I’m no expert but my understanding is that you don’t, because that’s not exactly how it works.

I believe that you can see what instances it’s not federated with, but it basically federates with any instance where a kbin user has followed an element on that instance. However I think that still only feeds that part of the instance through to kbin, so it’s less ‘kbin federates with that instance and more ‘you can follow elements from any instance you want’

The federated public feed is basically your instance, and anything people from your instance are subscribed to.

You can also block instances privately, or choose to defederate on an individual basis, if you don’t wish to see content from other instances at all.

I’d be interested on peoples views on a concern that I’ve had growing for a while; maybe the concern is genuine, or maybe I’m being paranoid. But I feel that some of the more extreme ‘pro-trans’ conversation online feels less ‘pro-trans’ and more ‘anti-terf’ or even ‘anti-everything’ to the extent that it has become impossible to have a discussion about concerns, confusions, genuine ignorance etc, in other words impossible to educate or come up with solutions to genuine problems.

A lot of these extreme trans, conversation destroying comments are so full of hate, so often, that I admit I have become suspicious. If you were deliberately trying to divide a community from potential allies you couldn’t do it better, and I’ve seen one too many ‘as a black woman’ comments accidentally posted from the wrong account by some white as a lily racist extremist man to trust everyone who says ‘as a trans person’ online.

I would like a space where people with genuine curiosity but also genuine concerns (as in, that they have the concern is genuine, it doesn’t mean necessarily that there is a genuine problem that needs resolving) could have an adult discussion to educate and understand each other, in order to find solutions, without having to worry about being cancelled and shut down.

If you’re on the fence and it feels like the only people who listen to you with respect and sympathy are the anti-trans people, well, you’re going to end up hearing a lot more of what they have to say than learning something actually useful.

I understand that the trans community must get frustrated with having to explain themselves all the time, and impatient for the day they don’t, and it sucks that that’s the world we live in right now. But I’m also very concerned that we should be cautious about accepting every hateful or insane sounding ‘as a trans person’ comment we read at face value. Hatred leads to the dark side after all, and that’s where some people want you to be.

That said I’m not trans, or even pretending to be trans, so I can’t speak for the community. I just believe strongly in the adage that the most effective way to win support is to meet hate with love, and I know a growing number of people who should have been trans allies being turned away by the feeling that they are not being listened to or taken seriously. Even if their concerns feel stupid to be people in the community.

Oh also, whilst I think people should be taking genuine concerns seriously, be careful of ‘whataboutism’ so hey, fun tight rope.

That’s my paranoid ramblings for anyone who cares from someone who wants to see tolerance and understanding but is scared we’re going the wrong way.

I think different people respond in different ways, and to different doses. I use Ritalin as a general term people understand but the specific ones we use are different variants of the same underlying medicine, depending on our individual needs.

It’s not a miracle drug but it has definitely made a significant difference, taking things from overwhelmingly impossible to merely difficult but manageable.

Same, it makes learning languages really hard. For various reasons I speak about 4 languages badly, but only one language well. Whenever I have to speak in one of the other four it ends up as a melange of all four at the same time and it’s a nightmare.

Where I am you need a prescription but having ADHD makes you eligible for one. My daughter slept through for the first time in her 8 years of life when we started giving her melatonin. Two years later I would argue that the melatonin made a greater difference than the Ritalin. She’s thriving.

For me I used to love Feedbin and subscribed to loads of feeds, but after Google killed off Greader I felt the internet changed. Fewer and fewer people posted quality content that way and I would no longer know how to find it if they did, so eventually I stopped using it and switched to Reddit instead. Now I’ve moved to kbin but it is a good opportunity to rethink things again.

Go to search and put in your full mastodon address (eg @archiehasantlers @mastodon.social but without the space because I couldn’t figure out how to stop it auto formatting it into a link )

That should bring up your mastodon account as a user you can then click on and follow.

I have an account on mastodon, which I’m following from my kbin account so that I can see my mastodon feed and respond to articles from within this platform without having to switch apps. I could also do the reverse if I wished. This probably helps those mastodon articles be more visible to other users on kbin.social. Others are probably doing likewise.

I think that’s how it works anyway.