so if you haven't come across it, see here , here , here and here .
in short, one side says sources are pro-imperialist, the other side believes they're legitimate sources. then there is one user thinking we have been targeted by troll farms, one accusing others of being conspiracy theorists and stuff like that. it's one of the most unproductive arguements I've seen on Lemmy, something that looks like one those downvoted-to-oblivian threads on reddit. it's just a mess.
I think we can do a few things to prevent such pointless fights in the future:
- my favoriate response would be creating a community of fact-checker Lemmurs. it'll function similar to a wikipedia talk page, anyone can request a trial for an article shared on c/worldnews , then they will present evidence and sources to challenge the article, while the other side attempts to do the same. personal attacks, accusing of being a troll, asking for a call on jitsi to debate face to face (like seriously?!?!) will be forbidden. both sides will debate untill they reach an agreement. trying to go off-topic, bad faith arguements etc will be forbidden as well.
each time we reach a conclusion, a positive or negative point will be assigned to news source and to the person who posted it. best contributers who show the least bias will get a point as well. overtime it will help us to see if a source is really good or not.
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a much easier approch would be to let downvotes and upvotes decide the fate of each post. I understand that this is the whole point of lemmy and similar platforms, but right now we have the problem of each side using downvotes and upvotes like it's a battle. posts about internet censoreship and tiny pigs are being downvoted because the person who posts them trusts the Guardian and other news outlets.
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we can limit the number of posts on c/worldnews to minimize the amount of personal attacks and arguements.
so what do you think? I personally think as more users come to lemmy, we'll be dealling with more diverse opinions, and people might just engage in behaviors that harms the platform and benefits no one. this will be a real problem considering that Lemmy leans far-left. in my opinion having a fact-checking community will be neccessary if we don't want fact-based communities turn into battlefields.
ps: am I going too far and overreacting? to be honest I don't know xD I just think there's no chance for productive political arguements if we can't agree on the facts, and i see no point in what's happening on c/worldnews right now.
First of all, thanks for making this thread, I think it is important to discuss these issues in the open, rather than developing grudges.
I think what you are mainly talking about are the comments by @[email protected] and @[email protected] which are relatively aggressive. We could probably consider them violations against rule 2 ("Be respectful. Everyone should feel welcome here"), which we havent enforced that much so far. So enforcing that rule more strictly could already be a step in the right direction, though I am unsure where to draw the line (suggestions welcome).
That said, I think it is important to allow everyone to voice their opinion, especially if they disagree. If everyone agrees from the start, that doesnt make for an interesting discussion. This is also why I dislike the idea of fact checkers, because it likely means that one side gets excluded from the discussion, and Lemmy turns into an echo-chamber.
On the technical side, we are working on a feature that will let users block communities (so you dont see their posts anymore). That should be useful for people who simply dont care about politics (or other topics).
I will admit I acted in a pervert manner, and with a tinge of assholery. No defense for that. However I planned to possibly generate this discussion as a chain reaction resultant.
If I had not acted aggressively, confronting the absolutely bizarre mass posting of particular kind of news articles like this, it would have continued, a behaviour which started to ramp up in the last few days.
I have been one of the people that do not want to see Lemmy as that same bigoted toxic narrow echo chamber as Reddit or other social media, and I had to act like a pervert for it for the greater good.
The last thing I will accept, as an old adopter of Lemmy, is it getting trashed by handful users with a bias of their own, even if it requires engagement, a bit of confrontation and reforms.
Moreover, the narrative bring thrown around of discouraging critical thinking, and promoting some fact checker groups, is anti intellectual and encourages degrading quality of posters and conversations.
I have a ton of experience with forums and hence can explain this stuff. Anyone may discuss this with me, now that the dust has settled (hopefully). I will be relatively calm here.
โ Self-awareness
โ Being prosocial (although I wonder if people would see the "I had to do it" as prosocial, but still)
Thanks for those two things.
I'm sure you'll be able to discuss your genuinely interesting views in an effective way (apart from continuing posting interesting stuff!)
Do not worry, I came here not for a sprint but a marathon ;)