You complain about some sites being alt-right cesspools, as if being a cesspool is not bad on its own.
The reason you don't see a lot of "alt-left cesspool"s is because usually those people don't need to hide on alternative social media, as the mainstream ones are fine with alt-left people. Alt-right are the ones who are currently being fired if their opinion are being shared publicly.
Now I'm neither of those, and have no fists in the fight at all, but I also realize what the current climate is like, even though I'm hoping no one wins and eventually we can all be friends again.
There's no huge threat of people being fired for wanting less regulation on companies.
Since you are of a very black & white impression of a large swaths of people, I'm assuming you're in the same boat as me.
My point is not that alt-right opinions are wholesome, but rather that since they don't have a lot of places they can write their opinions without getting overrun by opposition, it's only natural they'll retract into properties where they can freely talk.
For example: If you're of the opinion that you don't think homosexuality should be legal, there is not a lot of places you could have a factual conversation about that with others, without it ending up in name-calling or huge troll wars.
Now I don't agree with that opinion at all (I'm bixsexual myself), but I do agree with the right for those people to hold that opinion and being able to talk with others about this opinion, without it ending up in huge fights and drama.
Guess I'm just so far in the "We can educate everyone" camp that the alternatives all seem so fucked up. Hiding people away in separate social medias just make things worse, and all this because people can't ignore others, they _have_ to say something.
Just as a quick reminder before people continue the discussion, from the guidelines:
> Be kind. Don't be snarky. Have curious conversation; don't cross-examine. Please don't fulminate. Please don't sneer, including at the rest of the community.
> Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive.
It's so much an opinion that a good chunk of the world makes it illegal one way or another : https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_by_country_or_terr...
Russia even created new 'anti gay propaganda' laws recently, after allowing gay relations in 1993, so it's not even a 'it takes time to reach this stage' cultural milestone.
But even though I think we can both agree that LGBT rights are a good thing, you have to remember that all the advances that we saw on this front is precisely because LGBT people crossed 'the line' of acceptability of their time.
And they had to fight people that had the exact same kind of reaction against free speech. "Saying homosexuality should be legal isn’t an opinion, it’s heresy."
At the end of the day there are some viewpoints that "we" - general society - just deem to be wrong.
This shift has ever expanded the militarized zone of topics one can't even discuss and all for what purpose? It seems like the enclaves of bad and dangerous ideas now insulated from the very influence of better information. It this not just the worst of both worlds?
Exemplifying my point.
Opinions cannot be "invalid", just like a persons taste cannot be invalid.
You don't have to debate, just don't engage and problem solved. Others are interested in discussions even around subjects they don't agree on, let us continue being able to use the internet for those discussions.
You seem to be thinking that tolerating bigotry is acceptable because the bigot who wants to infringe on other human beings basic rights is a valid opinion. It is not. Please read on the paradox of tolerance, because tolerating intolerance breeds intolerance and allows intolerance to take over from the tolerant.
Bigots do not deserve fair debate. Any opinion that is based off of infringing on others rights based off sex, gender, or skin color is invalid.
"noun: opinion; a view or judgement formed about something, not necessarily based on fact or knowledge."
Even if I disagree with the statement "The earth is flat", I cannot lie and say it's not an opinion, no matter how much I disagree with it. By invalidating peoples opinion by flat out saying "Your opinion is invalid", you miss any chance of having an honest conversation with them, maybe with a small chance of helping them understand a perspective they haven't considered before.
> Bigots do not deserve fair debate. Any opinion that is based off of infringing on others rights based off sex, gender, or skin color is invalid.
Let's say our conversation here was 40 years ago. Then with your mindset, "homosexuality should be illegal" would be what you would argue for, since that was the normally accepted opinion at the time. If I was to try to raise that conversation with you, you would have responded with "that's not a valid opinion, because I disagree so much with you". I'm saying, no matter how outlandish someones opinion sounds on the surface, it's always worth talking about, as otherwise we will never have any change in a good direction.
I can quote several other examples and many anecdotal ones too but I think this example is good enough.
When one has the "opinion" that a group of people should be locked up for simply being who they are, then yes you should expect some backlash for that.
Also there are huge sections of the population (some even on this very forum) that believe calls for deregulation, less government spending, reduction in social programs, etc are "violence"
Also people seem to bend over backwards to excuse the real and actual violence that occurs and is supported in authoritarian left circles, pushing the narrative as you have that violence only occurs on the right
To withdraw to identifying people with their world-views is to give up on having a meaningful relationship. We do it because we can't tolerate them. The conclusion of that train of reactions is violence.
I've been taking a stand in my own life with friends about having hard conversations and not just drinking the coolaid of every inflammatory headline.
Its been very difficult to discussing with some friends that their views are far more radical than they realize.
Some time these conversations can be agonizing because ultimately you may not care "what side is correct" just that there is an honest discussion about the facts of the matter and even going into the facts of the matter can cause repulsive reactions.
Its strange the world we live in, in terms of discussions of ideas.
That aphorism has never really been true. If it's "fire" in the sense of projectile weapons, then of course you can. If it's "fire" in the sense of "forest fire," a controlled or prescribed burn is an oft-used technique to cut off a forest fire by creating an unburnable zone around it... The fire can't find fuel in an already-burned area, so it can no longer feed itself and dies out.
“The so-called paradox of freedom is the argument that freedom in the sense of absence of any constraining control must lead to very great restraint, since it makes the bully free to enslave the meek. The idea is, in a slightly different form, and with very different tendency, clearly expressed in Plato.
Less well known is the paradox of tolerance: Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them. — In this formulation, I do not imply, for instance, that we should always suppress the utterance of intolerant philosophies; as long as we can counter them by rational argument and keep them in check by public opinion, suppression would certainly be unwise. But we should claim the right to suppress them if necessary even by force; for it may easily turn out that they are not prepared to meet us on the level of rational argument, but begin by denouncing all argument; they may forbid their followers to listen to rational argument, because it is deceptive, and teach them to answer arguments by the use of their fists or pistols. We should therefore claim, in the name of tolerance, the right not to tolerate the intolerant. We should claim that any movement preaching intolerance places itself outside the law, and we should consider incitement to intolerance and persecution as criminal, in the same way as we should consider incitement to murder, or to kidnapping, or to the revival of the slave trade, as criminal.”
― Karl Raimund Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies
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But anyway, IMHO it's not for websites to police free speech, that's what the judiciary is for.
I'm not sure whether I consider the new EU terrorist content regulation to be good or bad, it's going to depend on what "competent authority" giving the removal orders means.
The "specific measures to protect [...] against dissemination to the public of terrorist content" just seem like usual moderation tools, but again, it's left to be seen what is going to happen in practice.
Most dramas on Twitter or Reddit involve some one- or two-digit number of people that get enormous publicity.