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I don't see much of that myself. Either it's mostly from the few people I have blocked or it's the communities I'm not in.
I'm also not sure why negative and rude is the same as dispassionate to you. Maybe that's why we're not seeing the same things. Or maybe that's not what you meant to say, but that's how this reads to me.
No it's definitely there, but you're right that it seems variable by community.
I don't think Lemmy has a particularly more hateful user base than any other site, or than the population in general. However, I think the demographics here mean that the handful of Lemmy users who are hateful tend to be so in the same direction. So if there are two positions for some topic, hate for one position will be more common on Lemmy than the other. This can manifest in many ways.
I suspect there are many others, but I'll talk about the one I've noticed. On some of the Christian communities here on Lemmy, all the posts have been downvoted more than upvoted. Kinda makes me think there are a few people who just downvote every post they see on those communities.
Besides communities, it could also depend on your instance. The one I'm on, for example, makes a point of providing a safe space for gender diverse people to hang out, so the admins will defederate with any instance that does not police itself sufficiently to avoid bigotry. I imagine that means I end up seeing very little of the hate that goes in the broader fediverse. No big loss, I'm sure.
Same here, but I block political and news communities on my main account
You’re asking something that is extremely subjective, in a very combative way. You don’t seem like you have good intentions
Cant say im seeing it. Maybe hang out in different communities?
Redditfugees.
Don't roll The Fugees into this. They may be 2/3 out-of-touch asshats IRL, but at least they're not Reddidurs sloughing off that fetid cadaver like whiny pus.
We try to integrate , at least some of us
I don't think it's something limited to Fedi, but internet in general. The whole social media "algorithm" promotes such posts, an edgy extreme post filled with hate will get more reactions and upvotes, than a "lame" conventional opinion, so you're more likely to see it. I am not sure how to even fix it, I think it's one of the fundamental problems if the internet, but this is how it is
There is no algorithm like that here. You could argue that “popular” posts are the most inflammatory, but that’s not the case in a lot of the communities I frequent.
The algorithm in this case is the human ego multiplied by the limits of text communication.
Fair, but I would argue that in and of itself is not the major problem. There were flame wars/trolls/squabbles on the internet for years. Then along came the rage-rewarding algorithms and clickbait based on profiling, and it all went to shit. Basically, dumping gasoline on ego and indignity.
You are correct in your history for sure.
My comment was more focused on Lemmy and the reason for occasional outbreaks of nastiness. There is no algorithm in the sense you describe on Lemmy.
I meant to convey that what we see on Lemmy is a property that emerges from human interaction through this medium.
Our conversation may be an example of this. I made a comment that was short, but I thought it was unambiguous. Your reply was thoughtful and topical. But a short text requires you to fill in a lot of context. So you may create a slightly different picture than I intended.
This is a deep cut sci-fi tangent, but it applies. Being pseudonymous and not having durable social reputation makes for different human behaviors.
True Names by Vernor Vinge exceprt
The full story is available with a search on the title and author.
Do you have the problematic instances, communities, and users blocked? Most of the maligned content that I’ve seen has come from two instances that I’ve since blocked from my feed, although blocking their bananas users requires each user to make themselves known first. Lemmy requires a bit of custom pruning of federation to fit each user’s tastes, interests, and values.
Secondly, there is a lot of despair going on due to the current state of society. For-profit media will show things through one lens, and non-profit forums will show things through another. There are a lot of people passionate about making a better world and stopping malicious powers.
Thirdly, amassing fandom communities takes time. Everyone is affected by global superpowers and politics, but they’re not going to be happy about it; in contrast, not everyone is into the same specific pastimes. Attracting people to communities for XYZ fandoms/hobbies/passions requires these communities to stand out among the sea of posts and catch the users’ eye, or for the user to actively seek them out and find them.
Last and least likely, you don’t happen to be sorting by Controversial?
If you have only been here for a month it's not enough time to judge if the culture is changing, no?
Also you're saying two different things, that people are negative and rude and that they aren't expressing any passion. I think some users are negative and rude, but they definitely still express passion even though it isn't always positive. Lemmy users have always held strong and passionate beliefs, it's part of why we decided to leave mainstream social media and use Lemmy instead.
Sometimes those beliefs clash, but I don't think it's gotten any more negative lately. Plus it varies so much from server to server and community to community. It's pretty foolish to paint all of Lemmy with the same brush because really it's a bunch of independent communities with different attitudes and behaviors that are also able to interact with each other.
Because it's on the internet.
Once I replied to a meme and got 10 people replying with hateful things, downvoting my replies, nobody had my back did'nt understand why. Turned out the meme I replied to was posted in a communist instance and the anti-us sentiment wasn't really a joke. At some point a mod blocked me from replying so I blocked the instance and never looked back. If I see a user or community from specific instances I think twice before I reply. 99% of the time I feel free to say whatever I want, so I don't really care about the parts of lemmy where I'm not. I've seen plenty of passionate and caring people in the 2-3 weeks since I registered, so don't know how you've missed them so far. They're here though.
I think that the variety of leftists here, ranging all the way from people who don't hate voting for Democrats to literal Stalinists, is one of the peculiarities of Lemmy that I find interesting. With that said, actually engaging with any of the ones more like the latter than the former is, as you've experienced, unrewarding.
Lemmy seems less like a space built around a shared passion for ideas or a vision of a better future, and more like a community bonded by mutual hatred of an outgroup. The sense of belonging often comes not from shared goals or values, but from shared enemies. That kind of dynamic tends to breed a negative, hostile culture where outrage and mockery are more common than curiosity or constructive discussion.
Got an example?
