I swear, every time most of the time I see someone being particularly rude, ignorant, and inappropriate on a post (usually political in origin, or they swing it to being political) I click on their profile and see it has been created that same day.
They are only there to sow discord. Only to piss people off. Idk if we can just report them (for what?) but I’d like to try exposing them before responding and interacting…
I am guilty of gobbling up the bait. I’ve started looking at profiles of people that piss me off exceptionally and noticed they’re burner bot loser accounts.
I guess i just want to say I’ve noticed it!
100%. I’ve been saying it over and over. It’s election season on the internet, division aplenty.
Current Contenders:
- found the egocentric, ethnocentric American!
- (adjusts tone and verbage to current audience) Sounds like neo-libralism to me!
- Tankie‽
- Biden, Trump : Old, Fascist
- Beans and denim?
- Palestine vs. Isreal
- Ukraine vs. Russian
- the rights of (insert oppressed group)
- Individual/State rights
- Linux
- Abortion
- LGBTQ
- Oil/Nuclear/Fossil/Coal/Renewable
- Climate Change
- Class-gap
- Sustainability
- Equality
…Fight!!!
Round 2 …
- found the egocentric, ethnocentric American!
hmmm
The year 2024 is notable for the large number of elections, with 8 of the world’s 10 most populous nations (Bangladesh, Brazil, 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. Around 2 billion voters - approximately a quarter of the world’s population - are expected to be heading to the polls this year.
Stay blissful my friend.
But yes, American social media platforms are targeted during American elections, so you aren’t ignorant about one thing.
A first round contender, I see
Every time I hear that 2024 is a big election year for the world I don’t really understand the stats.
Around 2 billion voters - approximately a quarter of the world’s population - are expected to be heading to the polls this year.
Like if everyone has 4 year terms then generally a quarter of the world’s population will have an election every year.
Not every country has four year terms. Also, elections can be triggered early for various reasons.
Not every country has elections either.
What other terms are popular? 3 years ?
Mainly 5 year terms, but I can see on the list some 6 and 7 year terms as well… https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_political_term_limits
There’s a very easy way to stop division: Have a set of values based in reality, and use that to determine what is not up for debate. The first thing a good troll will do is push at the fabric of what is acceptable and erode the community from there. Some people are inherently unreasonable and therefore shouldn’t be listened to. Give them a chance to see the light and if they refuse, give em the yeet.
The reason why neo-nazi communities are so quick to fall apart is because their values are not based on reality, so all you have to do is point out a single contradiction and then watch as they passionately debate themselves into increasingly splintering groups. My favorite that sits on the mantle of shit-stirring pot is “Trump is pro-Israel” which absolutely decimates any far-right community it touches.
Yes. Especially in subs like “Canada” or any post involving Canada in any way
It does not matter what the topic of the thread or conversation is. It can be about how Canada loves puppies. And there will be random 1 or 2 liners from new accounts making political comments heavily pushing specific agendas. Even completely unrelated
Lots of random anti government misinformation and one liners pushing a specific party misinformation and narrative. Our how we’re some 3rd world collapsing country
It is not natural. Same thing occurs also on Reddit.
We can expect this with any system that grows in size, becomes popular right? I don’t know the science behind it, but communities over a certain size naturally create subcommunities or attract partisans, antagonists, anarchists with a tendency to troll for fun. It’s the way of things.
We’re about 6 months away from the US presidential election so it doesn’t surprise me.
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No, not really.
Some people don’t get this:
If your communities are filled with polarized nonsense, your people suck, not your tech.
Right now, people’s suckyness worldwide is at an all time high.
It rocks! And if it gets shitty where you’re at, just go to a new instance and you can stay!
Is this the last migration?
I have seen this as well. Thankfully Voyager flags accounts under a certain age, so there’s an immediate visual indicator that an inflammatory comment may be just a troll.
