trafguy

joined 2 years ago
[–] trafguy@midwest.social 15 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (2 children)

If we end up triggering a self-sustaining feedback loop, that's how I understand it, yeah. We still do have some very high risk strategies we could implement, like solar shielding to reduce total light reaching the earth, or bioengineering plants that suck up carbon super efficiently, but it's hard to say what the impacts of those would be

[–] trafguy@midwest.social 11 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Reminds me of this discussion of how a scene/subculture grows and evetnaully dies: https://meaningness.com/geeks-mops-sociopaths

Feels like federated social networks are creating a new fresh scene, and there's now an influx of new users (including myself)

[–] trafguy@midwest.social 3 points 2 years ago

Sounds good to me, as long as there's a way for instances/users to disable those filters. Since they're more in-depth/granular, I suspect engagement with them would be lower, so there's a higher risk of a smaller minority using it to dictate the conversation. But I'd definitely be interested in seeing that in action. It could be really helpful for giving people tools to shape their feed.

[–] trafguy@midwest.social 3 points 2 years ago (1 children)

I generally agree with you. I don't know that it matters so much whether articles are posted, it matters more that people continue to speak against the ideology and don't allow fascists to take the stage. Seeing others' support a cause lends it credence. Seeing that a cause exists lends some, but not as much as active support would. Seeing people voice disapproval helps to take away that credibility.

That said, the principle generally makes sense that spreading an ideology's message helps that ideology spread. The impact of posting an article on Lemmy is likely to be small, but non-zero. It's a matter of providing access to a fresh audience. Fox's viewers are thoroughly saturated with hateful rhetoric already, so there aren't many left to radicalize who can be reached by that message. Exposing a fresh audience to the content expands its reach and potentially radicalizes new people. Plus, exposure to new hateful messages can deepen the entrenchment of those who are already caught in the web.

[–] trafguy@midwest.social 7 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago) (5 children)

It isn't exactly a matter of wanting or not wanting to see it. You know the addage "any news is good news?" By posting content that keeps a person and their commentary in the forefront of people's minds, that person gains an audience. That audience will contain people who can be swayed by the snake oil, but who would otherwise be reasonable. Or in short, posting their content facilitates radicalization.

That said, while content from harmful influential people needs to be approached with caution, I don't see this as promoting Trump's action/behaviors. To me it reads more like a "not the onion" headline. I'd be disappointed if anyone felt that the death penalty was warranted for late tax filing, but I suppose it's possible.

Does Lemmy have a way to filter keywords? It would be helpful for people to be able to blacklist keywords so a user could choose to avoid seeing, for example, news about Trump or content with sensitive topics.

[–] trafguy@midwest.social 5 points 2 years ago

Yeah, I agree with kobra. It's a mix. The Alt Right Playbook video series gives some interesting thoughts on the matter. Conservatives and further right tend to be hyper hierarchical and tend to demand respect for the chain of authority, even to their own detriment (as long as it hurts someone else more). Rejecting an authority figure is a bigger deal on the right than the left due to the whole "control how people think" angle.

So it hasn't gone far enough to alienate the ones that are still on board. Some refuse to hear the negative and just bury their head in the sand. Some are convinced by emotionally charged rhetoric that "the other side is even worse." And some already agreed with them secretly. For most, it's probably a mix of these various techniques for contorting to fit the shape demanded of them by their authority figures--some being more bigoted than others after all. For the pro-hierarchical people, their place in the hierarchy is a piece of their self-identity and it's really hard to fight that instinct.

[–] trafguy@midwest.social 1 points 2 years ago

The best job I could ever hope for would let me find arbitrary projects to work on, at whatever pace I'm comfortable with. Doing the same type of work day after day will get boring/tiring for me no matter what it is, no matter how complex or simple, how isolated or social.

I've basically started picking up random productive hobbies around my day job that take over my life until I finish them or the grind of life obligations makes me put it down to be forgotten.

I'm curious where we'll be if we can move towards a future with a living wage UBI and people can choose to be productive in whatever way suits them. How would people fill their time?

[–] trafguy@midwest.social 1 points 2 years ago* (last edited 2 years ago)

Hello! Another Northern Illinois member here in the 25-35 age bracket. I have some potentially useful knowledge in web development, programming, a good intuition for structural engineering (mostly through woodworking and some 3D printing), and am currently working on some electronics projects.

Technically I'm now a refugee from vlemmy . net (the server suddenly disappeared a few days ago, their donation accounts are suspended/deleted), but before that I was on Reddit where I explored a lot of smaller niche information sharing type communities. I was a mod of a few relatively small communities there under a different name, but have pretty much abandoned the platform since they attacked their power users/mods and started charging exorbitant rates for their API.

Generally, the way I engage:

  • I try to follow the paradox of tolerance. I try to be tolerant of others doing/saying anything which does not reduce overall tolerance of society, and when pushing back against intolerant ideology, I aim to politely discuss ideas from a place of logic and reason.
  • I tend to engage in discussion of ideas and am happy to discuss hypotheticals that I find interesting. I like to solve problems, and have been known to come up with some atypical (and I'd argue interesting), if often unworkable, solutions/approaches.

I don't have time to devote to moderation/administration, but I'm happy to offer whatever advice I can within my knowledge areas to whoever may ask, such that it is.

view more: ‹ prev next ›