Hello! I’ve been searching for a reddit alternative, and yes, I’ve picked Lemmy and Raddle, but here’s the thing. My morbid curiosity is perked up, and a part of me wants to join the “free speech” alternatives, like Saidit, Poal, etc. What’s wrong with me that I want to join toxic places? I mean, yes I’ll find a whole new perspective (albeit wrong), on political topics, but a part of me wants to be the antagonist, and post lefty memes, and music with a left-leaning message (bands from r/rabm) I know that’s like kicking the hornet’s nest, so you don’t need to start in with “that’s a bad idea” I know it is. My main point/question is, is it wrong to join a site with potential hate speech? Does it make someone a bad person?
It potentially opens you up to radicalization in the wrong direction.
Generally radicalization in any direction is bad.
Why? Shouldn’t the measure of good and bad be with respect to how correct it is, not how closely the position aligns with the status quo?
The word implies an unhealthy and incorrect degree. Otherwise you’re not radicalized, just representing an opinion.
the word radical means “from or going to a root or source.”
it simply implies wanting to deal with the root cause of issues. the word you are looking for is probably “extremism”
radical means arising from or going for the root.
it implies fixing things at the perceived root cause, the word you are actually looking for here is probably “extremism”
Not necessarily, it implies conviction and separation from the norm.
To be fair I think my definition of radicalize is wrong given the other comments. Ive always used it as a synonym for extremism.
Yes, hence they reveal that they think the staus quo is the correct way of doing things… Though to be fair, being a little reactionary is hard wired in human brains and is especially prone to surface for those politically illiterate (or idiots in Greek).
For what its worth I don’t think the status quo is the correct way of doing things, but Ill bet we have different ideas on what to change. I couldn’t care less about what economic system we end up with for instance. I just want to remove as much authoritarianism from society as possible. After that I genuinely don’t care what happens, as long as Im left alone. Don’t spy on me, don’t force me to give my data to those I don’t want to, don’t take all of my money and don’t put arbitrary barriers in my way to things that don’t hurt others because you “know better”. After that I don’t care anymore.
Enlightened centrist entered the chat.
Like up?
we need radical change tbh, things are not sustainable the way they are. just pays to be cautious about it though.
Good luck man, you’re about to learn how easy it is to get banned on those free speech alternatives. Still funny though.
Be careful however. No matter what, you’re still just a brain in a flesh jar. You are susceptible to false information and lies as your brain can’t really differentiate between false and correct info that well.
You are not immune to propaganda
Be careful however. No matter what, you’re still just a brain in a flesh jar. You are susceptible to false information and lies as your brain can’t really differentiate between false and correct info that well.
You are not immune to propaganda
I never understood this argument. How is it any different for leftist propaganda? This just feels like telling someone to stop thinking because you’re on our team now and we want to make sure you don’t leave.
How is this different than leftist propaganda?
It’s not. In no way, shape, and or form. Once more, you are not immune to propaganda.
Again, I’m not stating you shouldn’t seek out people who disagree with you, I seek these people out often, but you need to understand what your brain will do.
You should generally be cognizant of bias and the fact that you will, inevitably, accept without confirmation some information or internalize information you’ve confirmed incorrect. This is not only true to one group, and is just as true for those under the umbrella of “leftist” as much as under the term “alt right”.
I will state it’s less dangerous to be less cautious here than a free speach absolutist community. Here, we value truth. There, they value all speach even objectively false. Here, you’ll see false info removed there, definitionally, or is not.
Lastly, for fascism, death of truth is a defining reality. To paraphrase Mussolini let not truth stand on a pillar except insomuch as it assists in our goals. In the places where absolutist freedom of speach reigns fascists, famously very good propagandists, thrive. This is a danger above a left winger repeating false statistics around racism in the police force, or the rates of spousal abuse. Or even myself lying about that Mussolini quote at the beginning of this paragraph
Thank you for the responce however and the respectful tone you took, I hope I clarified>
So if I understand correctly, you’re saying that
- you’re more likely to be exposed to lies on a right wing forum compared to left wing forums
- the types of lies you’re exposed to are more dangerous in a right wing community compared to the left.
So first of all, how do you determine that #1 is true? I’ve seen my fair share of misinformation on Lemmy and the left-leaning parts of Reddit getting highly upvoted and vice versa. But I’m basing this on what I personally know (and who knows if I’m right?) and in general, there isn’t much objective info going around. It’s mostly people sharing their sentiments on a topic with little to no factual information (e.g. “fuck [entity X]”).
#2 also assumes that you’re right to begin with and that sharing these false statistics would lead to a better world. Take false statistics on police racism for example. This can be a problem in many ways. Let’s say hypothetically that there is no police racism, but we say there is and we convince everyone that we need to fix it. This can divert resources away from other problems (e.g. working on reducing spousal abuse), and thus making problems worse elsewhere. Moreso if the police force is tasked with handling spousal violence and they’re now tied up in internal investigations, maybe losing funding, and thus reducing their capabilities. It’ll also be fuelling an unnecessary conflict (possibly violent) between people who should otherwise be allies in the struggle that is life. More people get hurt, more people can die. That’s a pretty dangerous outcome.
