Do you hate nazis? Do you want to boycott a platform that makes money from nazis? If your response to this is ‘sure, that’s why I use Bluesky instead of Twitter/X’, then you should also be boycotting Substack.
Substack has been tolerating far-right content since back when Twitter was still called Twitter. Indeed, there are some people, like a certain well-known transphobic former sitcom writer, who was only able to retain a platform on Substack after every other social media platform banned him. Of course, when Twitter became X and various other platforms changed their tune, he was straight back on them, but maybe if Substack had been less tolerant of abusive voices, he would have lost his platform altogether.
So, this is part of the reason why I never have used Substack, and probably never will. Besides, I have my own perfectly good blog here, and if you want to receive new blog posts by email each week, sign up here.
Using the Anti-Substack Labeler
I’ve posted about Bluesky labellers before – these add labels to Bluesky profiles and/or individual posts (skeets?), or allow you to hide them altogether. To hide Substack posts, here’s the labeller. Like all labellers, there are three modes:
- Off – no changes
- Show badge – all posts containing a Substack link have a warning label attached to them
- Hide – all posts containing a Substack link simply won’t show in your standard Following feed
I personally have this set to ‘show badge’ but it depends how much you despise the hate-tolerant people in charge at Substack. ‘Hide’ works pretty well, and it even picks up a number of sites which have their own domain but use Substack as their backend.
But wait, I use Substack! What about me?
If you’re reading this because you yourself post on Substack and are worried that people will stop clicking through, then I can only advise that you consider moving your content to another platform. As I’ve mentioned above, Substack have tolerated some really awful content on their platform for years, so this is not a new development. Every time I see someone start a new Substack newsletter, I find it heartbreaking – especially from those who have quit Twitter/X for the same reason.
There are many Substack alternatives out there; Ghost seems to be a popular option and there’s an official migration guide. Which, notably, will also move your subscribers over, including paid subscribers. Other options include Beehiiv and Medium, or you could do what I do and self-host using something like WordPress.
