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The problem with extremists is that they drive people who disagree with them away. I've been a fairly heavy user of 4chan for well over a decade now, and I even
by simias 7y ago
The problem with extremists is that they drive people who disagree with them away. I've been a fairly heavy user of 4chan for well over a decade now, and I even spent some time on 8chan. I like the anarchic, less ego-driven nature of anonymous image boards. You avoid most of the empty posturing from other social networks.
I even think that 8chan was a great idea on paper. It's basically 4chan with Reddit's ability to create sub-communities on a whim instead of having to beg the admins to create a new board. I created a few of those myself.
But then of course the fascists took over. Admittedly on 8chan is happened almost immediately but on 4chan it was more gradual. Now 8chan is (rightfully IMO) dead and frankly I wouldn't be too sad to see 4chan, or at least some of its more popular boards, go the same way. The /pol/ cancer spreads everywhere, the big boards are 50% shitposting and 50% hate speech. And not in a fun "let's make ironic memes about Hitler to push people's buttons" way but in a rather depressing "I seriously hate women and minorities" way.
The more moderate people gets driven away. Actually any sane people would be driven away from this terrible and constant negativity and all you have left are the zealots who feed on each other's extremism. It's not free speech, it's a circular feedback-loop of radicalization. I've genuinely read a (supposedly videogame related) thread yesterday on 4chan where somebody was trying somewhat successfully to appear moderate by saying "I support white nationalists but I don't think we should be killing brown people". How nice.
Note that Reddit isn't a whole lot better at handling this, they're just better at hiding it under the rug while posturing in their PR releases.
- microcolonel 7y ago> But then of course the fascists took over. Keep in mind that it's still mostly ironic.
- happytoexplain 7y agoI'm in the same boat as the parent poster in terms of time spent on 4chan and 8chan, and I honestly can't tell if you're being sarcastic. I understand the nature of irony on the chans, and that a lot of "-ist" comments are "kidding" (to varying degrees of success in terms of comedy and responsibility for the message one is putting out there), but: 1. To be so sure about the numbers seems presumptuous. 2. Does it matter?
- microcolonel 7y agoI know several people who lurk and post on /pol/, and it is an ethnically diverse group from my perspective. I've heard this sentiment echoed by others. Of course, if you live in a very white place, you probably can't tell either way, even if you know a lot of channers. Maybe there are a lot of unironic black and native-mixed neo-nazis, but I'm not so sure myself.
- odessacubbage 7y ago>that they drive people who disagree with them away. /leftypol/ was more or less just active on 8ch as /pol/, you'd be hard pressed to find any groups more diametrically opposed than that. people also often fail to take into account that the userbase was at varying points self reported to be upwards of 60% lgbtq and presumptively far more neurodivergent than more mainstream platforms. also worth noting that practically every mass shooter that has been newsworthy had an abundance of typical social media accounts, so the dangerous subset of fascists you're so worried about are already present on all the so-called moderate platforms. so who is actually dissuaded by this course of action? certainly someone motivated enough to plan and inflict mass-death upon a group of innocent people isn't gonna be kept away from extremist content simply because they have to take 15 minutes to set up tor browser.