Comment by fullstackchris | Hacker News Reader

Comment by fullstackchris | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

I disagree harshly with the idea that social media _isn't_ an echo chamber. I mean, look at Reddit over the past few years. They've slowly (and successfully) removed nearly every conservative leaning subreddit on the site. It's clearly a hive mide ultra-lib circle jerk and anyone who doesn't see that has been drinking the blue reddit koolaide too long.

The only thing left really is r/conservative which is at best made fun of on the rest of the site - and even they have been debating going private.

Another annoying example: its frequently "fine" for liberals to say stuff like "I hope those who didn't get vaccinated die", which I've seen extremely frequently in things like r/politics and others, but when its the reverse (r/nonewnormal) it causes an entire ban of subreddit?

Not that I condone either side of these ignorant comments, but if you're going to take stuff down, at least be fair to both sides about it.

But hell, even centrists critiques like these are made fun of nowadays - gotta be a part of that extreme echo chamber to be cool, right?! So who am I kidding...

You don't get to embrace bigotry and hatred, and then turn around and complain when you get kicked out. If the conservative subreddits could have managed to behave themselves like rational and good people, they would not be getting kicked out.

Were they more bigoted and hateful than, let's say, r/FemaleDatingStrategy, r/BlackPeopleTwitter or r/FragileWhiteRedditor?

Yes.

Is it not bigoted and hateful to say that someone should die because they didn’t get the vaccine?

Asking as a liberal

That's certainly an unhealthy, unhelpful and hateful attitude. I'm not sure if "bigoted" is the right word here, but that comes down to etymology.

On the other hand when there's a disease that's killed millions worldwide and someone decides to allow themselves to become a vector and let the disease spread rather than get vaxed, I'm not going to shed too many tears if they happen to die from it.

Hoping or praying for somebody's death is ugly, but some schadenfreude may be appropriate.

Answer as a liberal: yes, it is bigoted and hateful.

You'll see people from both sides doing all sorts of pirouettes to justify why when the others do it it's bad, but when they do something similar it's justified, or they'll point out to other stuff to deflect the criticism. In any sufficiently large group of people you'll always find people who are not good at admitting mistakes or doing any self reflection, that goes for conservatives, liberals, socialists, fascists... You can argue it's to different extents, but all have plenty of it.

My experience with social media is that it tends to amplify the stuff that's most reactionary, causing it to spread until the fastest growing one takes over, kind of like a mould on stale bread. The analogy kind of works for new websites too, as it seems new social media is often more enjoyable and it takes some time for toxicity to start seeping in.

Not taking a vaccine and endangering yourself and others as a result is a personal choice, so I would not call it "bigoted" to be angry at someone for making that choice.

"Hateful", maybe. But again, it is personal choice that person made that endangers others. It is also not an active stance - no "liberal" is going out to actively make unvaccinated people die. They are just sitting there hoping for their choices to have extreme consequences.

And the complaints from conservatives about this are definitely not in good faith. They are just an attempt at a gotcha and turning tables. They themselves do the same kind of thing every time, and do not see a problem with it when it is their own side doing it.

Bigoted literally means close-minded.

I have encountered many close-minded liberal opinions.

Think about this: we have seen ideas on the right that go too far (e.g., storming the capitol, white nationalism, racism or other forms of hateful discrimination). But there are ideas on the left that go too far also.

Who is keeping check on the other end? Can liberal or left-leaning ideas go to far? When they do, are they being criticized publicly or excuses/ignored? If that’s not happening then bigotry will become rampant.

There are no widely accepted ideas on the left that go anywhere near as "too far" as there are on the right. There simply is no comparison there.

There certainly could be such ideas. But right now, as things stand? No, there aren't anything like the absolute madness the right is displaying. Nowhere near.

Your answer reveals a lot.

Perhaps the reason you think that is because of the previously discussed biases that have became normal.

I’ll give two examples:

1. The Black Lives Matter movement. Riots and cities being burned because of a few cases of police brutality were covered in a very sympathetic rather than objective way. In one case the words “mostly peaceful protest” was used to describe one where several things were on fire.

2. Transgender issues. Most ideas about it are never questioned. Parents are allowing their small children to decide what gender they want to be. People are having surgeries and hormone treatments with seemingly no other alternatives ever being explored. Biological men are competing in women’s sports and destroying old records. People are switching bathrooms and everyone must just put up with it. No one is questioning wether we are actually taking the healthiest long-term approach. Why? Because they are afraid to question it.

1. The Black Lives Matter protests were, in fact, mostly peaceful. I didn't attend any of the protests but there were several in my city. No broken windows, no fires, no riots. "Peaceful" objectively describes the majority of the protests. Much like most police officers are well meaning individuals who became police because they want to help people, most of the protesters were law abiding folks who want to make America a better place.

2. You have to have some pretty narrow blinders on to think that no one is questioning transgender issues.

You are making some extreme misrepresentations in this comment, like "People are having surgeries and hormone treatments with seemingly no other alternatives ever being explored."

This is very, very, very far from what reality is. This is what you have been told by people pushing far-right ideology. It is not reality.

I know I could simply upvote this but I'm replying to this anyway to say that you're 100% right here. hoo boy that comment got to me and I'm honestly upset that it didn't get downvoted.

Woke ideology is certainly widely criticized in public.

It is, but it's also a false equivalency to say that kind of language has reached the mainstream of the American left.

Whereas the mainstream of the American right saw Trumpism (anti-democracy, anti-immigrant, etc.) wholly adopted.

This is such a bullshit argument but I am sure you already know that.

You could also say that reddit represents a far wider spectrum of views than normal discourse, just because of stuff like r/childfree or r/witchesagainstpatriarchy. It's all liberal-compatible, but it's still more diverse than normal media, where you have centrists, and the occasional off-center guest, but all exist within an essentially narrow section of possible opinions.

> They've slowly (and successfully) removed nearly every conservative leaning subreddit on the site.

If the content that came from The_Donald is now what half the US considers to be "conservative leaning", we're in big trouble. White nationalism, anti-vax, pro-authoritarian, pro-civil war content. This isn't a debate about tax policy anymore, it's gotten more visceral.

It's gone to a new level where some people just want to appear as not being in the echo chamber, so they label themselves uniquely, but when you listen to them, they are just part of the larger groupthink.

For example I have started seeing many people online calling themselves "libertarians," but they are still in favor of big government ideas such as UBI and universal healthcare. Or "libertarians" who want a white ethnostate enforced by the police

Reply on news.ycombinator.com