The ball is starting to roll. My non-IT org had the question asked to the director on last years company all hands meeting. A month later, we now have official guidance that allows bsky and suggests using both. I presume this will shift some more now Musk/Trump are in office, especially if they do loud distastefull things.
I use Debian, and never followed their account there. Like most "official" accounts that now make a big point of leaving X, they only posted a feed of their official pages and contribute nothing that would make it wortwhile to follow or interact with, anyway.
An explicit announcement like this, on the official news channel, is almost the definition of virtue signalling. If they don’t want to post to X, that’s fine, and an announcement on X would even be appropriate, and they could criticize X there, which would be useful information for other people using X. But a widely publicized post like this, to everybody not using X? It is obviously only done to signal virtue.
Using the phrase "virtue signaling" as a pejorative is iniquity signaling.
In reality, it serves an important social function. Expressing ethical values signals to others that these values matter and encourages collective action. When enough people make similar choices, it can create economic and social pressure for change. Publicly aligning one's actions with one's principles isn't just about image. It's about fostering accountability, strengthening community values, and inspiring others to reflect on their own choices.
In this way, "virtue signaling" can be a catalyst for meaningful social and economic reform.
Debian is an organization with an opinion on free software. Debian might also reasonably have an opinion about the centralized nature of X and similar platforms. They may even have opinions on the nature of proper discourse on its own discussion forums and similar venues they themselves control. But for Debian to have an opinion about political issues like this is a bit beyond their purview. People don’t, or should not be made to, sign up to support an organization with a definite position about everything under the sun. This would seem to me to be the opposite of diversity, a value they claim to support.
> People don’t, or should not be made to, sign up to support an organization with a definite position about everything under the sun.
I agree. This is about one particular issue: whether they're going to continue hanging out at the Nazi bar, and as someone who doesn't hang out there, I for one appreciate learning their stance on it. It's a very important issue, and as you said above, it is absolutely the virtuous thing to do.
> This would seem to me to be the opposite of diversity, a value they claim to support.
If your definition of "diversity" includes treating white supremacists, Christian nationalists, rapists, violent criminals, etc on equal ground as everyone else, I think you should carefully examine your own morality.
There’s something to be said for the opposite approach. There is a Buddhist temple in Las Vegas, I think. “Only Nixon could go to China.”. But you are perhaps right in that Debian would be the wrong choice for this role; this would probably be better served by some more general human rights organization, of which I am sadly not informed enough to suggest one.
> as someone who doesn't hang out there, I for one appreciate learning their stance on it.
Why? You know you are not going to use X. The only benefit you could get from learning about Debian’s change of policy is only the dubious pleasure of having your preexisting beliefs validated. But this is all that Debian will accomplish with this kind of public wide announcement. People who do use X could just as well hear about it on X, and would not need a wider public announcement. This is why I called this “virtue signalling”: Debian is not making this announcement to everyone, Debian is announcing to everybody who does not use X that their decision is correct and that they are good and virtuous people. This is a very low and cheap way to get appreciation, and only worsens the politicization and polarization of the issue.
> Why? You know you are not going to use X. The only benefit you could get from learning about Debian’s change of policy is only the dubious pleasure of having your preexisting beliefs validated.
No, I appreciate learning their stance on it because now I know they do actually stand by the values that are posted on their website, and I know that I won’t need to be looking for an alternative Linux distribution.
> Debian is not making this announcement to everyone,
Yes, they are. Posting only to Twitter would reach a smaller audience. Or are you saying that the average Twitter user doesn’t know/care to surf the web?
> This is a very low and cheap way to get appreciation
How so?
> and only worsens the politicization and polarization of the issue.
Human rights are not a political issue, and a site that is run by, staffed by, and platforms people who wish to take away human rights should be shunned, loudly and often.
> No, I appreciate learning their stance on it because now I know they do actually stand by the values that are posted on their website, and I know that I won’t need to be looking for an alternative Linux distribution.
This fits my description exactly. You gained no useful information from this announcement, and you will change nothing in your behaviour as a result of it. The only thing which this announcement gave you is a nice fuzzy feeling of validation.
> Yes, they are.
Compared to what Debian could have reasonably done – i.e. post the announcement to the actual X account which Debian is closing – announcing to the entire world that Debian no will longer post to X is announcing to the subset of the world which does not use or read X.
> How so?
It is giving people warm fuzzy feelings of being vindicated in their beliefs, when these specific beliefs are not, IMHO, relevant for Debian.
> Human rights are not a political issue, and a site that is run by, staffed by, and platforms people who wish to take away human rights should be shunned, loudly and often.
That ”or platforms” is doing a lot of heavy lifting. By this reasoning, anyone using the internet, or the web, at all is implicitly supporting a platform used by a lot of unpleasant people with unsavory beliefs. Or if the internet is too big, how about Google? Should Google be “shunned” if they don’t black-hole certain sites and beliefs in Google’s search results? Should Google Maps remove all references to unwanted people or businesses? Should Cloudflare be held liable for every site Cloudflare provides DDoS protection for? How about hosting providers? Internet service providers who provide peering with any of the above? Your list of people to shun grows long very quickly. Not to mention that of you do get your way, once the mechanisms have been put in place, they will easily turn on a dime to suppress your beliefs instead.
Also, why should Debian, specifically, take on the public advocacy role against X? Debian is not supposed to advocate for every single thing which you think is good – Debian is supposed to restrict their advocacy to issues relevant to Debian.
Is it so hard to believe that some people do not want to mix software advocacy with political advocacy? It no more bad faith than people arguing that they want to keep their professional life and personal life separate.
I find it much easier to trust Debian if they don't involve themself with world politics and focus on software freedoms. Same with a company if they focus on being a company rather than a political advocacy.
Advocating for the right of minorities and other disadvantaged groups to exist is not “world politics” and it saddens me that I’ve had to say this multiple times on this site.
> Advocating for the right of minorities and other disadvantaged groups to exist is not “world politics”
The top-level topic was the stated reason for Debian to stop posting on X, which was “[…] we feel X doesn't reflect Debian shared values as stated in our social contract, code of conduct and diversity statement. X evolved into a place where people we care about don't feel safe.”. This does not even name who is feeling unsafe, and certainly does not say that X is against the existence of “minorities and other disadvantaged groups”.
And this is not even relevant to our subtopic in this tree, where I have never argued against the existence of anyone. It is utterly disingenous of you to cast aspersions that everyone not agreeing with you – in this case me – are standing with what X is being indirectly accused of.
Accusing me, out of the blue, of not arguing in good faith is certainly what I would call an ad hominem. According to your link, which does seem plausible, I am wrong about this definition, and I admit that I very well could be.
This still does not make it OK for you to accuse me of not arguing in good faith, without explaining how.
Is the bluesky account non-official?