this post was submitted on 14 Sep 2025

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531

Seriously what's that idea? (feddit.org)

submitted 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) by NichEherVielleicht@feddit.org to c/asklemmy@lemmy.world

373 comments fedilink hide all child comments

They shouldn't be able to do that!

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[–] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 10 points 15 hours ago (1 children)

Why not, exactly? I think with the way the fediverse works, this would be a needless hassle for them to program this in. IIRC, posts are all separate and are just referring to another post. I think it'll be up to their server on whether or not to honour that block (your server could possibly sever the link on it's frontend, but that won't change that the person linked your post to theirs)

And even if you could, they could still post a screenshot locally or write stuff about you.

[–] greenbelt@lemy.lol 1 points 10 hours ago

or copy-paste your comment (post-url)

[–] UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 22 points 18 hours ago

I'm more annoyed by losing the "Block Community" button when a sub's admin blocks me.

[–] regedit@lemmy.zip 32 points 22 hours ago (7 children)

That's why I love Voyager for mobile viewing. Not sure the feature's exclusivity, but you can tag people and add up or downvotes to their accounts total. For instance, you were at +70 upvotes from me. But if I didn't like you, I could add a tag to your account with why or whatever, and add -1000, effectively highlighting, for me, how much less I enjoy your input compared to others. It doesn't hide their bullshit but makes it super obvious who sucks complete ass!

Along the vein of blocking, I like how lemmy does it. I can see the block person left a comment and choose to read it or ignore it.

[–] rothaine@lemmy.zip 6 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

How do you do that? I'm on voyager and didn't know about this. I would love tags

[–] lenz@lemmy.ml 6 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Settings>User Tags>Track Votes! :D

[–] rothaine@lemmy.zip 5 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Awesome! Ty!

[–] regedit@lemmy.zip 4 points 15 hours ago

Yup, it's pretty rad! To add or remove stuff on a user account, tap their name then use the three do a in the upper-right to get to tags. From there, it's easy peasy!

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[–] ILikeBoobies@lemmy.ca 4 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

Seems ideal, then they won’t know they’re blocked.

[–] HalfSalesman@lemmy.world 6 points 14 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

That should be a separate function: Muting, Ignoring, or maybe "Shadow Blocking".

Regular Blocking should prevent direct replies completely.

EDIT: There also should be an option to make all or specific comments "Viewable by logged in & unblocked users only". For maximum separation.

[–] Feathercrown@lemmy.world 76 points 1 day ago (4 children)

Blocking someone is not a tool to silence them. It's a tool to ignore them.

[–] lightnsfw@reddthat.com 21 points 19 hours ago (1 children)

Yeah, by blocking them you are saying YOU don't want to see their posts. That doesn't mean you get to make that decision for everyone else. I don't see the problem here.

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 9 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

I never had a twitter account, but made a bsky account just to support people moving away from there even though I'd them they move to mastodon.

Anyway, I saw a post claiming a certain fetish term was now forbidden because it was being used a slur. I commented that I've only ever heard it used to refer to a real person when the person in question was using it to describe themselves. I got some positive responses, but the ended up getting blocked from replying when they disagreed with me. Can 3rd parties see blocks or did it just look like I chickened out?

I didn't care for that and I think these little "features" of twitter that people have gotten use to has twisted how to interact with other people. On reddit or lemmy, the topic is the main focus and the people managing the topic should be the only ones who control what gets said there. With twitter and bsky, the opening post is the main focus and they get control of what gets said. I prefer the former over that latter.

[–] JcbAzPx@lemmy.world 6 points 16 hours ago (1 children)

Reddit also blocks you from replying. Not just to that person, but to the comment thread in general. So many people do the insult-block to "win" a conversation.

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 2 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

The mods of the sub are the ones to decide who gets blocked though. Not the person you're auguring with, unless you're arguing with is a mod.

[–] JcbAzPx@lemmy.world 4 points 13 hours ago

The mods can ban you, but anyone can block you and stop you from commenting on threads they are involved in.

[–] AstralPath@lemmy.ca 8 points 20 hours ago (2 children)

A block should also be able to prevent them from seeing your activity. That would not constitute silencing the blocked individual as they can still go anywhere and talk to/see anyone else on the fediverse, just not you.

[–] deaf_fish@midwest.social 11 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

No, I don't think that would be good. So for example if there was a guy who thought we should all be eating lead. And every time he posts you put up facts about how eating lead was poisonous. And then the lead guy blocked you. Then every time the lead guy posts about how everyone should eat lead, you wouldn't see it and so you wouldn't be able to reply with how lead is poisonous.

So if the lead guy blocked everyone who disagreed with him publicly. Then the lead guy can just post whatever they want and no who knew lead was poisonous would reply because they wouldn't see the post. So others who didn't know lead was poisonous would start seeing this guy posting about eating lead without being challenged. And so they might think it's a good thing.

[–] AstralPath@lemmy.ca 4 points 17 hours ago (1 children)

I see what you mean. Personally I'm gonna side with the folks that need the block functionality as a defense against stalking/harassment though.

The lead eater can ban anyone they want but that doesn't stop others from posting direct challenges to the lead eater's rhetoric elsewhere. I think its better to help those in need than to leave them vulnerable with less than ideal tools to protect themselves.

