't have to do any of that - the website is filled with complaints about SJWs and libtards and handmaidens (referring exclusively to libfems ofc) and calling said libfems and TIFs idiots and traitors. It's just that there aren't any or enough libfems around to take offense, and if they tried, they'd be mass-downvoted and told to fuck off. Much free speech, such no censorship.

A related way in which these rules always get abused to punish feminists is in deleting "drama" - which means a single user can say offensive shit, but the second another user calls them out on it, suddenly it's "controversial" and "combative" and these meanie women are not playing nice and smiling enough, and either the person who responded gets their replies deleted for being a meanie, or, if the initial commentator was really obviously full of it, both of them get punished. The result is that people and mods leave the offensive shit up unchallenged and punish anyone who does challenge it (with only minor possibility of the first user making the offensive comment potentially getting a slap on the wrist) because the only real problem is the "drama", rather than what is actually being said. It's especially ironic to see this attitude on forums that claim to be "anti censorship" - you can't both say this and also delete any threads when they get too heated and controversial because all the women aren't smiling enough. Pick one.

And lord knows the mods can't be counted on to do anything about offensive comments because "hyuck, it's not technically breaking any rules if it's not the most obviously vile comment imaginable 🤷‍♀️", but explaining why someone's bullshit ignorant misogynistic opinion is wrong is rulebreaking and hostile. This is also how feminist rhetoric gets watered down in any other feminist space, by being censored for being "transphobic", "misandrist", "SWERFy" etc. or, if all else fails, hostile and combative because attacking the patriarchy makes people clutch their pearls and that's bad and must be silenced.

Quote:As far as making a conservative circle and a leftist/liberal circle so different ideologies can be corralled, there are concerns about that creating echo chambers.

lol have you seen Vexxed? In what universe is that whole website not an echo chamber?
Edited Oct 17 2025, 7:35 AM by YesYourNigel.
I refuse to debate two obvious facts: 1. the patriarchy exists 2. and that's a bad thing
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YesYourNigel
Oct 13 2025, 6:34 PM #97

(Oct 7 2025, 1:32 PM)ILoveKaleJustSoDangMuch One issue we've identified with the rightwing stuff is the issue of free speech vs censorship.

I'm sorry...what? Are mods actually wrecking their brains with how to handle rightwing shit in a FEMINIST space with rules against misogynistic content because the poor baby rightwingers' free speech needs to be maintained? On someone's privately owned feminist-focused website on the internet? Like, it's pretty baffling to have "no promotion of misogynistic practices" in the rules, and then also act like rightwingers, whose entire ideology is dedicated to promoting misogynistic practices, need to be allowed to have a say there.

What about all the men? What about all the TIMs getting censored? The libfems? Where is their free speech? Why only rightwingers? They get endless allowances so long as they don't literally spell out that they're anti-abortion. I can't imagine a libfem being open about her views there and getting the amount of assumed good faith and people acting dumb over what she is saying the way that conservative women are.

Quote:The team is pretty against censorship

For a space that has "no promotion of misogynistic practices" in its rules, it's pretty odd to claim to be against censorship. That already censors a hefty amount of opinions. You can't have a niche feminist anti-prostitution gender critical space without censoring the mountains of normie opinions.

Quote:there have been a number of cases where something was posted that we didn't like, but couldn't justifiably delete as it didn't actually break any rules.

Why are mods acting like their hands are tied regarding this? It's their website. There's clearly an attempt to present it as a feminist space, but the second a misogynist makes the laziest attempt to cover their ass, all of a sudden it's "Well, we see they're misogynists, but we just can't do anything about it unless they literally spell out that they hate women 🤷‍♀️".

And given the amount of radfem takes I've seen get censored and how often I got banned from these "GC" """no censorship""" spaces for saying radfem things, I find the whole "no censorship" shtick very hard to buy into.

Quote:Then when other users call those users out, cases like that have sometimes fallen into rule-breaking territory like discussing downvotes, personal attacks, etc.

I mean...if you're making rules specifically to address feminists complaining about misogynists in a feminist space in order to keep the space welcoming to misogynists, then maybe the rules are the problem? And also the misogynists? And not the feminists being mean to misogynists?

Maybe the rules that are needed are the ones to keep bad faith brainless misogynistic actors out, rather than protecting said bad faith actors for the sake of keeping the illusion of a "no censorship" "everyone welcome" space that's...also trying to roleplay that it's feminist?? Why is it so important for the mods to protect a wilfully ignorant misogynistic audience? Are we really lacking in feminist spaces where most of the arguments are ignorant patriarchal parroting that we need to protect these parrots in yet another one? Do we really need another space where feminists have to sugarcoat the harms of misogyny? How about one single space that isn't that?

Quote:My best advice for responding to those kinds of posts/threads would be to respond with facts from credible sources, stats, and trying to keep the discussion from being about rightwing posters.

