Childish? Kinda. Insane? No.

There are three relevant things to say about hexbear.

1. It is not a serious instance. Or at least not completely serious; they’re mostly there for memes, funposting, “I know that feel” etc.

So they’re less like the meeting room of a communist party than like the bar where those communists hang out and drink beer, after the meeting is over.

I feel like this is often misinterpreted, as HB users say something that is mostly a taunt and others interpret as actual argumentation. And it also tends to attract younger users, who… well, behave like young people?

2. Even if not a serious instance, they’re serious about their views. Your typical HB user is communist, antifa, vegan, anti-cop, and interprets things in a very specific way. They’re rather transparent about it.

And, because of #1, they aren’t really willing to spend their time entertaining anyone’s counterpoints. It’ll be interpreted as sealioning or similar.

3. Hexbear was already its own thing before federation. As such it developed social norms that often conflict with the norms typically found in the rest of the Threadiverse (Lemmy, Mbin, Piefed etc.)

For example, even if Lemmy as a whole is prone to intrusive political discussions, HB users tend to do it far more. Because they’re used to an environment where this is typically taken as OK.

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When it comes to dealing with HB users here, my advice is the exact same as dealing with other users:

• if you don’t like what someone is saying (because it’s idiotic, obstrusive, or whatever), block the person for some peace of mind.
• if you’re consistently uninterested on the content coming from an instance, block the instance.