Huh, interesting. Voyager’s one of the Lemmy apps? Is it for iOS too?
Yeah, it’s an iOS app.
Lemmy.world actually host a voyager instance at https://m.lemmy.world/
I see. The symbol is an yellow baby
Is this on per default? How to activate it?
Thanks
Just installed due to this thread.
On by default. Nice feature
AFAIK it’s on by default. I’m using the most recent iOS version, if you’re not seeing it I’d ask in the voyager community.
That’s a neat feature. I will request that gets added to sync.
Never feed the trolls, the only winning move is to downvote and move on
Nothing is as maddening as writing an elaborate troll post only to be completely ignored.
I do all my riling people up on Reddit though because that site is collapsing anyway and a shell of former self. Hard to bring yourself to respect it and not throw some spicy fake made up posts into the wild and see what happens
Never feed the trolls, the only winning move is to downvote and move on
A counter-philosophy I subscribe to is call out the BS but don’t go back and forth. If you let the trolls be this can bring more trolls. Call out the bad behavior and move on so it isn’t accepted but they also don’t get the satisfaction of engaging in an argument.
You should report them as trolls in any case, most instances on Lemmy have rules against trolling in general, further violations beyond that just add to the initial violation of trolling.
So you speak from experience?
Yes.
Dammit
I think I’m seeing something different, although also synthetic in nature.
It seems like companies or brands are in here (and probably on any social media) actively controlling the message about their brand. People make a post or comment about a specific thing (or person) and you get pre-packages responses, similar in nature and argument.
It makes you feel like it’s tin foil hat time, but I’ve seen different accounts proporting the same exact experiences about a product, which are super specific in nature.
I could see that being a part of a company trying to actively “control the message,” but it makes you question the authenticity of a lot of posts or arguments. Is that person really standing up for this thing with a questionable history, or are they a paid shill?
What would be a safe space from this though? A forum small enough to stay under the radar? I enjoy larger platforms like this because of the diversity in content and viewpoints, but not if it’s a haven for corporate messaging or agencies controlling a narrative.
Am I joining the tin foil hat club here, or has anyone else seen similar?
I disagree. This place isn’t big enough. The nerdiest people I know don’t even know what it is. I worked at a Dev tools company and I spoke to devs all day and everyone is still on Reddit. Nobody corporate cares enough to spend that time here, especially in what’s pretty much an overblown Linux dick-sucking-competition forum. The fake libertarians are ripe for alt right indoctrination however. That, plus the wannabe commies and fake leftists, Russia and China can pickup a few votes from the West here and there.
I hope you’re right
Wait, tankies and libertarians are fake, and China and Russia are interested, but corporate isn’t? I’m not sure this position is coherent
Yes. I hardly look at Lemmy any more. It’s so toxic
Thank you. The one sympathetic voice in a sea of frothing idiocy
But you made a post less <2 days ago, and commented over 50 times just this past week
So, did you just VERY recently start “hardly looking” or something? Or are you just trolling/full of
shitbologna?. No hard feelings or anything, but damn; low effort. Be better
Ya, Lemmy is speed running the worst things about Reddit but struggling to build the niche communities that would make people want to hang around.
The thing that’s making me kinda want to leave is it feels like even more of an echo chamber then Reddit was, especially when you see someone calling for the death of someone at least once a week or so
Quite often see people getting downvote bombed and dogpiled for having different political opinions
I left reddit because I fucking hate the company.
But I’m not happy here because I fucking hate the users.
Great summary.
Me even typing a response to your comment make me 70% more likely to get banned in the few hours.
It’s infectuous
Yes but not that much I see the communities are starting to materialize but many that are a 1 to 1 copy didn’t took off sadly the Warframe one is a good example, but you see the pixel dungeon one is going great even Evan00 (the dev of shattered) is buzzing in and the helldivers2 is starting to get to the frontpages. I guess the fediverse moves in a more organical way? Regarding the trolls is normal is a “ladran Sancho” situation, we are getting more people in and that includes idiots. Sadlly/Luckly idiots comes in the full spectrum of races backgrounds and preferences.
