this post was submitted on 14 Aug 2023
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AskBeehaw
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A thought — looking at your post, and the other comment here, it sounds like you are looking for a community with very low tolerance for trolls and the like. Sounds familiar... 🤔
Maybe ask the BeeHaw mods if there's room for the community that you're looking for: /c/mentalhealth.
I wouldn't be surprised if they'd be worried about the responsibility of such a place, both in terms of modding and I guess legal liability, but it can't hurt to ask, right? Try asking in /c/beehawsupport.
It's not the same (potential) can of worms, but we already have /c/neurodivergent.
BeeHaw is specifically a safe space; if what you're looking for could exist, I personally can't imagine a better home for it.
Good job! 👏
Also, if there is some sort of feeling that legal liability could be an issue, you might try suggesting that the proposed community had an extended set of rules, such as "no medical advice", "suicide talk must be reported", etc. And maybe some guidelines with standard responses to the latter, links to prevention hotlines, that sort of thing.
A suggestion could be to peruse Reddit for a similar community, specifically to look at their rules, standard responses, etc.
Best of luck! 😃 And do report back here if you post a proposal, I'll gladly pop by for support and upvotes 👌
If you link to suicide hotlines, mention which ones can send cops (under the guise of EMS) to your door without your consent. (For instance, I’d never suggest 988 because of this.) That way, users know you know what’s up and that they can trust the group’s info. And given cops’ record of shooting mentally ill people in crisis, it’s pretty important.
I think catering to a worldwide audience and offering options for all the available countries would be a good addition to your suggestion.
I live in Scandinavia, and the cops try really hard not to kill people here, mentally ill or otherwise.
Similarly, I don't know what 988 is and that information would be very unhelpful if I were in a situation where I needed help.
In essence, I'm all for doing some deep thinking about what information to give, and taking various national idiosyncracy into account. As long as we keep in mind that not everyone is an American.
This is an excellent point and something I will keep in mind as I type up my post.
I’m trying to provide information to prevent people from getting killed, and you’re policing my not being Euro-inclusive enough? Srsly?
I'm not policing anyone, I was pointing out the importance of being inclusive. If you feel like I was fishing for Euro-inclusivity, you're missing the point — that would be just as fruitless as being America-centric. I was suggesting a global mindset, again, to prevent people from getting killed.
If you feel the need to take offense, I'll freely admit that my comment could also be viewed as a thinly veiled jab at a "first-world" country that is collectively afraid of being killed by its own police force, so much so that a citizen would be compelled to point out the importance of only using suicide prevention services that don't involve the police.
Either way, it's a moot point, as the mods have definitively shot down the idea of a mental health community on BeeHaw (see nearby comments).
I'm genuinely sorry if my comment annoyed you, as that was not my intention, and doesn't add anything to my overall happiness. I hope you won't spend too much time thinking about it, and that you have a nice Monday 🙂
Thank you. I’m sorry. There’s a vocal segment in spaces like this that goes beyond trying to make sure Americans don’t manifest destiny the internet (totally fair) and crosses the line into attacking anything about us (not just the many, many, justified parts). I may have overreacted, but yes, living in a country where calling a suicide hotline could result in being shot by a police officer heightens my emotional response here. Thank you for being understanding.
Thank you, but no need to apologize, I get where you're coming from.
One of my passports is American (mom is an expat), so I probably spend more time reading American news than most of my countrymen. It's not unlikely that this, in turn, can foster a bit of antipathy from time to time; even if I don't get affected directly by all the horrible stuff (especially everything instigated by the right and their collective boner for fascism and hatred), it's frustrating too look on from the sidelines when you feel you have a connection, however tenuous.
People actively working against their own self-interests and buying into the populist narratives is mind-blowing, and the dumpster pyre just keeps growing. And it's difficult to look away, however morbid the fascination may be.
It's also leaking. The rise of the right all over the globe is scary as fuck, and while America can't take the full blame, the normalization of fascism that the American right is peddling (quite successfully) is making everything worse, rapidly.
So yeah, my comment could probably have been worded better, and I'll work on being better going forward. I'll also keep voting in every American election, even if I'm a natural born expat. It's the least I can do (and probably also the most).
I hope you have the resources to do the same. If only elections could become national holidays like many have proposed, but the right will never allow that, and they will make sure that it never happens.
Making sure voting is a luxury that many can't afford was a damned clever move; being poor and struggling now effectively means you're too poor to vote in many places, and having to rely on the privileged to do the right thing. And too many aren't.
I honestly have a hard time seeing a happy ending on the horizon these days, and it's bloody depressing.
Mental health is one of the few communities that fall into a general category of 'often problematic on the internet' due to a confluence of factors noted already in this post as well as a few not mentioned - namely that people who are not educated can cause serious and real harm to others with bad or misinformed advice. In the same way that you shouldn't ask for legal advice from a random individual, asking for mental health advice online can be fraught with bad responses/answers. At this point in time we're not entertaining the idea.
Tagging @[email protected] for transparency
Makes total sense, and I respect you and the team's decision on the matter 😊
I hadn't really thought the 'bad advice' angle through, thank you for the clarification.