Maybe cite some sources. I shouldn't have to do my own research to substantiate YOUR claim lol.

Of course, no one needs literature or evidence of any sort; people just say anything these days and knowingly or unknowingly contributes to the misinformation that plagues the country. The whole issue is that people don't feel the need to intellectually defend themselves; so much so that people are now incapable of it. It's tragic that asking people to provide some sort of evidence to substantiate their claim is always met with "i don't need to."

I'm not too sure it's as difficult as you are making it out to be. We see something similar with "black wall street" where black communities were committed to keeping their capital within their communities and black owned companies. We can even see this with the Amish and how they have survived as a community. I'm not completely sure if you can keep 100% of the capital within certain communities; but in a similar sense, we can at least attempt to be more meaningful with how and where we spend our money. The tech community chooses which company they support and do "business" with, similarly with fashion and many other things that aren't completely necessary. I feel like that would at least be a start. Rome wasn't built in a day, and neither will correcting the public's spending habits. But it has been done and can be done again. There just needs to be the right incentive; to which, I'm not sure what that would be.

If you might allow me to disagree with you slightly...

The key to this, as in many things, is balance; in ALL things. Voting with your wallet does work, its a form of influencing and controlling the direction of the capital. It just doesn't work in a long term sense because people stop there; like boycotting. It is hard to boycott a company that has a monopoly on a market that has become a necessity, even if it's only a necessity to a niche community.

The key is, that you spend on smaller businesses, that are closer to the consumer than at large conglomerates. If there is none for the market, create one and encourage people to support your business that doesn't have any political ties yet. For example, I live in a capitol city, and my neighbor a few houses down has started a small chicken coop in their back yard; i began buying my eggs from them as its much cheaper and I don't have to worry about my funds being reallocated in support of something that would harm me or my community as they are a part of my community. Also, I deliver pizza as a third job for a small, mom and pops place and encourage those political minded people to spend money there as the pizza is made with fresh ingredients and made there. Takes a bit longer but we are too small to allocate funds to political matters and organizations; we do small events for the schools in the community but that is about it.

Once said businesses start to grow too big, rinse and repeat. Find another small business and support them. As support dwindles from a company that is growing too large, their options become more and more limited.

This seems not to work due to peoples mindset and preferring convenience over meaningful spending; which is something that I know not how to combat. What say you, friends?

Even if that is the case, though you've provided no literature or evidence to substantiate such a grandiose claim, there are so many people who blindly support trump and would defend him against all logic and evidence. The fact that you see in many online spaces such massive support for a man like this is very concerning for democracy; just as it was when Hitler gained more and more support in his rise and seizure of power.

I think they are linked. Democracy can only work and thrive with an educated and/or informed population who is willing and able to have public and civil discourse. The fact that the political climate is the way it is now, so divided and only engaging to act on petty revenges, allows for fascism to take root. We saw this in Germany prior to the second World War. When NSDAP began beating people up in the street who opposed their ideology, with little repercussions for such behavior, led to the beer hall putsch, and eventually the rise of Herr Hitler. I can see parallels with the modern day political climate of America. The issue is that we voted them into the white house; I think that might even be more jarring than them being in there itself. Democratically voting a fascist in power is a tell tale sign that our democracy is not working.

Bro is already executing, he is beyond staging. Goes to show that knowledge isn't power in capitalism; you can be as removed as they come and still fry shit on a national level; as long as you have the capital funds for it.

The local versions I've tested out today are absolutely garbage. It frustrated me over simple questions.

I somewhat disagree. They don't want to forget, they want to finish the job. They have immense pride in something they should feel shame for. That, I think, is the issue. The unwillingness to feel shame, so they replace that feeling with over-zealous pride.

I can agree with that; but I also think that the average person has not the attention span for long form "macro-blogging" to use it as much as something like twitter or bluesky or microblogging platforms. I think this is why things like vine, tiktok, and twitter are so popular; its because they are all short form content. Things like tumblr, which I'm sure has declined for other reasons, but I'm also sure it is because no one wants to read a whole blog of someone they don't know, but they might read a few words or sentences and if they agree or find it funny or like it for whatever reason, they would be inclined to follow and keep up with that person and may be more inclined to read or give a chance to their content that is of longer form.

Fair enough, I just figured that as a social network, part of the goal is to connect new people together. You can look at Facebook in the same way you described it. That’s what its original purpose was. To just connect with people you already know, but I feel like social networking in general has since evolved from this. We can look at things like Facebook groups for example where it is more on the lines of what I’m thinking, people join groups that interest them and interact with like minded people that they have likely never met before.

I find the idea of using hashtags as the same.

I’m starting to realize that too. I might be more active on one than the other but it’s nice to have them all because it seems like a fuller experience; I am starting to see how they are complimentary.

I think either mastodon or pixelfed. I’m sure we are due to get a specific crowd — just from the political climate at the moment.

Very valid! This guy is like 38 though so I think he has gotten to the age where he has streamed for so long that it’s second nature but using a new social media that isn’t familiar enough seems like a hassle I guess? I feel those closer to my age, people in their 20’s, are either a bit intimidated by it or feel that there is a lack of people and content because it’s hard to find relevant “tweets” (or whatever the equivalent is called). That was my biggest thing when I first tried it a few years ago. I had this “so… what now..?” Feeling. It felt like the social was missing from it. I’m a little bit better at finding things to engage with; such as now, but I can somewhat remember the feeling I had that originally deterred me till now.

Nice to know! I think lemmy has been meeting my needs pretty well, as there are no limits that I’m aware of here. What would be compelling for something like write.as and writefreely?

Thanks for the tip -- new to fediverse altogether and my most annoying challenge is the social aspect of finding people to connect with and making an interesting feed! Lemmy has been the easiest; right above friendica!

Not sure; I guess as a new person, I'd like to find micro blogs about topics and things that I might agree with? I was never really into twitter or micro-blogging; I don't really understand the appeal but I figure since it is a social media, you might want to find similar people with like-minded blogs or whatever? Like I found a new up-coming political streamer that I like from another. Maybe that isn't what micro-blogging is for and I'm off base.

Not Acer. I’ve been burnt by them too much in the past.

That and finding relevant things or anything at all sometimes; also I hear that people want to see everything like a friendica environment but don't like the differences from the social medias they know already. I'm not sure if it is all valid or relevant because I am extremely new to the fediverse in general myself.

I think it is because Bluesky is simpler and easier to understand, as well as more familiar to use than mastodon. My favorite streamer said he is reluctant to move to the fediverse because of how different it is and the learning curve it has to it. I'm also, like, EXTREMELY new here and understand but once you start to get used to it, its easy to see how the fediverse and this "New Social" wave is far superior; the only hard part is getting "normies" to try it long enough to build enough familiarity to see that.

Same here. I still try to use it once every day in support but I don't like having such a low limit (or any limit at all, really) on how many characters I'm allowed to use for my posts or response. I am more of a macro-blogger as I tend to be very verbose; especially posting online. I do, however, think it is important to create accounts, use and donate to the project that is mastodon; as they are leading by example in this "New Social" era or movement we are all apart of. It would be a shame that something like this isn't able to continue, let alone expand, because not enough people supported the project -- even though such project is giving the people exactly what they wanted and asked for. Let's all try to show our support behind such a bold and selfless decision.