visit any Linux community here for diverse opinions :) fuck Arch BTW ;)

Yes, this is an echo chamber. Yes, most things are very samey. You don’t see alternative opinions because this is a TINY community. Like crazy tiny. Lemmy has what, 60,000 active users? You know a ton of those are bots too. Even after a reddit exodus that site gets what, 2 million daily users*? So you’ve got a crazy small group but it’s also very similar in type of person who is here. It’s overwhelmingly educated middle aged men with a tech background or focus. So you’ve got a limited pool of opinions to draw on, and then EVEN if you do occasionally get a different opinion, even within that narrow band of experience it can get voted down or swarmed.

Look, I only lurk here occasionally, and I see stuff I disagree with constantly. I see stuff in this thread I disagree with. But I don’t post about it because it’s not worth it. I also don’t have time to argue a minority opinion on the internet, and my life is better since I stopped doing that. And I guarantee I’m not alone. But I ASSURE you this is a bubble.

…but if it makes you feel better though, most people live in bubbles. I have been lucky to grow up in a very different place than I live, and I’ve found that politically, most Americans absolutely talk past one another because they are incapable of understanding “the other side” because they’ve never truly talked to people on the other side or listened to them, much less lived with them and understood them. This isn’t enlightened centrist BS, I have a side I agree with, but I also don’t misrepresent the views of people I disagree with based on no actual knowledge. And with non politics it’s very similar - small groups beget small opinion spaces based on a small pool of experiences. Whether that’s cars or AI or Linux.

We used to get exposed to people with different life experiences and opinions in so-called “third places”, and we don’t have them anymore. Way fewer people go to chuch and the middle of the road protestant mainline has been subsumed. Social clubs like the elks and masons are far less popular. 12% of the population doesn’t serve in the military with a socioeconomic cross-cut. Kids don’t even have malls, sports start specializations early, and the Internet, almost worst of all, has made it easier than ever to get a social fix consuming only content from those most like you or what is algorithmically fed to you.

Anyway, things are bad, I do not have a solution, but I have a little bit of time and feel compelled to post when you are practically begging for unpopular opinions. So my unpopular opinion is holy shit is this place an echo chamber, and if you don’t feel that deep in your bones you need to immediately drive 2 hours outside of whatever city you live in and go to a pancake breakfast hosted by some local scout troop, go to some small town festival and talk to people, or hell go visit a church of a religion you don’t belong to. And don’t talk to people your own age, or same familial structure. Talk to someone who thinks voting is dumb. Talk to someone who doesn’t care which Linux distro you’re on because they don’t even HAVE a computer, they just have an iPad.

…and yes, realistically you’re probably not gonna make a connection that way without moving somewhere, and I’m obviously being mostly flippant, but at least don’t turn on conservative tiktok or watch Fox News and expect that to be “the other side”. Experiencing a different bubble is “growth” I guess, but people aren’t the bubbles they live in, and actually talking to them is a way better way to understand WHY we disagree, not just how. Again, like I said, I don’t have real solutions on how to do that. I just have the answer to your question and yes this place is a bubble.

*Note I’m pulling those numbers out of my ass, but I bet I’m close on orders of magnitude. And yes I know reddit is half bots too.

Since I left Reddit, ive seen tons of diverse opinions. I’ve seen debate. I can’t understand why this wouldn’t be the case unless you’re looking to see thoughts right of center, in which case, I’m perfectly happy to never see that type of thought. It’s pervasive everywhere else.

The opposing views amount to we should keep the orphan grinding machine for the sake of the orphans we grinded down before hand.

Simple and short, anything that doesn’t emancipate people to truly live freely without the oppressive boot of a select few is not an opinion worth arguing much less validating with said arguments. MAGAts are modern day Nazis. Neo-liberals coddle up with them to prevent progress against capitalism. Progressives have the right idea but typically aren’t as loud or angry about it as they ought to be. Fuck tankies.

Nope, not concerned.

Well, conservative opinion is worthless…so, no.

Opinions are like assholes, as they say. I don’t care for diversity of opinions. I care more about diversity of experiences, viewpoints, personhoods, modalities of existence. People just saying what they think about something doesn’t mean anything to me, coming from strangers. There is so much to celebrate in diversity, but opinions aren’t on that list for me.

Yep.

Cool niche content gets sparser and sparser as attention of more popular opinions snowball, and the “hero” posters holding single communities afloat burn out.

Mark my words, Lemmy (and Piefed) will meet Voat’s fate (amongst other Reddit clones) unless something changes. It’s happened over and over again, and creative filtering like Piefed is doing or “open” Federation as is Lemmy’s focus isn’t going to fix it. Neither will posters. They need more fundamental structural attention/UI changes, in the code.

It’s not very diverse at the surface level, but go deeper into the Fediverse and you’ll find some real crazy shit.

There is a certain orthodoxy that is generally accepted. If you go against it you’ll get downvoted into oblivion. On the other hand, there are certain viewpoints that I find appalling and I also downvote.

I also hold some opinions the consensus of Lemmy doesn’t like and I don’t let Lemmy discourage me from sharing them when I feel it is the truth, my understanding of the truth. I accept the downvotes. You gotta be willing to stand up to the mob if you’re going to change minds. And, accept that you won’t change minds. But, you have to be there telling people what you think.

I’ve disagreed with some things here but I haven’t felt the need to comment on it. Maybe that’s left over from the reddit “don’t argue with idiots” mentality I gained though.

Diversity of opinions isn’t automatically good for its own sake. I’m sure with a little imagination, you can come up with all sorts of objectively stupid opinions. Are those what you want to sift through? If you have a space where you allow all opinions no matter what, you’ll end up overwhelmed by the stupidest ones. If you moderate at all, you will always be accused of bias by someone. If you doubt any of this, just start hosting your own server!

tl;dr: different places have different vibes. That’s OK. Not everywhere has to contain all opinions.

I’m concerned in a general way that the federated design of Lemmy / Mastodon etc. is by its nature (arguably even by its intent) likely to lead users to construct isolated media bubbles. But I don’t know how to improve it. I’m not going to subscribe to a (hypothetical as far as I know) fascist community just to “broaden my mind,” that wouldn’t work.

It’s hard to know how much of the division we see and feel is meatspace division facilitated by social media, and how much of it is social media reflecting divisions in meatspace. There’s no reason to suppose the answer would be simple or easy.

Are you familiar with tolerance of intolerance?

Yeah so basically when you give right wing ideology any foothold, they eventually take over.

Just like with the rest of the world. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paradox_of_tolerance

I used to have the mindset that censorship of right ideologies wasn’t really ok because surely people would just see how selfish and cruel they were and not give them any time.

But I sure was wrong about that.

Now I take a stronger stance on the matter. Hate has no place in the world. Tolerating it only allows it to flourish.

Otherwise I don’t think other opinions should be censored. Just those promoting bigotry and hate.

And yes there are objective definitions of that. It’s actually pretty simple.

Do you hate someone for being part of a group or identity, OR because they are a shit person ?

First one is bigotry and hate. Second one is not.

I don’t hate Trump cause he’s a Republican. I hate Trump for all the shit he has done.

That said, Criticizing political groups (their politicians) does not fall into being bigoted because I judge based on actions and their intolerance/hate. Like trying to harm trans people. That’s a no no.

We have to be intolerant of intolerance.

If we aren’t, it just keeps making a comeback. Because scapegoating is an easy play by politicians. Always has been.