Hello World,
following feedback we have received in the last few days, both from users and moderators, we are making some changes to clarify our ToS.
Before we get to the changes, we want to remind everyone that we are not a (US) free speech instance. We are not located in US, which means different laws apply. As written in our ToS, we're primarily subject to Dutch, Finnish and German laws. Additionally, it is our discretion to further limit discussion that we don't consider tolerable. There are plenty other websites out there hosted in US and promoting free speech on their platform. You should be aware that even free speech in US does not cover true threats of violence.
Having said that, we have seen a lot of comments removed referring to our ToS, which were not explicitly intended to be covered by our ToS. After discussion with some of our moderators we have determined there to be both an issue with the ambiguity of our ToS to some extent, but also lack of clarity on what we expect from our moderators.
We want to clarify that, when moderators believe certain parts of our ToS do not appropriately cover a specific situation, they are welcome to bring these issues up with our admin team for review, escalating the issue without taking action themselves when in doubt. We also allow for moderator discretion in a lot of cases, as we generally don't review each individual report or moderator action unless they're specifically brought to admin attention. This also means that content that may be permitted by ToS can at the same time be violating community rules and therefore result in moderator action. We have added a new section to our ToS to clarify what we expect from moderators.
We are generally aiming to avoid content organizing, glorifying or suggesting to harm people or animals, but we are limiting the scope of our ToS to build the minimum framework inside which we all can have discussions, leaving a broader area for moderators to decide what is and isn't allowed in the communities they oversee. We trust the moderators judgement and in cases where we see a gross disagreement between moderatos and admins' criteria we can have a conversation and reach an agreement, as in many cases the decision is case-specific and context matters.
We have previously asked moderators to remove content relating to jury nullification when this was suggested in context of murder or other violent crimes. Following a discussion in our team we want to clarify that we are no longer requesting moderators to remove content relating to jury nullification in the context of violent crimes when the crime in question already happened. We will still consider suggestions of jury nullification for crimes that have not (yet) happened as advocation for violence, which is violating our terms of service.
As always, if you stumble across content that appears to be violating our site or community rules, please use Lemmys report functionality. Especially when threads are very active, moderators will not be able to go through every single comment for review. Reporting content and providing accurate reasons for reports will help moderators deal with problematic content in a reasonable amount of time.
Everything was fine until the "Jury nullification" thing? Apparently that's an American thing where a state can disregard a federal law if they find it to be unconstitutional.
What does that have to do with Lemmy moderation?
I'm sorry if this is very obvious, but I'm not American, and just learned the meaning of the term from Wikipedia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nullification_(U.S._Constitution)
Wrong Nullification, Jury Nullification is when jurors say "not guilty" as the result of a trial despite evidence undoubtedly pointing to a crime as the law sees it.
Yes thanks, I somehow fucked up my search. Now it makes sense.
It's not really even that. It's when jurors believe the law should not apply in that specific instance for some reason.
For example, you might be opposed to the laws against drug possession in small amounts. You could vote "not guilty" if you were on a jury where someone was on trial for violating that law, even if it's 100% clear the defendant did, in fact, break the law. That would be nullification.
I think I see where the admins are coming from in the sense of using nullification as a way to get off from a crime in planning (but, let's face it, the odds that are EXTREMELY slim), but they already covered planning crimes as being against the policy. Why bother calling out the nullification part?
Well its not the state ignoring federal law. It the jury voting innocent when they know the person Is guilty.
1 jury member is free to vote innocent or guilty 2 jurers cant be sued or prosecuted if they reached the wrong verdict 3 the jury is the final say in guilt or innocent
Therefore, when a jury votes innocent despite overwhelming evidence of guilt, then the person is innocent. The state as Lost it's ability to enforce its law. And no one can
Apparently I fucked up my search. ๐ Thanks for giving the correct info.
Now it at least makes sense.
Minor nitpick, juries only decide guilt; either guilty or not guilty. There is no way to legally declare someone innocent.
True but very pedantic. But what else is the internet for if not nitpicks