Just to clarify, I don’t think it’s a problem that hatred is minimal here, and I don’t just mean politics.
I feel like I very rarely see alternative opinions about anything, whether it be software, ai, news about companies, etc. it just seems like everyone universally agrees about anything with only a tiny handful of exceptions.
It makes me hesitant to believe I’m on the “correct side” and I never see any arguments from opposition. This makes me worried that I’m in some sort of echo chamber. In real life, I do see much more diverse opinions and, if I only used the fediverse for social media, would likely be weaker in defending my own since their arguments would be “new” to me.
I understand the reasons for which the fediverse has pretty collective opinion, but it does still worry me. I want to be able to see all the other people with their own thoughts (given it’s respectful) on the Internet, which should be the most capable tool to do so.
Damn. That was, apropos to your themes, an excellent read. I’ve seen several comments here reference the shifted Overton window and how it offers a diversity distinct from larger, more mainstream platforms. But you really did a great job writing about the value a discerning eye can glean.
I do have one gripe with your comment, however:
I will not stand for this food truck slander! Food trucks are to the world of food what Lemmy is to the landscape of social media. They present an alternative starting point from which to derive ideas contrary to established conventions. I implore you: don’t pass them off as the culinary equivalent of doomscroll slop. Instead, recognize that a discerning connoisseur can find flavors driven by passion, unbound from convention!
Okay, enough melodrama. Seriously though, I think your comment was the best-considered take on OP’s question.
Wow, thank you. When I wrote this, I was trying to explain something I have been thinking about and understanding innately for years but have never really put into words, and as a result it got long. But it has to do with how the act of consuming short-form content like social media (tweets and tik-tok videos, for example) has the effect of placing us in a semi-trance state, where the usual walls between ourselves and the outside world blur or even disappear, and our trust is the default even as we are certain it isn’t.
When we go in to consume that short-form stuff, because we think we actively chose it and believe our own chemistry has nothing to do with it, we’re walls down, thinking we’re in charge, but in fact our inner landscape has changed dramatically: mentally we’re in another world that we’ve created for ourselves. It’s made of the combination of what we brought and what we’re seeing, and how our imaginations combine that mix into something almost trustworthy at the moment of consumption when in reality it’s anything but that. Entirely Hitchcockian in a sense – “let the viewer create the fear” – but for the technological age where the mantra is “let the reader create the sense of trust” where trust could NOT be less deserved.
So later I was thinking about a TL;DR for all that, and honestly, if I could offer one, it would be that the more intentionally and forcefully we hold our own mental space, the freer and safer we are to read and skip whatever we want, because we are not feeling the same pressure to stay and get more. We can literally drop something mid-sentence and not feel a loss. The usual hooks of alternating dopamine and subtle fear just don’t hit the same when you really can just take it or leave it.
And because there’s no part of us feeling trapped and unable to let go, the need to hit back at something disagreeable also lessens. And that’s the part that lets the subtlety of diverse opinion in: it’s no longer a threat, because you’re not in the same kind of trance mode. You never stop maintaining that critical inner separation from its content. But that takes work and vigilance: I have to know what I’m up against to do it and actively continue working at keeping myself separate.
Yeah, not at a good TL;DR yet. Still needs work, clearly. Also, no denigration to food trucks! It’s not unusual to get better food from a truck than a sit-down restaurant, depending on where you’re located. And speaking of diversity, especially national, they can offer a lot more than the usual. To be clear I was thinking more the smaller, limited item ones – hot dogs and pretzels – they have at amusement parks than the real street trucks in NYC and LA, for example, and totally forgot about some of the amazing, unusual ones I’ve had the privilege of trying.
I genuinely hope no food trucks were harmed in the making of my comment, lol. But it’s a point well taken. Thank you for the correction!