Have you visited hobby communities? They can be quite pleasant.
I browse 3-5 times a day, and see something unnecessarily rude maybe once a week or so. I've not noticed any change in rudeness or negativity recently.
Without hard data, mood trends identified on social media usually say more about the identifier than the community.
Only been here a short while, and have had mainly positive experiences. I’ll usually give people benefit of the doubt as it can be hard for some to express themselves in text - so can come across as rude. Obvious trolling I just ignore.
Currently there aren't enough tools for small communities. It's hard for a niche community to grow and flourish.
If you post something like 'BBQ is delicious', it becomes a open referendum for the entirety of Lemmy to tell you why everything you said is wrong. Everybody dog piles their own personal biases and issues. And that's fine for a general discussion.
lemmy needs smaller community safe spaces so the conversations can grow by interested parties, that's currently lacking. Like a subscriber only post, only seen by people who subscribe to a community. And then when it gets large enough, people can say I want this to be generally available. I think that would help a lot
I don't see that much hate but plenty of anger
Won't speculate as to why but will recommend the community push for keyword filtering at the account level (a la Bluesky) rather than relying on apps like Sync to help us sift through the garbage
I try to be more constructive and positive... you get what you give for the most part. There are trolls abound like any online platform but ignore, report and/or block them and move on with your day.
There is no one I seen here who even had expressed any passion towards anything really.
All/Top is mostly general posts, news and memes. There are a lot of smaller communities on Lemmy that are about people's passions.
Is technology your passion (judging by your posts)? If so check out more specific communities on stuff like Android, Apple, retro computing, homeassistant, linux, windows, etc. If it's something else chances are there's a community for that (albeit it could be relatively inactive). The technology subs attract general discussion, so go for the niches.
As others have said, one's view of Lemmy is highly dependent upon the instances and communities that one frequents. As someone who isn't a habitué of politics, news, sport or meme communities, I've found my fellow lemmings to be pleasant, but I also believe that that is due to trying to be helpful and polite myself and being willing to apologize when warranted.
I've found my fellow lemmings to be pleasant, but I also believe that that is due to trying to be helpful and polite myself and being willing to apologize when warranted.
Thank you for your part in bringing healthy, helpful and constructive discussion to Lemmy.
I only have this issue on political communities. Anger towards Americans is much more pronounced on Lemmy than on Reddit. People will call for violence a lot more frequently here than on Reddit.
I understand the anger towards Americans, but it can be downright toxic to organizing at times.
I get it too. People would rather start calling you names than have a discussion. I think it's the "with us or against us" mentality as a whole that makes people very volatile.
You sound like a reasonable person though, so I hope you don't depart.
If I am being pretty honest with you, I thought about leaving Lemmy before due to multiple reasons+ the culture of hate here.
But I always think about the alternatives and I don't find many.
As long as there is no a better alternative to Reddit, I am staying.
While the communities you view may differ from my own experience, I would say that political and news themed communities have had an uptick in aggression.
My sense is that it is less about the overall population on Lemmy, but more about the polarization of news and political topics in our society. If there were truly a force actively trying to promote a culture war to prevent a class war, I’d say they are doing an effective job.
Outside of news/politics communities, postings, and (directly or indirectly) related comments (or commenters), I have not experienced an increase in outright negativity and rudeness.
Just like in any written dialogue, I think some expressions of humor can be written or received poorly, lending to a received sense of rudeness—and those moments sometimes serve as reinforcement of actual offensive aggression observed elsewhere, you dick /s.
Jokes aside, I do appreciate you drawing attention to it, as a reminder for each of us to do our part to express ourselves more clearly—allowing for discussion, disagreement, sarcasm, and humor while maintaining respect and civility.
And, of course, continue to block users and communities you find objectionable; though, I would challenge anyone to ask themselves if they are blocking to avoid offensive content, or are they blocking to avoid content which does not align with their views. Silencing different points of view, ultimately, only expedites the original problem.
I've seen it here as long as I've been here, it's the main reason why I'm not on here much anymore. First time I noticed it was when I went looking for Christian communities here and found nearly every post was getting more downvotes than upvotes. Kinda seems like there are a few on this platform who enjoy downvoting people just for being Christians - and those people outnumber those interested in actual conversation on those communities.
So why is Lemmy like this? I dunno, I can only speculate.
with the enshittification of all other social media, the exodi and influx would be appropriate for this particular cartoon about little blobs being unwelcome, creating their own space, then being crowded out to the dialogue "oh no"....clear??
Totally agree. People here are some of the worst I have ever seen. Like actually worse than Reddit. Easily. Pretty sure most people here are just miserable depressed fucks. Kinda makes sense honestly.
Americans are indoctrinated by their media and society to be segregated into political and social camps that have tribal wars with each other. That's all priority no. 1 for them rn and it spills over.
It's just people bickering about social and political issues like gender, misinterpretation of isms, social hierarchy, etc. But because Americans don't do anything but compete amongst each other, they bring their problems here where it echoes out into nothingness and disintegrates. But so long as they feel they were heard or had an online "win", they get a dopamine hit and sense of progress, entirely ignorant to their apathy.
This can feel, at times, the place that attracts the biggest losers. Like all the troll characters out of South Park's Skank Hunt saga. But there is also a huge amount of insecurity and desire to be spotlighted. What society thinks of a person is also always a really important thing they'll post about—just is, they really, really care for some reason.
Moosh that all together and you got a bunch of apathetic, socially anxious, and insecure people that lack social tact and empathy, hidden on keyboards, watching their world fall apart but hoping someone besides them will help it.
The most recent reddit exodus brought a lot of shitty people. The vibe here changed overnight.
