Burnout Café Admin@admin@burnout.cafe

To the admins of mastodon.social and mastodon.world:

I respectfully ask you to consider amending your Server Rules to prohibit the publication of pornography on your instances.

Flagship Mastodon instances such as mastodon.social and mastodon.world are easily perceived by many newcomers as central, general-purpose entry points into Mastodon and the wider Fediverse. That gives those flagship sites a particular responsibility.

Flagship general-purpose instances should not normalize unexpected exposure to pornography, regardless of orientation.

Pornography is commonly considered by many people to be harmful, offensive or inappropriate in general-purpose public spaces. People who want to view, publish or discuss pornography can already do so on other instances that allow it, or on dedicated adult-focused instances where users knowingly choose that environment.

Content warnings, sensitive-media blurring and hashtags are not sufficient containment for pornography on large general-purpose instances. In practice, many users who publish pornography do not reliably apply content warnings, sensitive-media settings or suitable hashtags, and other users who do not want to be exposed to that content can still encounter it unexpectedly.

There is also a legal and regulatory issue. In Germany and the UK, for instance, legal adult pornography is not simply prohibited online, but making pornography publicly accessible to minors without effective age-gating or age assurance is heavily restricted and may be unlawful or legally non-compliant. Large public social-media instances should not rely on ordinary Mastodon content warnings or media blurring as if they were equivalent to age verification.

For those reasons, I ask you to consider changing the server rules to prohibit pornography on mastodon.social and mastodon.world, rather than merely requiring it to be marked as sensitive.

This would not be anti-sex, anti-LGBT, anti-expression or anti-Fediverse. It would simply recognize that large general-purpose onboarding instances have a different role from adult-focused communities. A general-purpose flagship instance should be safe and predictable for ordinary users, including people who do not consent to unexpected exposure to pornography.

@staff
@ruud
@jeroen
@bannanaente.mastodon.world
@paul
@solarbranka
@mwadmin
@sokian
@Rooki
@SigurdVie
@Gargron

#mastodon #fediverse #pornography #moderation

Rosa Aeterna@rosaaeterna@transfem.social

Replying to @admin@burnout.cafe

@admin@burnout.cafe @Gargron@mastodon.social @ruud@mastodon.world @mwadmin@mastodon.world @solarbranka@mastodon.world @paul@mastodon.world @SigurdVie@mastodon.world @staff@mastodon.social @jeroen@mastodon.world @Rooki@mastodon.world @sokian@mastodon.world

I respectfully ask you to consider amending your Server Rules to prohibit the publication of pornography on your instances.
I respectfully ask you, the admin of burnout.cafe, to consider defederating from the fediverse entirely if you hate sex so much and want to force people to not post it.
Flagship Mastodon instances such as mastodon.social and mastodon.world are easily perceived by many newcomers as central, general-purpose entry points into Mastodon and the wider Fediverse. That gives those flagship sites a particular responsibility.
No, people making a mistake and thinking that this is somehow a centralized social media platform does not mean that any instance has any sort of responsibility about this. The users have a responsibility to actually learn about the platform they're trying to join, and to realize that the entire point of the fediverse is decentralization.
Flagship general-purpose instances should not normalize unexpected exposure to pornography, regardless of orientation.
If it has a CW on it, then it is in fact not unexpected at all. No reasonable person will see "CW: Gay Porn" and expect it not to have gay porn behind it.
Pornography is commonly considered by many people to be harmful, offensive or inappropriate in general-purpose public spaces. People who want to view, publish or discuss pornography can already do so on other instances that allow it, or on dedicated adult-focused instances where users knowingly choose that environment.
Puritanism is commonly considered by many people to be harmful and offensive to the general public. People who want to have zero chance of viewing or discussing pornography can already do so on other instances that align with their anti-sex ideology. Puritanism results in repressed people who cannot handle the natural body, and overall results in poorly-adjusted people for life in a normal society.
Content warnings, sensitive-media blurring and hashtags are not sufficient containment for pornography on large general-purpose instances. In practice, many users who publish pornography do not reliably apply content warnings, sensitive-media settings or suitable hashtags, and other users who do not want to be exposed to that content can still encounter it unexpectedly.
They in fact are perfectly good containment on all instances, and you saying otherwise does not make it suddenly false. If people are not applying them correctly, then criticize THAT. Go ahead and report the people not properly CWing their shit! But that does not mean you get to come after the people doing the right thing. If people are using CWs, then there is no situation in which they "unexpectedly encounter pornography".
There is also a legal and regulatory issue. In Germany and the UK, for instance, legal adult pornography is not simply prohibited online, but making pornography publicly accessible to minors without effective age-gating or age assurance is heavily restricted and may be unlawful or legally non-compliant. Large public social-media instances should not rely on ordinary Mastodon content warnings or media blurring as if they were equivalent to age verification.
I can assure you, the admins of the instances affected know their laws far better than you do. I've heard from several of said people that you are completely full of shit about this.
This would not be anti-sex, anti-LGBT, anti-expression or anti-Fediverse. It would simply recognize that large general-purpose onboarding instances have a different role from adult-focused communities. A general-purpose flagship instance should be safe and predictable for ordinary users, including people who do not consent to unexpected exposure to pornography.
1. Yes it is
2. You dense motherfucker, you literally EXCLUSIVELY CALLED OUT GAY PORN IN THE ORIGINAL POSTS, and doubled down on it. You compared it to fucking beheading videos!
3. Yes it is
4. Yes. It. Is.
Straight up saying that people posting, discussing, looking, and just existing in the presence of porn are not "ordinary users". As if your puritanism and anti-sex ideology was not obvious enough. I would contend that people looking at porn and posting it are PERFECTLY ordinary users of the Fediverse, whereas you and your puritan posse are not. if anything, it is better that the large instances not ban porn like your puritan ass wants them to, so that people will realize that this social media platform is very different to the mainstream corpo ones and they can get quickly acclimated to the different culture!

Once again, I call upon you to defederate from the fediverse entirely and stop trying to censor and suppress the rest of us. We will not change for your techbro, puritan, colonialist-ass. We will not become another corpo-friendly anti-sex shitfest of a platform, no matter how much you want us to. So your only options are to either defederate and have your instance live in its own far-off bubble where none of the porn can get to you, or better yet you can go back to Meta since you clearly love their anti-porn, puritan ideologies so much.

Jul 5, 2026, 21:41 UTC