Ravelry

I belonged to Ravelry for five years, beginning when I learned to knit after my son was born. I loved coming to the site for creative inspiration and I also made some great connections for charity knitting projects.
Fast forward to their "new and improved", "think like us and only like us or GTFO" community rules. Not so great anymore. The focus is no longer on knitting, but instead is on making sure everyone on the site agrees with the mods/founders/admins in terms of politics (AKA the Trump ban).
I'm pretty darn progressive, a registered democrat, LGBTQ ally, etc, etc. However, I am aghast the founders of Ravelry don't see how incredibly hypocritical and divisive their new policies and political focus are. Just ban political topics altogether, as the only other forum I belong to does quite successfully. It seems these folks are the type who want to live in a world where everyone else thinks just as they do, all while espousing to be open and liberal. That's not how progressiveness works, kids.
The last straw for me was starting a thread in which I suggested going back to featuring creatively focused posts on the home page, rather than 90% of the home page posts being focused on tech tips, politics, and profiles of their "team." Know what happened? I was flamed by "oh so liberal" members who claimed the Ravelry community needed to be "protected" from the forces of evil by the Ravelry team. Say what? You would think I had announced my loyalty to Pol Pot or something. Then, the thread was locked because it violated "Community Guidelines." I asked for clarification on this and was given none, no response at all.
As a progressive knitter, do I care to have anything to do with these folks? Nope!
Stay far, far away.

Ravelry categorizes people... and I am one that is amazingly weird. And love it by the way. My real last name is Pena, hispanic as it sounds but my dad will tell you that is only your heritage you are AMERICAN. I am blond haired blue eyed and look Scandinavian, but I am AMERICAN. On my mothers side I have a Jewish grandmother, a Choctaw great great grandfather, but I am AMERICAN... and her family were share croppers, literally picking cotton in the fields with POC... but they worked side by side, and THEY WERE ALL AMERICAN. Last year after several in the family decided to do the genetic testing we also have 9% Nigerian DNA... But we are American. Ravelry has classified me as a white supremists...
I am AMERICAN. This is a bigoted site and by their own words have done what is unconscionable and marginalized AMERICANS just because THEY deemed it so.
Bigoted, racists, misogyny are the practiced norms and I refuse to be on any list or denigrated in any way for who I am. They are their own worse enemies... doing exactly what they accuse others of doing. Yarn... go to Hobby Lobby... pattern literally can find anything they have on another site with a little research... patterns too. Peace of mind, acceptance, pride in self and country... ALL CAN BE FOUND SOMEWHERE ELSE,
Do your homework or be as resists as they are and join their club of mean bullies.