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Has it occurred to you that social media tilts left because lefty people are more likely to use the internet? Internet and social media use use track closely w
by hackyhacky 5y ago
Has it occurred to you that social media tilts left because lefty people are more likely to use the internet?
Internet and social media use use track closely with education level, which correlate to position on the political spectrum.
If that's true, then an attempt to make social media more "neutral" would in fact be giving rightists an unfair advantage.
- zaptrem 5y agoWhile this might have been true a decade or two ago, nearly everybody uses the internet now. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/04/02/7-of-americans-dont-use-the-internet-who-are-they/ https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/04/02/7-of-americ... (this is a year out of date -- 93%)
- hackyhacky 4y agoMaybe, but not everyone uses the internet equally. Educated people, professors, lawyers, doctors, programmers, and others with desk jobs are more likely to participate heavily in social media than the uneducated and, working class, and menial laborers. Just because most people have a Facebook account doesn't mean that representation is equal, and there is no reason to expect that a preponderance of lefty posts necessarily implies systemic bias.
- stale2002 5y agoThere are lots and lots of lefty places on the internet. I am sure that people on the left will do just fine, if there happens to be 1 major neutral platform that doesn't do as strict moderation.
- hackyhacky 4y agoYou've not understood my post at all. I am not arguing against more strict moderation. I am saying that the apparent leftist tilt of, for example, Twitter, is not in fact a consequence of biased moderation, but rather a consequence of a bias in the underlying population: internet users tend to be more left.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]