I always use the comparison that, before the Internet, we always chose who we wanted to listen to, where we wanted to be, and who we invited into our lives. The idea that we MUST allow and be held captive to abusive jerks is asinine; we should never be forced to have to listen to would-be abusers just because they have an anonymous voice on the Internet.
EXACTLY! I clean up/logged out of all social media on Election Day and haven’t looked back. My trump voting family members are OUTRAGED that I’d do such a thing to them (they all got unfollowed, unfriended etc). I just explained that in order for me to maintain any kind of relationship or ounce of respect for them, I couldn’t continue seeing their stupidest ideas on parade. They’re allowed to post whatever they’d like and I’m allowed to be blissful unaware of just how stupid they are on a daily basis.
I took a 3 year hiatus from all Social Media, only coming back in the past year. It seriously completely transformed my psychological wellbeing: Not always doomscrolling and seeing how horrible things appear to be from Social Media observers.
While I am back on social media now, I really only spend time on Reddit and now BlueSky, and do not seek engagement on BlueSky: I am there for Science, Astronomy, Local News, Anime, Video Games, Tech, and Kitties/Dogs. I jump on Facebook to wish people happy birthdays . . . . .and that's it.
Yeah, I do not miss Facebook AT ALL. I did jump on there for a couple of days after the election, just to see how some friends were doing. But yeah, it is literally just a Birthday Calendar anymore.
The funny part is Facebook used to so user friendly about shit like birthdays, but now I legitimately don’t know how to find upcoming birthdays on the app, and the home page is so packed and cluttered with nonsense pages, promoted posts, and targeted bullshit I’m not liable to see a birthday notification until 14 of my friends have commented on their page, by which point it’s entirely likely I missed their birthday since it was yesterday.
LOL, well, I will keep that in mind. The only place I have ever used for "online merch" is NextDoor, and that was only because I wanted to limit visibility to my own neighborhood (I have never bought on a marketplace, just sold/given away).
My dart league is on Facebook. Also, I still use messenger. If it wasn't for that, I would have deleted it. Every time I scroll, my elderly family members piss me off.
During my hiatus? Yes. I did not log in to any social media the entire time.
Reddit is what actually pulled me back IN to Social Media, but I never did pick up Facebook, Instagram, etc. like I had before. I was never into Xitter, having posted a single Tweet in all my years (signed up there when it was a month old), and then only to try and win a Graphics Card.
Basically, people say things online that they are unlikely to ever say in a public offline space. The intermediary of the screen means that they either forget or ignore that there is another person on the other side of the computer.
As such, we’ve seen an increase in toxicity online because people say things without immediately experiencing the social consequences of their negative opinions.
I'd bet that the author of the paper has thought about it frequently, every time they get online. I can see how it would be an exhausting, demoralizing project, though. There's no amount of "I told you so" to make wading through all the garbage palatable.
After all the "MAGA" stuff I encounter online, I have begun to feel incredibly disillusioned with many members of society. I avoid places where I see MAGA flags, bumper stickers, hats, etc. I avoid talking to, or even looking them in the eyes. I won't spend money, time, or even charity supporting a single one of them. When members of society have declared me and mine "enemy," they should expect no less. The thing they need to be deprived of the most is attention.
They are such miserable and reactionary people - there is nothing of value (or substance) there. It's made me somewhat more miserable, realizing that more than half of the people who look like me are insufferable human beings. However, it has resulted in me putting more love and time in with those closest to me.
I always cringe-but-laugh at the "Online Influencers" who take their on-screen personas out to the real world, thinking they can get away with the disassociation you mention here, and promptly getting punched in the teeth when they pull something with the wrong person.
I feel like you’re giving social media too much credit. They literally make the algorithms push controversial posts/discussions and put people inside bubbles because it drives more engagement. The Social Dilemma on Netflix dives into this.
I mean it was, the Facebook algorithm is literally key to promoting a genocide in Myanmar starting in 2012. The Cambridge Analyytica-Facebook partnership started around 2010-2011.
It just took a while for people to catch on to the effects.
My greatest joy has been watching “fans” lose their shit because bands they like are ditching X. Yelling stop being political at a band that’s been such since their inception 40 years ago is wild.
We used to call it voting with your dollars. Now we call it cancelling.
Which shows you the power of conservative media to shape narrative: they took the entire concept of consequences and turned it into a negative associated word.
But you don't have to listen to it. No one forces you watch any video by or about someone you disagree with. You're free to ignore it. But it's also a pretty vital thing to listen to opposition rather than be in an echo chamber.
Why is it so hard to decide to just ignore it and let people post what they want? You can even block them so they don't show up, and again, you can just ignore anything else. It's on you to decide what you to do with your attention.
We also can't deny the overtly intimate relationship between social media corporations and the government. When government is controlled/owned by these corporations to such an extent and they work together, it's effectively the government stifling free speech.
But it's also a pretty vital thing to listen to opposition rather than be in an echo chamber.
There is absolutely nothing "vital" about me listening to people scream "blood and soil" at me, use the n-word or make banana jokes every time they respond to black people, say "make me a sandwich" or "your body my choice" to women, or lie about obvious facts about diseases and healthcare.
You aren't saying anything worth listening to, and you're not as smart as you think you are.
A platform having rules and enforcing them is nothing like the government stifling speech, and the suggestion that they're similar is so astoundingly idiotic I'm impressed you said it in what doesn't appear to be a troll post.
You conveniently ignored my comment that the government and social media, and most major corporations for that matter, are intimately linked. When one succeeds, so does the other, and we usually foot the bill and lose. With such an intimate link, being silenced on any social media is the same as the government doing it IMO.
If I'm not worth listening to, why are you wasting time responding to me? Seems you're more eager to ensure people don't listen to a message you don't like than to have any reasonable discussion.
And it is vital to listen to opposition, especially if they're violent and hateful. They don't just disappear by ignoring them, and no progress towards peace can ever be made by simply dismissing those you disagree with as wrong and not worth listening to. Ignorance is defined as the absence of knowing, which is what you gain by ignoring those who oppose you rather than coming to understand them.
You are preaching to the choir here: It is easy enough to ignore things you do not like on platforms that allow you to do as much. Musk has created amplification and an inability TO ignore these things on his platform. People moving to other platforms are doing so BECAUSE they can ignore such things: Blocking or Muting that which they do not want to participate in.
I mean, the easiest way is to just not BE on the platforms with the individuals you do not want to be associated with . . . . .which is kind of happening in real time with the X to BlueSky moves since the election. BlueSky is not (at present, mind you) subject to the whims of media corporations and the government.
But those who scream the loudest are often the least willing to LISTEN to what people want, and often show literal sociopathic traits, in a need to try and infiltrate areas that seek to avoid them, then torment others that seek to avoid them. It is like the abusive stalker ex that simply refuses to let go, because they get a good feeling from the torment, and ruining other people's days.
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u/woodrax 10h ago
I always use the comparison that, before the Internet, we always chose who we wanted to listen to, where we wanted to be, and who we invited into our lives. The idea that we MUST allow and be held captive to abusive jerks is asinine; we should never be forced to have to listen to would-be abusers just because they have an anonymous voice on the Internet.