3 ms·

I think the people making those comments are the same people you see out in the world who are visibly unstable. Disheveled, muttering to themselves angrily, car

I think the people making those comments are the same people you see out in the world who are visibly unstable. Disheveled, muttering to themselves angrily, cars plastered in political bumper stickers, getting into confrontations with service workers, etc. In the world there is context. You're sitting in a cafe surrounded by 20 other average people getting on with their day, and there's some guy talking loudly to no in particular that Bill Gates is trying to steal our blood or whatever. It's those people sitting on these comment sections all day. That's what I tell myself anyway, otherwise it's too disturbing to think about the other explanations.

chipotle_coyote 6y ago
I think there's something to this. The internet actually giving context to people who think Bill Gates is trying to steal our blood or whatever. They can find a little space on a forum, or a subreddit, or 4chan, or indeed newspaper comment sections and find other people who think the same way, and now they're all reinforcing each other. And, letters to the newspaper have, for many years, been the province of grumpy retirees and people whose job literally involves writing letters to the editors (activist organizers, PR people, etc.). I'm always faintly bemused when I read the comments in the San Francisco Chronicle, which are near-universally from conservative cranks bemoaning how those big-spendin' liberals are ruinin' everythin' what with their welfare programs supportin' no-gooders and their public transit bringin' in crime why in my youth we had to walk up Telegraph Hill through the snow both ways comin' and goin' and we liked it. I'm pretty sure I could paste in a letter to the editor that appeared in the paper of my youth, the Tampa Tribune in the 1980s, with surprisingly little editing necessary.
- chowderhead 6y ago
  The reinforcement is concerning. Well, I guess that's how we wind up at censorship and de-platforming issues. Do you provide space in your cafe to accommodate all the neighborhood nutjobs to congregate, and they all start shouting in unison about gangstalking or Bill Gates stealing our blood. How far do you let them go? They rile themselves up and you get a guy barging into a pizza shop wielding an assault rifle to take down a non-existent pedophile ring. There are social and geographic boundaries out in the world, so that doesn't happen naturally. But on the internet... sigh. It's a problem without an obvious solution.
  - api 6y ago
    I think one argument that can be made on the pro-deplatforming side is that it's necessary to protect the mentally ill and vulnerable. I've never seen anything like the Qanon phenomenon, and that's just the beginning. We're going to see Borg-scale folie a deux.

chipotle_coyote 6y ago

I think there's something to this. The internet actually giving context to people who think Bill Gates is trying to steal our blood or whatever. They can find a little space on a forum, or a subreddit, or 4chan, or indeed newspaper comment sections and find other people who think the same way, and now they're all reinforcing each other. And, letters to the newspaper have, for many years, been the province of grumpy retirees and people whose job literally involves writing letters to the editors (activist organizers, PR people, etc.). I'm always faintly bemused when I read the comments in the San Francisco Chronicle, which are near-universally from conservative cranks bemoaning how those big-spendin' liberals are ruinin' everythin' what with their welfare programs supportin' no-gooders and their public transit bringin' in crime why in my youth we had to walk up Telegraph Hill through the snow both ways comin' and goin' and we liked it. I'm pretty sure I could paste in a letter to the editor that appeared in the paper of my youth, the Tampa Tribune in the 1980s, with surprisingly little editing necessary.

chowderhead 6y ago
The reinforcement is concerning. Well, I guess that's how we wind up at censorship and de-platforming issues. Do you provide space in your cafe to accommodate all the neighborhood nutjobs to congregate, and they all start shouting in unison about gangstalking or Bill Gates stealing our blood. How far do you let them go? They rile themselves up and you get a guy barging into a pizza shop wielding an assault rifle to take down a non-existent pedophile ring. There are social and geographic boundaries out in the world, so that doesn't happen naturally. But on the internet... sigh. It's a problem without an obvious solution.
- api 6y ago
  I think one argument that can be made on the pro-deplatforming side is that it's necessary to protect the mentally ill and vulnerable. I've never seen anything like the Qanon phenomenon, and that's just the beginning. We're going to see Borg-scale folie a deux.