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I’ll go over this again later when I have more time, but for now, I just want to say that I don’t appreciate spending so much time trying to understand what you’ve written only to be met with accusations of having deliberately done the exact opposite. I may not be particularly smart, but I’m putting in the effort.
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So my efforts didn’t yield the correct understanding. I recognize that it happens and that’s why I put a short summary of my understanding right at the start so that you can easily correct it without having to read through everything else and expend unnecessary energy trying to parse it out. If you don’t want to continue the discussion, that’s fine. I can find my answers elsewhere. There’s no need to be a dick about it.
I never understood this argument. How is it any different for leftist propaganda? This just feels like telling someone to stop thinking because you’re on our team now and we want to make sure you don’t leave.
Your argument seems to suggest :
- Listening to far right voices is not too bad if you keep being alert.
- The brain of the listener who thinks for themselves will be strong enough to distinguish leftist propaganda and lies from facts and truth.
I fear, looking at the millions of people who are not well informed about some things (say privacy + GAFAM), that this is wishful thinking. Remember the experiment with people in the cinemas where some soft-drink images were almost invisible merged into the movie and made people thirsty and buy more drinks during the break ? In my opinion the human brain is unfortunately not as powerful as people make it believe it is. And I have no big issues in general with leftist propaganda as I’d like to see the planet saved rather than destroyed.
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It isn’t about the greater idea, it’s about the small lies you don’t know you’re accepting. Of course that isn’t to say you can’t engage at all with this content (I certainly seek out people who disagree with me.) as you say, with constant effort and confirming everything you’ll catch most of it. No matter what you’re going to end up believing something without confirming it or even realising it. Good propaganda goes unquestioned. It seems like something obvious, small, and in some base way unquestionable.
In a torrential downfall there’s no way to catch each raindrop, no umbrella that can block it all. You are going to get wet, even just a little.
They’re not looking for freedom of speech but freedom from consequences.
You’ll get banned there real quick.
you get banned from individual instances but not from the fediverse/lemmy which is kind of the point
Does Saidit and Poal work the same as Lemmy that way?
im not that familiar with them but they don’t look federated, which is what makes this possible, so no.
So what was the point of your previous comment?
wtf is freedom of speech if not a freedom of consequences from what you say?
There is a distinct difference.
Freedom of speach means that the government can’t punnish you for talking shit, except in limited circumstances.
Freedom of consequences from what you say, means that no one should be allowed to let what your say affect them in any way, this means that no one would be allowed to be offended by what you might say, nor that they would be allowed to act on such offence.
In a functional society you want to have freedom of speach, but not freedom of consequences from what you say. This allows you to express opposing views in mostly resonable ways.
As long as the consequences are words and non-violent actions. Advocating violence as a consequence for someone expressing an idea is imho dangerous and should be avoided.
yes, but words that incite violence are also very dangerous. there is a line to thread here.
case in point: i don’t think goebbels actually directly harmed anyone, but his speech caused quite a lot of suffering, violence and death. his speech should absolutely not be rebutted with ‘just words’, there must be actual consequences to what he did.
on top of it we live in a world where his propaganda techniques are still used for harm.
it is dangerous, but so is speech that incites violence even if the perpetrator himself isn’t directly doing it. its a fine line to tread.
case in point: i don’t think goebbels ever directly killed or harmed anyone, but his speech caused a lot of death and suffering, and someone like him should absolutely not be dealt with just words. keep in mind his propaganda techniques are still alive today.
I agree that speech that incites violence is dangerous too. In theory I can imagine a net benefit if we could silence some voices in various places. The big question then is, who do we trust to decide which people should be silenced? I think governments have historically shown that they can’t be trusted. Then private people? Lots of people across the political spectrum feel that their version of truth is so important that they deem it moral to silence others, so what it comes down to is just who does it better. The image of an angry mob is no fun if the mob has decided that you should be silenced, even though you feel like you’re on the good side. They probably think they are the good ones. Who then?
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The limited restrictions in the US is that you can’t for example yell “Fire!” in a room to try and cause panic.
Here in Sweden, we also have hate speech laws, which basically comes down to “You can’t incite violence toward an ethnic group”
It’s the textbook definition. Using another definition is wrong.
Anyone who thinks Freedom of Speech means “I can say whatever I want whenever I want however I want and you can’t do a damn thing about it” is mistaken. Likely guessing what it means based on the words.
Of course, the incorrect usage forgets about the Right to Live in Peace…or the Freedom of Speech that others have to tell someone their opinion is shit. Or the freedom of association for people to exclude from their groups people with shitty opinions (or decent opinions, but an inability to express them decently).
