4 ms·

> Almost all of the popular communities online lean left, take your pick. Like Reddit where /r/TheDonald is consistently at the top of /r/all, and stories abou

by pyre 10y ago

> Almost all of the popular communities online lean left, take your pick. Like Reddit where /r/TheDonald is consistently at the top of /r/all, and stories about terrorism on /r/WorldNews devolve into xenophobic rants that stop just short of containing phrases like "the only good Muslim is a dead Muslim?" That's not too "left leaning" to me.

lintiness 10y ago
anecdotal garbage. i glance at r/all once or twice a day and the number of threads from /thedonald making an appearance is dwarfed by those from /news and /politics -- both groups that banish even thoughtful "right leaning" comments to the basement. at least with /thedonald, you know there's a political bent. the other groups pretend to be "objective".
- turc1656 10y ago
  Because of this, I virtually never comment on anything on the internet. I am genuinely disgusted at the comments on most sites and want no part of it. It is not just a waste of time, it can also rot your soul. Besides the small handful of posts here on HackerNews, I honestly cannot remember the last time I wrote anything online at all. I suggest all of you do the same. You might find you are much better off, like I did. To be clear - by all means READ blogs and sites and stay informed. Just steer clear of the comments section. Vote at the ballot box and with your wallet. Not with your keyboard.
- turc1656 10y ago
  A bit more - what you wrote is exactly the typical case I have seen almost exclusively across the spectrum for many boards/sites. And Reddit in particular is especially guilty of this. It shouldn't really surprise anyone, though, given that Silicon Valley leans hard to the left - they are in charge of some of these non-media owned discussion sites like Reddit. Just look at the recent case of Facebook hiding conservative news from the feed. Of course they claim it was a few "rogue employees". Sure, I believe that. And as for discussions on Reddit or news websites, the typical tactic I see over and over is as soon as anyone who is in the minority viewpoint is starting to make any sort of sense, commenters whip out the laundry list of go-to techniques for intellectually dishonest attacks - name-calling, stereotyping, questioning motives, questioning knowledge/expertise/credentials, using incorrect assumptions and false premises, straw man attacks, claiming facts are just opinions, use of weasel words, or (my personal favorite) the claim of having "rights" that are not in fact rights at all (surprisingly common). None of these crap tactics address either incorrect facts or incorrect logic, which are the only two things that should matter. It's amazing to me how ugly things have become. And it's not just politics. Go to virtually ANY youtube video with more than a few thousand views and read the comments. There are an inordinate amount of hateful/angry posts, even for the most subjective things like music. And somehow anything related to news devolves into a political debate.
sergiotapia 10y ago
No. Reddit modified their algorithm weeks ago to remove /r/the_donald from the frontpage. Before it routinely made it due to the sheer number of upvotes and users engaged. They 'tweaked' their algorithm to allow more "diversity"; their words not mine. Also /r/worldnews is HEAVILY censored to remove any criticism against islam in particular. If you see it it's probably because they missed a spot.
- curried_haskell 10y ago
  Same with /r/news, to the extent that major breaking stories have to be reported on AskReddit. It's really disgusting.

by pyre 10y ago

lintiness 10y ago

anecdotal garbage. i glance at r/all once or twice a day and the number of threads from /thedonald making an appearance is dwarfed by those from /news and /politics -- both groups that banish even thoughtful "right leaning" comments to the basement. at least with /thedonald, you know there's a political bent. the other groups pretend to be "objective".

turc1656 10y ago
Because of this, I virtually never comment on anything on the internet. I am genuinely disgusted at the comments on most sites and want no part of it. It is not just a waste of time, it can also rot your soul. Besides the small handful of posts here on HackerNews, I honestly cannot remember the last time I wrote anything online at all. I suggest all of you do the same. You might find you are much better off, like I did. To be clear - by all means READ blogs and sites and stay informed. Just steer clear of the comments section. Vote at the ballot box and with your wallet. Not with your keyboard.
turc1656 10y ago
A bit more - what you wrote is exactly the typical case I have seen almost exclusively across the spectrum for many boards/sites. And Reddit in particular is especially guilty of this. It shouldn't really surprise anyone, though, given that Silicon Valley leans hard to the left - they are in charge of some of these non-media owned discussion sites like Reddit. Just look at the recent case of Facebook hiding conservative news from the feed. Of course they claim it was a few "rogue employees". Sure, I believe that. And as for discussions on Reddit or news websites, the typical tactic I see over and over is as soon as anyone who is in the minority viewpoint is starting to make any sort of sense, commenters whip out the laundry list of go-to techniques for intellectually dishonest attacks - name-calling, stereotyping, questioning motives, questioning knowledge/expertise/credentials, using incorrect assumptions and false premises, straw man attacks, claiming facts are just opinions, use of weasel words, or (my personal favorite) the claim of having "rights" that are not in fact rights at all (surprisingly common). None of these crap tactics address either incorrect facts or incorrect logic, which are the only two things that should matter. It's amazing to me how ugly things have become. And it's not just politics. Go to virtually ANY youtube video with more than a few thousand views and read the comments. There are an inordinate amount of hateful/angry posts, even for the most subjective things like music. And somehow anything related to news devolves into a political debate.

sergiotapia 10y ago

No. Reddit modified their algorithm weeks ago to remove /r/the_donald from the frontpage. Before it routinely made it due to the sheer number of upvotes and users engaged. They 'tweaked' their algorithm to allow more "diversity"; their words not mine. Also /r/worldnews is HEAVILY censored to remove any criticism against islam in particular. If you see it it's probably because they missed a spot.

curried_haskell 10y ago
Same with /r/news, to the extent that major breaking stories have to be reported on AskReddit. It's really disgusting.