Anger and fear are blinding if you let them be, especially if they're intensely justified.
Unfortunately we live in times where they're very justified. I don't begrudge people for reacting in anger or fear, I'm doing my best not to do exactly the same :(
I could be wrong but to me it feels odd to think lemmy is big enough to be worth organizing psyops for.
Not to say it couldn't be an issue in the future, but it feels much more likely that people expressing pro Russia sentiment are just people who bought into that particular brand of propaganda.
Which like, to some extent all of our individual world views are shaped by the environment of propaganda we're exposed to. We're all products of our social conditioning, and ultimately that's exactly what propaganda is. Media designed to socially condition people to a certain set of beliefs. All we as individuals can do is be aware of it and be willing to look at our own beliefs critically.
But at the end of the day I think the folks praising Russia on lemmy are just people. People I personally think are misguided, but I don't think theyre generally acting in bad faith any more than the general population here.
That is a very specific interpretation of what I meant by this post.
To be perfectly honest, I really wasn't making the point you should approve of nazis. Just that maybe it's worth putting effort into being kind to one another...
For example, I constantly see leftists online biting eachother's heads off (including on lemmy) for having slightly different left-wing ideology. Its not like "approach people you disagree with with curiosity" means specifically actual neonazis, and approaching someone with curiosity doesn't mean telling people "your idea is correct and you're right for thinking it"
It means trying to understand it. You can dislike someone and still gain from better understanding their worldview. Even if you think it's harmful. Even if you think it's illogical. Even if you think they're wrong. Curiousity isn't tacit approval.
If you want to think about it cynically you can consider it creating allies and knowing your enemy.
All of that ignoring the fact that if you look around, this platform is almost exclusively left wing 😅 even if it includes folks left of center I don't agree with, like tankies and neoliberals (who yes, I know, are only left with respect of the US overton window. Thats where I'm from 🤷♂️)
I understand we disagree on certain things, that's okay, these are just my thoughts on the subject, and it's a profoundly important one, so I can appreciate why people would have different strongly held beliefs on it. Hope you have a good one :)
I'm not sure I follow-
Are you saying you think I want to set people's stuff on fire and guillotine people, or that you think responders in this thread do?
As I've alluded to, there's a lot of justifiable anger about the state of the world, and you can see that hurt reflected in people's immediate response. The feelings driving that "conclusion jumping" valid and understandable, even if I don't think it's productive
There is no easy way to cope with fascism on your doorstep, or taking over your home and threatening to throw you out of it :(
Originally I listed all the extra examples/suggestions I put in my comment in the actual post itself, but I have a bad habit of making things way too long so I moved all the smaller more specific things to the comment. I think maybe it would have been more clear I'm not saying you should approve of Nazis had they still been in the post.
Yeah, I think that was a big issue with the culture of platforms like Voat.
The fediverse doesn't have it as bad but it's still definitely a risk. And being decentralized makes it easier to dodge bans and whatnot.
You're right, and like I said elsewhere in this thread, big corporate platforms definitely have issues but that doesn't mean there aren't any unique challenges the fediverse will have to contend with.
I definitely agree about the importance of breaking the silence, and engaging with folks who go out of their way to post.
As a culture we want that to be rewarding, it's something we all appreciate when folks do, so I think it's worth making sure posters can feel that it's appreciated. Make it known :)
In fairness reddit also has volunteer moderation, but you're absolutely right. I think that's why being intentional about what kind of culture we want is so important.
In a small space bad actors in leadership roles can do so much damage, and people intentionally facilitating healthy spaces can do so much good.
Corporate platforms have to deal with profit incentives and the way those warp what a space is about, but we shouldn't forget that our "new" fediverse model has its own problems well have to contend with.
The issue of greater variation in moderator/hosts was a big issue in the forum days to my understanding, and whether a space was healthy varried a lot from one to another. Big consolidated platforms homogenized things a lot but that came with its own issues. In a lot of ways it feels like the fediverse will have to address a lot of the unresolved issues of the old internet.
I can only hope we can learn by looking back at that history and build something better now
Thanks for your thoughts, thats a bit different of an approach than I'd really thought about, I feel like my thoughts have kinda been stuck at both extremes
That gives me new things to think about, thank you ❤️
I can definitely understand that. I think in a lot of ways that problem is driven by how much of a political echo chamber lemmy is. Any time there's a narower range of beliefs I feel like you can see those beliefs getting more extreme, or expressed in more extreme and toxic ways.
I honestly don't really know how to improve it given the state of the world. It feels like the range of political beliefs keeps getting compressed into two groups and it makes it harder and harder to tolerate the beliefs of those further from yourself. And for valid reasons.
And the more justified the contempt for people of other political views gets the harder it gets to figure out how, culturally, we manage the justified anger that comes from how deeply broken everything is.
Elon musk is doing actual literal Nazi salutes and peoples anger about that is justified. And at the same time I'm not sure what way of acting on that anger (and acting on the problem) yields anything other than radializing people teetering on the edge of extremism.
I'm glad I don't really see actual Nazis on lemmy. Its nice that there's less debate about the legitimacy of people's humanity.
And at the same time anger is deeply toxic to healthy interaction and drives behaviors that I genuinely don't think make the problems prompting people's anger any better.
Thank you for sharing your thoughts candidly, a lot of this thread is a love-fest and that's wonderful and puts a smile on my face, but it's at least as important to talk about the unhealthy aspects of the fediverse's culture
Cris @ Cris_Color @lemmy.world Posts 23Comments 1,176Joined 2 yr. ago
Anger and fear are blinding if you let them be, especially if they're intensely justified.
Unfortunately we live in times where they're very justified. I don't begrudge people for reacting in anger or fear, I'm doing my best not to do exactly the same :(
Take care my friend.