Twitter obviously has always had huge downsides, but if you heavily curated your feed, it was sometimes ok. There were socialist/communist circles that had decent discourse.
Recently (last few months), I’ve noticed almost EVERY thread is infested with combative libs.
I also see literal pro-Nazi/fascist threads. I’m talking about praising Hitler and calling for ethnic cleansing. They never seem to get taken down and are very active (often with little resistance).
These threads are not something I’ve dug for either. They are easy to stumble upon.
This is almost exactly what happened to Reddit, which is pretty much worthless now. I haven’t logged on in weeks.
I need to research more, but I know most social media companies have been infiltrated by ‘former’ US security stooges from the CIA etc.
I know anything remotely left wing gets suppressed by the algorithms, but I’m pretty convinced they are pushing hard right content.
The internet is much more full of bots now. Especially on political threads. There are several bot farms right now pushing Ukraine propaganda. Some farms are just internet recruiting grounds, where people just create a discord group and in it they detail who to harass and raid, what talking points to disseminate, etc. I believe NAFO right now is the biggest internet recruiting farm/bot farm for Ukraine propaganda. All they do is harass anyone and everyone who goes against the narrative on Ukraine. I follow the radio war nerd, and Mark Ames Twitter, and before Ukraine, he had no reply guys, anyone who replied or quote tweeted generally weren’t far from his politics and agreed with him. But now, he has dozens of reply guys commenting on every single tweet with snide/snarky remarks. And you look at their profiles and all they do all day is stalk other “anti-ukraine” posters and reply to every single one of them. It’s nuts. And Mark isn’t even “pro-russia” he still calls it an unjustified invasion. He’s just more critical of what the west has to say.
In general, real discussions over the internet are completely impossible because it’s all a social status competition where the most brash and rude people who can “own” their counterparts thoroughly enough are encouraged. Snarky, snide remarks and quips are about the most discussion you’re going to get. Which is why I like to be on smaller forums, where general discussion is more incentivised. And also, yes, “echo chambers” are better, since it’s impossible to have a real discussion with people who disagree with you over the internet, people flock to more agreeable spaces where they can actually have a productive conversation.
The weird thing is it is almost impossible to discern brainwashed libs from bots
Spot on here. I much prefer Lemmygrad over previous social media I was on. Wild how it’s presented as bad when you surround yourself with likeminded people.
If I wanted to argue all day about BS, I’d be back on Facebook.
I know right? Centrists and libs always tell you you always have to engage with people you disagree with and you have to put yourself in spaces where there isn’t particularly a political leaning (which is always a lie, all general political discussion spaces in the anglo internet sphere are heavily skewed towards liberalism), but buddy, I am forced to hear liberal talking points and viewpoints every day. Every time I turn on the TV, everytime I go on the internet, everywhere I am exposed to liberal viewpoints. I don’t at all need to engage with and expose myself to it, I already am forced to every day. It really should be the opposite, libs should be the ones that are shamed into engaging with and exposing themselves to left perspectives, because those perspectives are ones you aren’t going to find unless you look for them. It’s ridiculous.
the echochamber thing is a joke. libs just want to break you down and make you question reality
Absolutely. Though I do kind of miss the abrasiveness of r/genzedong; also being the sub that was hated by nearly all of reddit.
But discussions here are 100 percent better.
I would say it’s still good to have some sort of constructive debate with or against people who are not on paper agreeing with you, people you best can find outside of closed groups with likeminded people. In the mean time, you’re probably having more chances to survive on Mars or Pluto than having a constructive debate on social medias, especially with the so called enlightened libs.
I had such great debates on reddit before it turned crazy, for 50 idiot responses I had one or two great people who tried to devote time and energy to understand my position, defend their positions, and in turn I tried to do the same. To me it’s very interesting to go to the wilderness ( when it’s not sucking your mental health, which I reckon it did for the most part ) and try to present my arguments as clean as possible for the audience.