> It comes down, in the end, to whether or not you believe that the “digital town square” Musk talked about when he bought Twitter can really exist and, if it can, whether it is of any benefit to anyone.
I'd argue the moderation is the issue. It's one thing to have a discussion between different ideologies, but there's no more conservatives to discuss anything with. They've left twitter too, and the only people left are... not engaging in good faith discussions, to be polite about it.
Users seem to have an expectation of(or rather a desire for) civility, moreso than echo chamber agreement, but the current owner of twitter seems to think that restricting hate-speech is restricting free-speech. Then, for whatever moderation is left, all the most popular alt-right accounts also get an exemption from that, which encourages all their followers to be their worst version of themself.
I don't think its just moderation - but also that fact that most people don't have opinions worth listening too.
When you think about the town square, anyone could set up a soap box, say anything and be heard by anyone... anyone within a 50m radius depending on background noise. Standing in the town square didn't give you the ability (or right) to be heard by anyone in any town square.
But nowdays, you can (and sometimes are obligated to) have an opinion on anything. Local politics in a country on the otherside of the planet - go right ahead. Opinions on the mid-east that most people are not qualified to provide, sure thing!
And worse, if the echo chamber deems that "silence is violence" not only can you not refrain from expressing your opinion, silence means you have out-group-think, so either agree or be removed.
Twitter was fun... for a bit. But its quite obvious that this idea that anyone can have an idea, and everyone can hear it is just plain bad for society.
In most of the world you have free speech - go outside and use it. But online for the world to hear... maybe thats just overrated.
Agreed. I find it interesting that "silence is violence" people are assuming that silence means you agree with the opinions being expressed around you. So if you're in an echo chamber with those same people, while they chant slogans or pat each other on the back about whatever their issue du jour is -- if you're silent, by their logic, theoretically you're agreeing with them. But in practice, they think you being silent is disagreement, not silent support as is assumed for everything else except their views.
> In most of the world you have free speech - go outside and use it. But online for the world to hear... maybe thats just overrated.
Can't have both. You can either have a free Internet where everyone, including yourself, are free to say what they want, or you don't.
> But nowdays, you can (and sometimes are obligated to) have an opinion on anything
Seen in many of these echo chambers people state that if people don't actively campaign for something, they're scum of the earth, as bad as X Y Z and people with the polar opposite view of them and not welcome on the platform these echo chambers use.
I find platforms like Mastodon have had an effect of strengthening these echo chambers and the extremity of peoples views, emboldening the division of society and ultimately being self-harming.
> but the problem is that the chatterati — very nice and non-conspiracy-theorising and non-overtly-racist though they may be — tend to coalesce around some quite similar viewpoints, which makes for a rather echoey chamber.
Are any of us truly going to live better lives if we see a bunch of conspiracy theories and racist rants?
Some of those posts are a result of genuine mental illness. I have a clinically retarded uncle who is a big fan of nazi stuff. I'm glad the internet wasn't around when he was young.
Low IQ is correlated with being racist, though that may just be that having a low IQ means you're not smart enough to keep your mouth shut about being racist.
IQ discussions remind me of the obese discussing the diet trends. Those most concerned with dieting may not be the healthiest. However, they are healthy by the metrics of their diet program. Similarly, one can study for IQ tests, but it leaves the question: If they are satisfied with their intellectual capacity relative to the general population, why is it necessary?
> Similarly, one can study for IQ tests
Have you ever taken an IQ test?
I’d be interested in reading primary sources showing the correlation between low IQ scores and being racist. Do you have any? All I’ve ever seen is that the overall education level of right-wing voters is lower than that of left-wing voters, but there’s no correlation related to intelligence (it probably just means that the lower-educated people live in lesser-than-kind neighborhoods).
I think it could be better in that you get a more rounded perspective of what people think, and develop greater empathy for the hang-ups that people have and understand the patterns they develop along. It's certainly more comfortable to insulate yourself from those negative ideas, and everyone has to determine for themselves how much of it they can take, but ultimately I think it's positive for personal growth.
And these 'clinically retarded' people, as you call them, have all of the same rights you do, including the right to vote. It's antithetical to democratic and egalitarian values to imply that a value is lesser somehow because many of the people who hold it have intellectual disabilities. If anything you could just as easily say the reason people with disabilities hold these fringe ideas are because they aren't included in the public discourse, and we have failed to learn to communicate with them effectively enough to instill them with our values.
I called exactly one person clinically retarded. I also didn't suggest or imply disabled people should have no right to speech or vote. You made all that up.
The only people I see complaining about “social media echo chambers” are the ones who other people have decided they don’t want to be near.
Good riddance to them. You aren’t entitled to bother others if they don’t want to hear from you.
She decided that it was less of an echo chamber when lots of people on the platform disagreed loudly with her opinion, which is good in her mind I suppose?
If you think Bluesky is relatively progressive then Mastodon would abhor you.
unpaywalled: https://archive.ph/bateK
Clicking your link brings to a blocked page and to a banner from the italian police that states the website is linked with CP. Maybe you got the wrong link?
No, you just happen to live in a country that censors the internet. When I travel to countries like that, I use a VPN to read the news
dont think so, its an alternative URL of archive.today [0]
its also blocked in progressive democracies such as Russia and China
wtf kind of doublespeak is "progressive democracies"
it's a joke
Ahhh the classic 'CP' FUD.
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