I’ve transferred the community to GrainEater and left the mod team, I will now apply for mod again.

Here are some reasons why I want to be mod:

• I’m Chinese, I was born in China, raised in Singapore, studied for a while in Canada, returned to China.
• I like fact checking, but that doesn’t mean I’m always right or the authoritative source on China.
• I have some experience with being a moderator.

Here are some reasons why I might not be suitable for mod:

• I am not a neutral or impartial third party and will never be one, I side with China not just because of my nationality, but also because I believe China is truly developing Marxism or scientific socialism.
• While I like fact checking, I didn’t apply it rigorously to every post/comment in /c/China or on China-related posts/comments on Lemmygrad. There are times when I see questionable statements and let it slide because it’s too troublesome to fact check it properly. Sometimes it’s because the content is posted on websites not accessible in China and I don’t use a VPN (unlike others), and alternative front-ends like Invidious (for YouTube) or those for X/Twitter or Reddit may not be working properly. (News sites are fine because of archive services.)

I’d be glad to include caffeine in the list of substances too, this anti-promotion rule is not a ban on mentioning them. As many others have pointed out, certain substances have positive effects, in fact I’d say all of them have positive effects one way or another, whether medically or not. That’s why I think having positive effects is not a reason to exclude a substance from the list.

@GrainEater@lemmygrad.ml A community mod can’t appoint an admin as community mod apparently, so I have to ask you to do so yourself.

Why did you bring up morphine, to prove that we should be able to discuss morphine or related substances outside the context of medical use or research?

Indeed, there should be a defined process for the introduction of new rules in a community, maybe in the form of suggestions, or when an incident requiring moderation occurred that wasn’t covered by the rules. My next step might be making a post to receive suggestions for community rules, though /c/China isn’t a particularly active community so there hasn’t been many rule violations.

I’d like to add that such phrases should be backed up with sources and details, and not just as a matter-of-fact statement. Other factual statements like “X substance is legal in Y country” or “X substance is proven scientifically to have Y properties and Z effects” might not be fine depending on the context, like if the statements are used to justify promoting the substance in a person’s comment/post.

See my latest improvement to the rule that attempts resolve this disparity between different cultures, which includes a modification of your last suggestion: https://lemmygrad.ml/post/5205977/4756875

I think you meant to write “to” instead of “in” in your last sentence “keep those topics in other forums”, that’s what confused me.

Whatever the situation is regarding drug incarceration in America, it is not contradictory to my anti-promotion stance. My view is that anti-promotion should be encouraged to stop more people from becoming possible victims of substance abuse. As for people that are currently undergoing issues with substance abuse, they should at the minimum not be discriminated against, and if possible be helped into a better situation.

I was considering adding “(for non-medicinal purposes)” to the rule, but people who mention medical purposes have proved to me that this is unnecessary. I’m going to repeat this again, online spaces are not a good place to receive advice on medical prescription from others just because they use it in their culture or country.

Where in the post and my comments have I said to ban these substances? I find it frustrating that people come to me and mention so-and-so substance can have medicinal properties, because I understand this concept, but I’m assuming this type of medicine is prescribed by a certified doctor or therapist, and not by random people on the internet just because they use it in their culture or country.

One solution is for someone from hexbear to comment that they’re against this new rule, and then people from hexbear can upvote that comment.

I don’t think anyone will do so, but they might instead talk about their experiences with such substances in a neutral or positive tone, they might describe the experience as “interesting” or “cool”. While a person might not be intentionally promoting a substance when they talk about it in this way, what will people who are addicted to the substance think about such opinions? If there’s no opposition raised, the substance might be viewed as any other normal item.

This is not a rule to ostracize people who are addicted to various substances, it’s to clearly signal that these substances are not cool, not interesting, not something to joke about, not something to try out.

This is the /c/China community on Lemmygrad.ml, not hexbear.net.

Some of these substances might indeed have medicinal use, this does not contradict the idea of anti-promotion. The rule can thus be improved by making more clarifications with the input of other comments here, something like:

Do not promote the use of drugs/alcohol/tobacco/weed/psychedelics/inhalants (for non-medicinal purposes).

The phrase “for non-medicinal purposes” might be open for interpretation so I am against it, but it can be added if needed. I’d also like to add that online forums without verified experts are not the best places for medical advice. Any scientific discussion should be held elsewhere, or strictly limited to information from authoritative sources without subjective opinions of those involved.

Note that there can be ads for alcohol in China but not for tobacco, and both substances are legal for adults. This community rule goes further than the current legal situation in China.

People have different opinions on each of the listed substances, that’s fine by me. This is an anti-promotion rule that will definitely limit the discussion that people can have about them, including but not limited to:

• advocacy for these substances
• comparing pros and cons, then concluding that they’re a net good
• saying that they have little or no side effects in small doses

it really shouldn’t be controversial to be asked to keep those topics in other forums.

I’m not sure what you mean by this last sentence, are there some words missing?

It has been brought to my attention in the same private channel that some comrades have mentioned them casually in other communities, and I’m not going to wait for it to happen here before making up this new rule. The last rule I came up with was Rule 0 in reaction to someone who thought Taiwan was a country and not part of the People’s Republic of China.

I’d be warning them and then deleting their comments if necessary, not ban them, unless they double down. The ban is for people who come into this post and argue for substance abuse, I should probably make that clear.