The problem here is that reading between the lines, ripping apart misogynistic implications and insulting conservativism (which, again, is inherently against women's rights and holy shit how can any pretend-feminist space act dumb over this?) counts as a personal attack on the conservative women there. All it takes is for one conservative woman to start screaming for the mods because of the emotional injury that she's sustained at her ideology being dismantled and all of a sudden, this "no censorship" "loud and proud" feminist space has to tiptoe around such "divisive" subjects like Charlie Kirk.

And certainly conservatives don't have to do any of that - the website is filled with complaints about SJWs and libtards and handmaidens (referring exclusively to libfems ofc) and calling said libfems and TIFs idiots and traitors. It's just that there aren't any or enough libfems around to take offense, and if they tried, they'd be mass-downvoted and told to fuck off. Much free speech, such no censorship.

A related way in which these rules always get abused to punish feminists is in deleting "drama" - which means a single user can say offensive shit, but the second another user calls them out on it, suddenly it's "controversial" and "combative" and these meanie women are not playing nice and smiling enough, and either the person who responded gets their replies deleted for being a meanie, or, if the initial commentator was really obviously full of it, both of them get punished. The result is that people and mods leave the offensive shit up unchallenged and punish anyone who does challenge it (with only minor possibility of the first user making the offensive comment potentially getting a slap on the wrist) because the only real problem is the "drama", rather than what is actually being said. It's especially ironic to see this attitude on forums that claim to be "anti censorship" - you can't both say this and also delete any threads when they get too heated and controversial because all the women aren't smiling enough. Pick one.

And lord knows the mods can't be counted on to do anything about offensive comments because "hyuck, it's not technically breaking any rules if it's not the most obviously vile comment imaginable 🤷‍♀️", but explaining why someone's bullshit ignorant misogynistic opinion is wrong is rulebreaking and hostile. This is also how feminist rhetoric gets watered down in any other feminist space, by being censored for being "transphobic", "misandrist", "SWERFy" etc. or, if all else fails, hostile and combative because attacking the patriarchy makes people clutch their pearls and that's bad and must be silenced.

Quote:As far as making a conservative circle and a leftist/liberal circle so different ideologies can be corralled, there are concerns about that creating echo chambers.

lol have you seen Vexxed? In what universe is that whole website not an echo chamber?

I refuse to debate two obvious facts: 1. the patriarchy exists 2. and that's a bad thing

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Wrongtoy
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Oct 13 2025, 7:52 PM
#98
Worth a separate thread, but Fllia UK had a left wing global women’s conference acknowledging women in Palestine haven’t gotten pads etc.

Tras boycotted in front. Zionist women went in, confronted lefties and a couple were ejected. Next thing you see is Kara Dansky and Lierre Kieth  of wolf holding a “Rape is not Resistance” sign waving the Israeli flag, even though Israeli media itself has said there were no confirmed rapes Oct 7 or afterward.

I imagine a similar dynamic if vexxed users came to a hypothetical clovenhooves event.
Edited Oct 13 2025, 7:59 PM by Wrongtoy.
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Wrongtoy
Oct 13 2025, 7:52 PM #98

Worth a separate thread, but Fllia UK had a left wing global women’s conference acknowledging women in Palestine haven’t gotten pads etc.

Tras boycotted in front. Zionist women went in, confronted lefties and a couple were ejected. Next thing you see is Kara Dansky and Lierre Kieth  of wolf holding a “Rape is not Resistance” sign waving the Israeli flag, even though Israeli media itself has said there were no confirmed rapes Oct 7 or afterward.

I imagine a similar dynamic if vexxed users came to a hypothetical clovenhooves event.

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komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
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Oct 14 2025, 4:54 PM
#99
(Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM)Clover I also want to mention some observations I have on how a "block culture" on Ovarit and subsequently Vexxed have probably contributed to making the "right-wing culture" problem worse, ala lefties not being able to downvote, report, or reply to shitty comments. Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed to some friends I'd made from Vexxed/Ovarit or some radfem Discord chats, just as a way to vent or share my annoyance. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users. It is understandable why one would not want to see garbage takes all the time. The thing is though, it allows right-wing rhetoric to build up. If you don't see a shit low-effort garbage take, you won't downvote it. You can't reply to it, even if you know you have something to say that negates it. You won't be able to share the stupid take with other women who might have the energy to reply to it. You won't be able to report it if it breaks the rules. In hindsight, I remember the admins/mods of Ovarit saying "please report rulebreaking content!" and now I'm wondering, how many users weren't reporting content because they blocked all the shitposters that are more likely to test the rules..? How many comments are left unchallenged, right-wing-leaning posts upvoted to appear like they're "accepted" viewpoints, all because the users making them have been so consistently insufferable they've been blocked? Idk, just something that made me think.