I fit your definition. Now lemme 'splain:
For thirty-five years I have heard nothing but radical right fascism spewing hate, lies, vitriol, slander, and violent rhetoric- over the airwaves, cable, and now social media- and without the slightest bit of challenge or pushback. The amount and volume increased when they figured out it pays big money. The people who listen have never known that it was for entertainment; they are being edged to violence just like Ruwandan radio did.
Liberals have been major pussies and doormats about this because they have no idea who they’re dealing with. They cannot be reasoned with or appealed to through humanity. The radical fascists’ free speech rights do not exist and are not to be defended; there is absolutely nothing to gain there and everything to lose. As I said, liberals have no idea who they’re dealing with.
For all the unchecked violence and damaged caused by the radical fascist shitbags to our daily lives, our long term properity, and to safety and security in general, I absolutely attack them with all the violent and vitriolic slander I can muster to pay back for thirty-five plus years of the same. This is the route every one of you should take, because they all think you’re a bunch of pussies and they take great joy in running you over. They must be made to fear even being seen in public, and beaten down like rabid dogs when they are. They are enemies of freedom, enemies of humanity, and enemies of all that is good in the world.
A lemmy.world account with a spine? 😳😳😳
God damn, color me pleasantly surprised!
Yeah that’s a new one. They deserve a better class of fed.
All they want is attention. I simply don’t give them the satisfaction of a response. They get bored and move on.
Do they just want attention? Or are they malicious actors from those that consider Lemmy competition?
Even if they’re malicious actors, they want attention just the same. They want to lure you into a bad faith “debate” so they can spread their propaganda. Either way, the solution is the same - ignore them. Don’t give them the opportunity to reply and promote more bullshit.
They’re malicious actors, but reddit is just as bad right now. It’ll die down to more organic hate after the elections.
China and Russia trying to step up the political discord between people ahead of the election in November.
Gamergate and Russiagate, we’re bringing back 2016, apparently.
i think that it’s a lot more likely that a few people are just making burner accounts to be dicks on the internet than some weird QAnon-esque conspiracy theory that both the Russian and Chinese governments are not only aware of a tiny reddit clone but also are actively employing people (who all happen to be fluent in english) to create fake accounts and convincingly imitate westerners all in order to slightly increase political divisions in america for a few thousand people by having arguments about already incredibly contentious issues.
It’s not a “QAnon-esque conspiracy theory”. Russia’s online influence in American politics has been fairly well documented. That being said, I think it’s somewhat unhealthy to assume everyone who says something controversial is dishonest or a troll. Not good for discourse.
The general consensus is that yes, Russians do troll. The conspiracy comes from the fact that EVERYONE you have a bad interaction with is a troll. No, a vast majority of Americans are just really shitty people and there’s a really good chance your argument is an organic one.
im not saying governments dont astroturf or anything, i meant it was a QAnon-esque conspiracy to assume that there were paid shills and bots around every corner and the vast majority of anti-american sentiment comes from a Russian cabal or something, especially on a comparitively tiny online space like lemmy. Like i’ve fairly frequently seen the accusation that lemmy is filled with paid actors / bots working for various countries from people just because they’ve suddenly been exposed to views that they’ve never really encountered before.
Thank you! Like, this isn’t how foriegn influence campaigns work. Believing the jerk you’re arguing with is a Russian agent might make you feel like you’re in a Tom Clancy novel, but the odds are it’s just a dweeb with multiple accounts. Foriegn influence campaigns make sock-puppets to repeat the same 5 talking points on as many communities as possible, and maybe have a few canned replies. They don’t fight with the same person in a 20 reply thread over the course of 2 days.
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“The Russian and Chinese oligarchs are taking over!” - Western oligarchs probably
