Skip Navigation
197 comments

  • A bunch are usually people disagreeing and making up situations to make themselves rightโ€ฆ i.e., you posit that the sky appeared blue when you went outside today, the replies are: not if itโ€™s night, not during cloudy days, etc. and at least one that sounds like they disagree but are reiterating what you just said.

    • I've made this observation before, but the funniest thing about Lemmy is that !ShowerThoughts posts elicit more controversy than !UnpopularOpinion. Like, someone posts "I love pineapple on pizza" in !ShowerThoughts, and it's downvoted to hell with people writing long essays about how pineapple on pizza is justification for bringing back shock treatment. The same thing posted to !UnpopularOpinion brings out a mob of people saying how not unpopular an opinion that is, quoting statistics about how Hawaiian Pizza is the most popular pizza in America. It's absolutely hilarious, and one of the few areas where the Lemmy community is truly contrarian just for contrarian's sake.

      With the exception of populations of some instances which I won't hex by bearishly naming, and a few individually excessive dicks (or trolls, but I think most are really just assholes), the Lemmy community tends to argue in good faith, admit when they're wrong or have had their minds changed, and are generally polite netizens in most exchanges. But !ShowerThoughts and !UnpopularOpinion just being out the contrarian in people, for some reason.

  • Most of the time I know exactly what I'm getting if I see more than maybe 3+ comments. Usually it's me saying something anti-communist, something on brand enough for me.

  • Lmao yeah sometimes. Since I mostly shitpost I just assume that the posts have had the intended effect of either making people laugh or working them up a little about something they care about. Just enough to make them share some stuff they're really passionate about. I like hearing people's unfiltered opinions.

  • Usually its when I either offend the libs on world or the fake leftists on ml/hexbear. Sometimes if I'm particularly skilled I piss off both of them at the exact same time (usually by advocating for true liberation for the working class not under a so called "vanguard" but by and for the workers themselves)

    • Thing is, it's easy to offend people. It doesn't take skill, or effort. And it's not constructive; nobody in history has ever said, "you know, your comment about Communists all being removed really changed my mind. I'm going to read Atlas Shrugged and become a capitalist!"

      Usually when I say stuff that pisses people off, it's because (a) a joke fell flat, or was not obviously a joke; (b) I was reacting emotionally and said something I intended to be hurtful; (c) I express an unpopular opinion. As I get older, the reactions to (c) more often make me scrutinize my opinion, to make sure I'm not just stupidly parroting something my fascist dad taught me when I was a child.

      I used to play devil's advocate, but it doesn't feel good. It's one thing if both parties go into it in good faith, and it's clear neither is just trying to be a troll, but now? I don't do it without establishing good faith first, and if I suspect someone's just trolling... I just block them. Straight up. It's easy, and I have one fewer irritants in my life.

      So, that's me. Why do _you_do it? Are you intentionally trying to rile people up, and if so, why? Are you angry at them? Or do you say you're offending people just by expressing sincerely held opinions, and the snowflakes are getting triggered? Is everyone but you a hypocrite?

      I mean, I believe everyone is a hypocrite, but there's a spectrum, right? There's a level where you are trying not to be a hypocrite, but it's impossible to exist and not be at some level. Then there's blatantly lying, saying one thing and doing another. A spectrum, and a lot of it boils down to good faith, and sincerity. Are you angry at faux liberals who you feel should be violently agitating for seizing the means of production, and are calling them out in their bullshit? Or just trying to make them angry so you can hurt them, just a little?

      • I'm an Anarcho-Syndicalist, I offend ml and hexbear users sometimes just by pointing out that China is a fascist dictatorship. I offend world users by telling the truth some aren't ready to hear. These truths include the simple facts that you cannot reform capitalism out of existence, liberal democracy is democracy for the capitalists, a bloodless revolution is not possible, and compromise with fascism only brings fascism. Sometimes I offend people by being unapologetically Queer, sometimes by being unapologetically Anarchist, but I have learned that apologizing for my beliefs is utterly nonsensical.

    • There will always be a vanguard, whether it's formalized into an entity that can be structured democratically and transparently or whether it's left unformalized and therefore subject to cliques, natural power imbalances, and a lack of accountability. The reason for this is that humans vary quite widely in political education and skill, those with more experience with organizing and those with no experience already form a natural hierarchy, and without formalizing this structure you run into danger. That doesn't mean the Vanguard isn't of the working class, rather, it just means that the Working Class as a whole is the real driver, and the Vanguard is the pointer, spear body and spearhead.

      The essay The Tyranny of Structurelessness does a good job of explaining the necessity of formalizing structures in order to keep them truly accountable.

      I don't really know what you're trying to say by saying Lemmy.ml and Hexbear are "fake Leftists," are you just trying to say Marxists are fake Leftists?

  • Usually there's enough context and it's recent enough I sort of remember. I haven't had a lot of ancient replies here, but Reddit was great for that, and that's exactly what I would think. What the hell are they talking about? What was really surreal was rereading what I wrote and vaguely remembering it, but sometimes the wording being a bit different than what I might say now. Not necessarily the point, just how I said it, as people do change with age. I don't regret anything I've every said though, it's why I've left my Reddit account alone, that plus it would probably be undeleted anyway and I've moved on.

  • I usually know if something I say will get a bunch of replies, plus I normally use Lemmy most actively in the morning and at night so it happens regularly.

197 comments