this post was submitted on 19 Jan 2024
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I feel like things on Lemmy were pretty chill several months ago, and that’s started to change.

People used to talk each other like they would talk to a neighbor. Now I get the sense that people have become quick to be negative, attack, and not be constructive.

Am I crazy in feeling like the vibe has changed?

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[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago) (3 children)

I apologize if these include me.

As we in the US loom towards the election I am getting more and more raw and worried about it. And with that my fear brings out screechy obscene me. That is one of my fear responses that I lose the handle on a lot.

So please forgive me. I will try to avoid political threads as we ramp up to either the end of American democracy or the continuing gerontocratic oligarchic republic.

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[–] MonsieurArchi 18 points 10 months ago (2 children)

Yes! I've been seeing a lot of toxic comments and posts lately. It's kinda turning into a niche hyper toxic reddit.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago

many, if not most of the popular/highly-trafficked communities are basically echo chambers now, anyone who disagrees with whatever the cookie-cutter general consensus of the day is becomes a hate magnet.

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[–] TORFdot0 17 points 10 months ago

I think there are more bummer world events happening like the Israel Hamas war and bummer late stage capitalism in general which leads to more inflammatory and charged discourse, compared to just after the Reddit exodus when we were united against Reddit.

Lemmy in general isn’t different from other social media in that it isn’t great for political discourse. Without the human connection there is less incentive to consider the experience and viewpoints of others when you can just downvote and read a hundred that agree with you

[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago

I honestly don't feel much has changed. There was perhaps a bit of a "new" feeling in the start and some excitement about the project, but I don't think people have gotten more aggressive or anything.

But I think all this probably depends what circles you hang out in. Probably also depends on what instances you federate with.

[–] [email protected] 16 points 10 months ago (2 children)

I haven't noticed, but some people say they are feeling political tensions, and...

The year 2024 is notable for the large number of elections, with 7 of world's 10 most populous nations (Bangladesh, India, United States, Indonesia, Pakistan, Russia, Mexico) voting; countries that are home to nearly half of the world's people will hold elections in 2024.

From the Wikipedia complete list.

I guess everyone is just a little worried about national and international elections.

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[–] [email protected] 15 points 10 months ago (18 children)

Comming from Reddit, I find it really peaceful, but IDK how it was before. Except for the people at Hexbear who bullied me for liking South Park. The socalled "dirtbag left" is basically the proudboys pretending to be far-left.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 10 months ago

It's never a bad idea to instance block them. They'll endlessly bully you and gang up like a bunch of school children. The only thing that stops it is to stop responding.

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[–] CitizenKong 15 points 10 months ago (3 children)

A lot of people are having a hard time right now. Try to be the change you want to see and react kindly and rationally would be my advice.

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[–] CultHero 15 points 10 months ago (15 children)

I just started a few days ago and already had to deal with a transphobic troll. Online is so toxic that I'm afraid eventually all social media platforms end up on trolls radar and they seek to destroy them. It's a shame because they ruin social media for everyone including themselves.

So many people lack a basic sense decency that they actually think it's ok to cause harm to other people simply for their own amusement. It's usually straight white american males too.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 10 months ago

Report transphobic comments and we'll get to them as soon as we can. No one should have to deal with transphobes.

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago (1 children)

People used to talk each other like they would talk to a neighbor.

Careful. I'll correct my neighbour's spelling, too . :-)

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[–] Mango 14 points 10 months ago (4 children)

I FART IN YOUR GENERAL DIRECTION!

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[–] [email protected] 14 points 10 months ago (1 children)

It's definitely gotten worse, especially the political circlejerk, jeez.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago (5 children)

Yeah, definitely the vibe has changed. It's kind of sad.

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 10 months ago* (last edited 10 months ago)

Vibe has changed but it's because of more users. The original users picked Lemmy because they were tired of reddit, so they were naturally nice people that didn't vibe with the shit that was going on at reddit. They wanted something else. We wanted something else.

That's why we shouldn't wish for exponential growth. This place will lose its charm quickly if we end up arguing with the trolls.

[–] fidodo 13 points 10 months ago (1 children)

100%. Seems like people are just itching to fight now and taking comments out of context constantly. They're just throwing out insults instead of engaging or asking for clarification. Dunno what happened.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago (2 children)

It has gotten worse and it will only continue to do so. There are people who are respectful and hold back their darkest impulses, but there are others who choose to hold those same features in high regard, as literal virtues in their eyes. Blocking hexbear and lemmygrad has helped my own peace of mind immensely, but you would not want to block lemmy.ml or lemmy.world or such so... here we are.

I do not really see any permanent solution to this problem, short of eternal vigilance. That's just nature though, e.g. viruses constantly evolve and seek new hosts, hence hosts that do not keep up die, there's no way around needing to keep up defenses against such a tireless onslaught. Similarly for information vs. misinformation too, it seems:-(.

It has also gotten much harder to have any discussion with even the tiniest hint of subtlety on the Fediverse - is Biden/Linux/socialism/religion good or bad? "Yes." For some of us, knowing what will happen - the flood of toxic responses I mean - if we dare to speak up is enough to cause us to cringe enough that we would simply rather stay silent instead. If only the opposing side were like that too! But no, they elect not to hold their own tongues, even while expecting YOU to hold yours. That too seems just the nature of the universe.

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[–] [email protected] 11 points 10 months ago

Sorry guys, I got mad

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago

I don't mind disagreeing and even bickering a bit, but when somebody gets extra or pointedly disengenuous I just block em. IDGAF. 🀷

[–] [email protected] 10 points 10 months ago (4 children)

You mean comments like this one?

https://feddit.nl/comment/6215624

Yeah, it's getting worse.

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[–] Resol 10 points 10 months ago

Idk why, but I feel like I'm starting to associate this kind of behavior with people who used to be on Reddit and moved over here when all the third party apps got Thanos snapped.

I first got here around July 2023, and it was pretty cool. Nowadays it's probably a little less cool.

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