People telling you you’re and arsehole and treating you like what arsehole is then expressing their freedom of speech.
It’s also a consequence of your speech.
That’s fair but I don’t think there’s much freedom of speech if someone will murder you for what you’ve said
Where the fuck did murder come from?
That’s a possible outcome that I subconciously included in the list of consequences
I mean sure, if you leap all the way from 0 to 1,000 for no reason.
No reason? Being murdered is still a consequence, isn’t it? Why wouldn’t I include it?
Freedom of speech is only freedom from government-sponsored consequences. As a member of We The People, you control the government. It is not democratic for the government to control you.
Freedom of Speech does not impose a limitation on me, a private individual, from taking action against you on the basis of your speech. I’ll defend your right to say whatever the hell you want, but I don’t have to give you my soapbox to stand on.
You aren’t immune to propaganda.
They are not really “free speech” sites, they are fascist sites. They will use your left wing posts as rhetorical proof of their openness until such a time that your antagonism gains any traction at which point they will promptly censor you as they do not really have any ideals. The game is rigged, post on a fascist site and you will be a tool for fascism.
Lemmy was built explicitly in recognition of this fact for the master’s tool will never dismantle the master’s house.
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I click on it’s front page and immediately see anti-semitism, racism, more anti-semitism and transphobic and queerphobic hatespeech.
Hmm wonder why you are rushing to it’s defense?
oh what do you know, you’ve previously defended neonazi lemmy instances like explodingheads with whataboutism arguments and have multiple bans for bigotry.
“free speech” absolutists just being nazis yet again
I think it is generally a bad idea to support sites that promote hatred and fascist ideas by providing them traffic and content.
You can if you want. You’ll certainly find new perspectives however you will be unlikely to get any good discussion. If you go there to antagonize they will simply ban you as they don’t want lefty memes or left leaning messages.
I don’t think being on the same platform as hate speech makes you a bad person. You’re only wasting your time and exposing your self to needless hate and toxicity.
I don’t think it makes you a bad person, but I do think you’d be banned faster than green grass through a goose
Green grass through a goose, that’s definitely a new one
Free speech enthusiasts are exercising hatred. Before non-hateful people realize this they sometimes conflate it with the inversion: speaking truth to power. Or sometimes simply “freedom” which isn’t perfectly absolute when we live in a society. If you wanna witness hatred then follow the free speech thread.
Perhaps an unpopular take, but my suggestion would be to think if you can come from the perspective of love: do you love these people, and care about them, though they’ve believed lies? Can you converse with them with respect, listening to why they feel how they do, and be patient to bring truth only to help them, not to self-righteously vindicate yourself?
Then again, this is the internet, so if you jump in, post inflammatory memes, pat yourself on the back for being so clever, and jump out again, and show us the results; perhaps I’ll giggle along with the rest of us.
For a different take, you might like to note that part of the effectiveness of propaganda is not a good rational explanation but repeated asserted lies. Jumping into a different set of assertions can help pop you out of ones you’ve wrongly believed from your own background - but it can also wear you down to believe, or half believe, what the other community is saying even if it’s without merit. Keep a check on the things you read: What’s the actual source behind this? Could these be repeatedly misconstruing that thing in the same way (so they look coherent but aren’t)? Is there some useful truth in here I missed? And is there a subtle lie attached to the truth? And there’s lots of other helpful questions you can ask: but keep a sensible head and be prepared to step back and look at something else.
This is the right answer. Hatred just breeds more hatred. If you approach with love and understanding (or at least a desire to understand), you’ll have a much better chance of changing hearts and minds. Try to meet in the middle and you might be able to point them in the right direction.
I’ve thought about being compassionate with these people, but the moment you get called a jewish slur or the n word, all compassion kinda goes out the window.
I feel for you, though that’s where the true test of compassion is.
Go into chud spaces and generally be a wrecker. Accuse various factions of being feds/antifa false flag/etc.
those things can honestly be posted here on .ml or on instances like hexbear, blahaj and such.
if you want to challenge your and other’s perspectives, you would do better doing so in instances such as lemmy.world or maaybe reddit, you are likely to encounter some pushback but they generally can be talked to. free-speech code-for-fascism sites will just ban you at best. if you actually want to troll them you will probably only have a chance if you organize.
that said if you are feeling masochistic you can go on 4chan, its probably where most of them hang out publicly, and its the rare place where they actually wont ban you for nothing.
Just do it and post screen caps here.
Learn how to mask your IP using VPNs or other open proxies before any of that.
Also tracking protection in the browser to prevent reading browser history and such. Security and privacy practices are absolutely paramount if you’re planning on visiting services like that. Of course the best thing is to not visit them at all but some people feel they need to see it for themselves, if they choose they should be prepared and keep themselves safe.
That’s a bad idea and you’re a bad person.
Join Hexbear, all of Lemmy says it’s the most toxic instance if that’s what you want.
