this post was submitted on 17 Jan 2026
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Mate, this discussion is in response to this comment.
We obviously got off that topic ages ago
"We"? I didn't. Everything I'm saying is still 100% in that context. Why in the world would I move away from it?
Well I guess that's the problem then, I assumed you were arguing against systemwide ban of instances that intentionally open the door for them.
Yeah of course, if it's an ICE account that just joins is their own accord, let that instance deal with it, not a problem. I think it's stupid for anyone to argue to ban the instance for something outside their control.
But if they do as bsky.social main instance did; open the door, officially recognise them, and don't kick/ban, then the instance is bad for the ecosystem and should be treated like the virus it is. That's when to defederate it.
Again: saying that you should ban/isolate an instance for allowing an official government entity because you don't agree with the government's policies is just insanity.
Just imagine having to ban any and all instances that allow official accounts of ICE, any Chinese gov entities, anything from Saudi Arabia or the Emirates, anything from India, anything from Israel, anything from Venezuela, anything from russia...
And then you have situations like in Ukraine - imagine having Fediverse since 2010. You have an official UA Ministry of Internal Affairs account, all is good. Then the Maidan Protests happen, over 100 people are shot dead by Berkut (equivalent of US SWAT)... so now you have to ban the account? Ban the instance, even! But then the people of Ukraine prevail, Yanukovych runs to russia, Berkut forces dissolve and disappear into the wind... so you can now un-ban the instance!
It's a mess, mate! It's childish and it undermines any hope for any fediverse services to ever be considered an alternative to established social media sites, because - if nothing else - no sane journalist/reporter/researcher would ever commit to supporting a product where their source of information may get randomly removed because an account on an instance is connected to something heinous.
And you didn't answer my question earlier, so I'm going to post it again:
The thing I'm arguing for is banning instances that open a floodgate.
So using your Johnny Regular example, if he goes postal, they can handle Johnny Regular, not our problem, they had no way to know
But if the server admins are like "🎉 Hey everyone! I know that you will all love to see him, please welcome Mass Murderer Johnny Regular! 🎉", that's when you ban the entire instance.
The SS was a government organisation, are you saying we should welcome them into our servers? Islamic State was a government organisation, are you saying we should welcome them? - No, we shouldn't.
We're not legalists, just cause it's legal and officially supported by a government doesn't magically make it moral. If an org does terrible things, and that's well known, then allowing them to join is always bad. It's implicit support of them.
Did Bsky do this? Or did they just verify an official account of a government entity?
The SS wasn't a government organisation, it was a military unit. It's like having an official account for 101st Airborne. I don't mind these not being around, but ICE is a federal entity, their primary task is to handle immigration and Customs Enforcement (that's literally their name). The fact that they got turned into para-SA/SA by the current administration is kinda' irrelevant here.
Instance admins shouldn't be moral police.
That's an absolutely insane take. Imagine saying: "allowing Nvidia to have an account on the Fediverse implicitly means the Fediverse supports everything Nvidia is doing with AI and chip/RAM supply".
Define Verification: to state that you approve of the user/org and officially recognise it. So they did both.
It does. Implicitly