I will paraphrase a comment on a similar Issue, additions of mine are in bold:

"It's absolutely in the spirit of Mastodon to allow silencing harmful instances and users. Not one single instance is intended to be a primary one, and if you disagree with their silencing of certain instances and users, you should find another instance that suits your needs, or start another one."

It's absolutely in the spirit of Mastodon to allow silencing harmful instances and users

I do not challenge this. I’m just proposing a system where the user has a bit of control without enforcing its tastes to anyone.

Not one single instance is intended to be a primary one

Maybe, but today mastodon.social can be considered as the primary one, and you can’t just overlook that fact by saying it was not the original intent.

you should find another instance that suits your needs, or start another one

Implying that migration and hosting are easy. They are not.

I'm opposed, because I support admins being able to curate and nurture the kind of environment they want.

you should find another instance that suits your needs, or start another one

Implying that migration and hosting are easy. They are not.

This is a difficult issue, and I think probably what I would support instead is making it easy to find out which instances are blocked and why before joining an instance, and making migration and hosting much easier.

Admins are ultimately in control of their instances and they should have the ability to alter the flow of data in and out of their instances. If you don't like what your instance is doing, make another one or move. If you can't find one you like and/or don't have the resources to make your own, then you're just out of luck.

I'm opposed, because I support admins being able to curate and nurture the kind of environment they want.

Again, I do not challenge this. I just want users to be able to see toots in the federated timeline that are silenced by the admin.

This is a difficult issue, and I think probably what I would support instead is making it easy to find out which instances are blocked and why before joining an instance

Unfortunately, it’s impossible. Some instance don’t let their users know who is silenced and/or why. Some removed the ability to see the reasons of the ban.

and making […] hosting much easier.

That’s impossible too. Not everyone has the technical knowledge to set it up, nor the time, nor the money. Let alone a proper setup, with frequent updates. Self-hosting is not simple, and it will probably never be.

Admins are ultimately in control of their instances and they should have the ability to alter the flow of data in and out of their instances.

That’s called banning. I’m talking about silencing.

If you don't like what your instance is doing, make another one or move. If you can't find one you like and/or don't have the resources to make your own, then you're just out of luck.

You do not help anyone with that kind of comments.

Unfortunately, it’s impossible. Some instance don’t let their users know who is silenced and/or why. Some removed the ability to see the reasons of the ban.

Then don't join that instance! There are many more, with more transparency. :)

This works as long as you know some of them don’t publish their ban list, and that you are not already subscribed somewhere in the fediverse. After that, it’s too late.

Hmmm, true.

The way it works now, users sign up to any old open instance, maybe one that was recommended, and then move to a new account when they find an instance that suits them better. I definitely agree that it's all pretty unwelcoming for new users, that more information for new users would be a good idea, easy ways to migrate are very important, etc. Maybe this is just my "old man yells at cloud" talking, but I feel like allowing content that admins don't want in their community is undermining.

I feel pretty much the opposite : it empowers the user, and it’s good. I’m not talking about blocked instances and users, but muted. If someone is muted, you can still subscribe to him, and you can still see his posts in your TL. Why not allowing users to unmute them just for themselves, if they want to?

Letting individual users unsilence/unblock instances/users leads to several complications too. Boosting blocked users? Drawing in content that's illegal in the country where the instance is located? At the very least your account would have to be silenced/blocked from view to shield other users.

There are plenty of instances that boast about not blocking/silencing anything. If it's that important to you to see everything, move to one of those instances. No need to start your own.

If an user or an instance is muted, not blocked, a boost can still happen.

If it's that important to you to see everything, move to one of those instances.

Once again, you are implying that the migration is easy. It’s not.

I take it "unsilence" and "unsuspend" aren't the same word?

Silences currently have a bit of a complicated relationship, in that they're designed to be minimally invasive—they're not supposed to affect people who have opted-in to communicate with silenced users—but there are times they get in the way anyway (such as when trying to view conversations with users who were later silenced)

See the posts by the m.s. admins about "communication without consent":

When instance A silences instance B, that doesn't stop all content from instance B from appearing on instance A, and it doesn't get rid of existing follow relationships or prevent new ones. Here's what it does do:

Users on instance B may not send communication to users on instance A without those users' active consent.

That's it. Users on B aren't cut off from users on A; they just need consent to communicate. That's all.

Anyway, I don't think I have a very strong opinion here one way or the other. Just wanted to give some context.

The thing is, if I am on instance A, which silenced instance B for whatever reason, maybe I’m missing some interesting content that is not the reason of the silence. That’s pretty much what happened recently on m.s : an 2k+ instance was muted because of one user.

And if the instance is silenced, how exactly do you give consent?

That’s pretty much what happened recently on m.s : an 2k+ instance was muted because of one user.

I think it's more complicated than that.

If I had been an admin faced with an instance whose admin doesn't take action against nazis, I might have done the same thing. Not for that one user, but because of the admin's attitude to nazis and how that kind of situation would be handled in future.

That's a bit of a tangent there, sorry folks! But it felt like an important distinction to make; admins have a right and a responsibility to uphold their rules in the face of their own members, other instances' members, and other instances' admins.

It was the first example that I though about, and pretty much everyone screwed up here, my intent was not to blame anyone.

I think this is an excellent idea. Having the instance timeline as ones community of neighbors is great. That two-level sense of locality seems to me to be one of the things that makes Mastodon work well, especially on small and medium-sized instances. I really like my instance's community. It's welcoming and friendly and full of great people.

SOME people, possibly even most people, also highly value curating the wider fediverse and want to have the shield of the community keeping undesirable elements away. This is perfectly fine and makes a sensible default.

I, personally, (and I know some other people) would prefer to be able to venture outside of the curation. This is orthogonal to the community aspect. There are legitimate technical problems to be solved about how to handle boosts and replies. It /seems/ like there might be workable solutions (they don't show up at all in the local or user timeline? Perhaps they only show up to eople who have opted out?) that would allow the best of both worlds without harming the instance-as-community.

I proposed a UI that would allow users to easily unsilence instances for themselves when toots from those instances are suppressed from a thread they are reading. It is in a comment to #5694

I'd like to see a "quality filter" setting that can be disabled like Twitter, allowing users to override or opt-out of instance silences. But it'd also be good to have it possible on a case-by-case basis, e.g. selectively let certain accounts through without being forced to follow them just to receive mentions from them.