[–] Buddahriffic@lemmy.world 3 points 15 hours ago

But even that case doesn't work because someone could use a different account (or no account at all) to do the stalking.

[–] exasperation@lemmy.dbzer0.com 8 points 18 hours ago (1 children)

There is a need for more precise terminology. We should refer to "block" as stopping someone from interacting with you or your submissions/comments and "mute"/"ignore" as making it so that the person's own actions cannot be seen by you.

[–] Feathercrown@lemmy.world 4 points 15 hours ago

Discord recently made this distinction; it makes sense imo

[–] smnwcj@fedia.io 8 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

I think communicating that someone is blocked is a useful part of blocking. Even if it's just a notification after comment "you have a blocked reply, it will not be visible to the poster".

[–] rhombus@sh.itjust.works 5 points 20 hours ago (1 children)

Someone else in this thread pointed out that this would just encourage bad actors to make sock puppet accounts to get around being blocked.

[–] Duamerthrax@lemmy.world 5 points 18 hours ago

Bad actors already do that.

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[–] Perspectivist@feddit.uk 78 points 1 day ago (11 children)

I have no issue with this whatsoever. I block people so that I don't need to see their posts, not that they couldn't see mine. If you don't want others reading what you post online, then don't post online.

[–] bss03@infosec.pub 28 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

Also, while other locations in the Fediverse might disable access to unauthenticated persons, comments and post in Lemmy are generally public in that way. So, a blocked user could simply logout (or visit from a different instance) to see the content.

Also, as a third-party I do want someone (e.g. a fact checker) to be able reply to a comment with more information, so that I can see it, even if the commenter doesn't want to see replies (from the "woke mob" or wikipedians, e.g.).

I understand some people think the reply thread under their comments is somehow "owned" and should be "controlled" by them, but I don't agree. I think this should also be true in most places on the Fediverse, tho it isn't (as I understand it) on Mastodon (and the like).

[–] angrystego@lemmy.world 1 points 14 hours ago (1 children)

Perhaps some people want others reading what they post online but don't want to be bullied.

[–] Perspectivist@feddit.uk 2 points 13 hours ago

You can block bullies. They can continue to waste their time writing mean messages but those will never reach you.

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[–] Sirence@feddit.org 28 points 1 day ago (1 children)

A lot of people here never had a stalker and it shows.

[–] tal@olio.cafe 21 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

If you're concerned about someone being able to see your activity, no blacklisting-based system

which is what OP is talking about in terms of "blocking" would be -- on a system without expensive identifiers (which the Threadiverse is not and Reddit is not

both let you make new accounts at zero cost) will do much of anything. All someone has to do is to just make a new account to monitor your activity. Or, hell, Reddit and a ton of Threadiverse instances provide anonymous access. Not to mention that on the Threadiverse, anyone who sets up an instance can see all the data being exchanged anyway.

In practice, if your concern is your activity being monitored, then you're going to have to use a whitelisting-based system. Like, the Fediverse would need to have something like invite-only communities, and the whole protocol would have to be changed in a major way.

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[–] mathemachristian@lemmy.blahaj.zone 33 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Because it would allow people to push narratives and not get called out if they block everyone against them.

Imagine a civil transphobe pushing some narrative that flies below the radar of whatever mods are moderating that comm. If they block all the trans users they cannot get called out on their stuff anymore.

I think there was some discourse on this on black mastodon?

[–] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 2 points 15 hours ago

Excellent point tbh

[–] Natanael@infosec.pub 20 points 1 day ago

From a technical standpoint, doing it in another way requires your blocks to be public.

He and you are both publishing individual comments with metadata telling which thread and where in it that these entries go. The instance hosting the community simply pull all these entries together. To cut off that response then your instance must tell that hosting instance to detach that reply from the blocked user. Currently Lemmy doesn't support any such thing.

[–] FaceDeer@fedia.io 60 points 1 day ago

How is it not fair? You get to decide what you can see and say. You don't get to decide what I can see and say.

[–] BlackPenguins@lemmy.world 23 points 1 day ago (4 children)

The way Reddit does is abusive. I called out a guy for spamming, he blocked me, he's the one who creates TV discussion threads, I can't participate anymore.

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[–] MyDarkestTimeline01@ani.social 113 points 1 day ago (64 children)

Blocking means you can't see them. It makes them non existent to you. It doesn't hide you from them. It's working as intended.

[–] PeriodicallyPedantic@lemmy.ca 47 points 1 day ago (13 children)

I'd call that "muting" rather than blocking.

And it leaves vulnerable communities open to abuse, because they're unable to police their communities and kick out harassers.

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[–] JackbyDev@programming.dev 17 points 1 day ago (1 children)

I don't mind it, but if the devs change it I hope they don't take the Reddit route that prevents you from replying to any comment chain the user is in, especially with how small Lemmy is. Direct replies I can understand.

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[–] tal@olio.cafe 33 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (4 children)

How the Threadiverse works today

blocking hides content from blocked users, but doesn't affect their ability to comment

is how Reddit originally worked, and I think that it was by far a better system.

Reddit only adopted the "you can't reply to a comment from someone who has blocked you" system later. What it produced was people getting into fights, adding one more comment, and then blocking the other person so that they'd be unable to respond, so it looked like the other person had conceded the point.

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