You can’t even speak frankly here. I came to Lemmy because I was tired of being censored by Reddit, but it seems like this place is just as restrictive on speech as Reddit was.
People, if we are going to talk about systemic change for a better world, violence has to be a tool in the toolbox.
If you run a tor relay, and encrypt all traffic, and do not store data locally, and make sure not to do any other nefarious activity online. There are legal resources to help you. But yes, it is a very very very shitty experience if the alphabet agencies come knocking. Expect to be audited, and have your employer and family members interviewed.
https://www.eff.org/pages/legal-faq-tor-relay-operators
If you’re not able or willing (completely understandable) to run a tor node consider donating to the EFF who will defend tor relay hosts.
https://supporters.eff.org/donate/
I actually read that exact one when I had just set it up. I came over during the big Reddit exodus and was so excited to set up my instance, just a small one with a few communities that I felt like I could handle. The downside is it’s the whole of the fediverse, and I quickly had to defed from several instances and had to moderate way more than I’d like. It’s honestly exhausting, and then the whole CSAM attacks happened, and then the spam attacks, and it’s a lot for one guy.
I broke down during the first csam attacks, I saw some horrific shit. I luckily was in therapy and talked about it, but goddamn do they post the worst things out there. I never thought I’d have contacts with federal agencies as a reporter (in the US if you host a site you are a mandated reporter), but here we are. All because I just wanted to talk about pop music.
And then people wonder why I don’t allow other material. I can barely handle the okayish material posted, let alone actual vile shit that comes my way, no one prepped me for that. I give kudos to others who do, the lemmy.world admins are way stronger than I am, but damn are there a lot of people out there who just want to ruin the little communities we have.
So, back to the OP, that’s why I kneejerk reacted there. It’s not nearly as fun hosting this as I thought it would be, and I’ve debated many times shutting it down, but I believe in the fediverse and open social media so I try to keep it up. It’s constant spam fighting, trolling protection, and just a headache, and it’s still never enough, users always demand it should be more open, but I just can’t.