Hey, it's me, the one who has a block list on Vexxed that's longer than my arm ;) Well, for what it's worth, here's my reasoning: I spent a lot of time reporting stuff on Ovarit and nothing changed, not a damn thing happened. Literal propaganda, racism, and homophobia was allowed to stay up, and yes, I checked after reporting. Come over to the Vexxed era and I basically don't use it anyway since it's the exact same cesspool of trolls and psychos, so I decided this time I'm just gonna block everyone I can't stand and call it a day. I'll change my mind if I start seeing the admins/mods take actual steps to deal with what's going on over there, but if they don't, then I'm sure not wasting my time anymore. If they can't see a way to fix it, little old me reporting the odd comment is not gonna make a difference.

IMHO, the real answer that almost nobody involved wants to accept is that if you are trying to craft a certain culture on your platform, you have to punish and even remove users who are ruining the vibes. Call it censorship or whatever you want, but it is what it is. If you refuse to remove users who are shitting everything up, then the users who can't stand shit are going to leave, while the users who love shit are gleefully rolling around in it, lapping it up, and producing even more shit. I'm not singling Vexxed or Ovarit out here; this is just the reality of the internet now. Any platform or community that is not properly moderated soon devolves into garbage.
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komorebi
“I am not free while any woman is unfree, even when her shackles are very different from my own.” – Audre Lorde
Oct 14 2025, 4:54 PM #99

(Oct 9 2025, 6:58 PM)Clover I also want to mention some observations I have on how a "block culture" on Ovarit and subsequently Vexxed have probably contributed to making the "right-wing culture" problem worse, ala lefties not being able to downvote, report, or reply to shitty comments. Several times, I'd send a screenshot of some dumb post/comment I'd see on Vexxed to some friends I'd made from Vexxed/Ovarit or some radfem Discord chats, just as a way to vent or share my annoyance. A decent amount of the time, I'd get a reply of "oh, I have that person blocked, I didn't even see it." Now, I don't mean to say this to judge anyone who blocks irritating users. It is understandable why one would not want to see garbage takes all the time. The thing is though, it allows right-wing rhetoric to build up. If you don't see a shit low-effort garbage take, you won't downvote it. You can't reply to it, even if you know you have something to say that negates it. You won't be able to share the stupid take with other women who might have the energy to reply to it. You won't be able to report it if it breaks the rules. In hindsight, I remember the admins/mods of Ovarit saying "please report rulebreaking content!" and now I'm wondering, how many users weren't reporting content because they blocked all the shitposters that are more likely to test the rules..? How many comments are left unchallenged, right-wing-leaning posts upvoted to appear like they're "accepted" viewpoints, all because the users making them have been so consistently insufferable they've been blocked? Idk, just something that made me think.

Hey, it's me, the one who has a block list on Vexxed that's longer than my arm ;) Well, for what it's worth, here's my reasoning: I spent a lot of time reporting stuff on Ovarit and nothing changed, not a damn thing happened. Literal propaganda, racism, and homophobia was allowed to stay up, and yes, I checked after reporting. Come over to the Vexxed era and I basically don't use it anyway since it's the exact same cesspool of trolls and psychos, so I decided this time I'm just gonna block everyone I can't stand and call it a day. I'll change my mind if I start seeing the admins/mods take actual steps to deal with what's going on over there, but if they don't, then I'm sure not wasting my time anymore. If they can't see a way to fix it, little old me reporting the odd comment is not gonna make a difference.

IMHO, the real answer that almost nobody involved wants to accept is that if you are trying to craft a certain culture on your platform, you have to punish and even remove users who are ruining the vibes. Call it censorship or whatever you want, but it is what it is. If you refuse to remove users who are shitting everything up, then the users who can't stand shit are going to leave, while the users who love shit are gleefully rolling around in it, lapping it up, and producing even more shit. I'm not singling Vexxed or Ovarit out here; this is just the reality of the internet now. Any platform or community that is not properly moderated soon devolves into garbage.

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Clover
Kozlik's regular account 🍀🐐
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Oct 16 2025, 10:24 PM
#100
(Oct 14 2025, 4:54 PM)komorebi If you refuse to remove users who are shitting everything up, then the users who can't stand shit are going to leave, while the users who love shit are gleefully rolling around in it, lapping it up, and producing even more shit.

Every time I try to reply to your comment, I get about this far and then this gets stuck in my brain and all I can do is laugh at the imagery. Fuck. This apparently will be my only contribution. lol. lmao, even.
Kozlik's regular member account. 🍀🐐
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Clover
Kozlik's regular account 🍀🐐
Oct 16 2025, 10:24 PM #100

(Oct 14 2025, 4:54 PM)komorebi If you refuse to remove users who are shitting everything up, then the users who can't stand shit are going to leave, while the users who love shit are gleefully rolling around in it, lapping it up, and producing even more shit.

Every time I try to reply to your comment, I get about this far and then this gets stuck in my brain and all I can do is laugh at the imagery. Fuck. This apparently will be my only contribution. lol. lmao, even.

Kozlik's regular member account. 🍀🐐

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