I feel like things on Lemmy were pretty chill several months ago, and that’s started to change.

People used to talk each other like they would talk to a neighbor. Now I get the sense that people have become quick to be negative, attack, and not be constructive.

Am I crazy in feeling like the vibe has changed?

  • spaduf@slrpnk.net
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    10 months ago

    Worth noting, the number of people who come here “to escape authoritarian moderators”. Nearly all of them were moderated for good reason.

    I also don’t think the presence of places like hexbear are doing us any favors.

    • Snot Flickerman
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      10 months ago

      You can see them jumping from Lemmy server to Lemmy server as they get banned from each.

      Eventually, they’ll just set up their own instances so they can bother people with impunity.

          • Mom Nom Mom@nom.mom
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            10 months ago

            It became a thing in Lemmy 0.19 - as long as you’re on an instance that has updated to that, it should be available to you. At the bottom of the settings page in the web ui, but if you use an app they might not expose that to you yet.

          • seathru@lemm.ee
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            10 months ago

            You can on instances running .19 or newer. Settings -> Blocks -> then at the bottom is an option for blocking instances.

          • Traegert@lemm.ee
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            10 months ago

            Connect has been able to do that from the get go. As well as individual communities within instances.

              • kopper [they/them]
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                10 months ago

                the 0.19 implementation is so half-assed I genuinely think the Lemmy devs just don’t want that functionality but expected quite a lot of backlash if they outright said as much, so they decided to implement something that ticks the box in the “wanted features” list without having any effect

                afaik it only blocks communities and explicitly lets users from blocked instances through

                • nutomic@lemmy.ml
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                  10 months ago

                  Feel free to make open an issue to improve instance blocking. Or better yet a pull request. We are only a few devs with limited time, and hundreds of issues to work on.

              • seathru@lemm.ee
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                10 months ago

                It’s under Settings -> Blocks -> then down at the bottom is the block instances option.

              • Mom Nom Mom@nom.mom
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                10 months ago

                If the apps don’t have instance blocking yet, the webui does (in 0.19)… I haven’t tested it, but it’s there, at the bottom of my settings page 🙂

        • Snot Flickerman
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          10 months ago

          …and then they spin up a new instance with a new domain…

          Domains are unfortunately fairly cheap and it’s not impossible to get a different IP assigned to a server box.

          • psud@lemmy.world
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            10 months ago

            I don’t mind costing them the effort or $10 for a new domain

            Incidentally I have several domains with DNS provided by freedns.afraid.net, which allows sharing domains. Everyone who asks for a domain under any of mine just seems so very sketchy. Now I have to worry if they’re a nazi looking for a new domain to get banned

    • Ghostalmedia@lemmy.worldOP
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      10 months ago

      The thing that actually worried me a little bit more was people upvoting the aggressive comments to be top comments.

      I was reading some thread over at !politics@lemmy.world today, and a lot of stuff advocating for political violence were the top comments. Mods yanked it, but nevertheless, people were vibing with some comments about dragging people through the street. I felt like I was on X/Twitter.

      • spaduf@slrpnk.net
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        10 months ago

        Yeah, I think it’s a legitimate and growing problem. I think a lot of folks don’t realize, but since growth has slowed from Reddit more broadly, the people who feel they have been “unfairly silenced” are the fastest growing subpopulation around here. If I’m honest, I think the only real antidote is to reestablish growth from communities with kinder dispositions.

      • kromem@lemmy.world
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        10 months ago

        People like to fetishize revolution.

        Even offline I have friends that talk that kind of way and just reveal themselves as being poor students of history.

      • d3Xt3r@lemmy.nz
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        10 months ago

        I was reading some thread over at !politics

        There you go, that’s your problem. Political topics always gets heated and brings out the worst in people, no matter the platform. The first thing I did is block all politics (and general news + sports) communities, and it’s been a fairly pleasant experience so far for me, except for the odd troll or fanboy that shows up every now and then.

        • Ilovethebomb@lemm.ee
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          10 months ago

          Lemmy.nz also defederated Hexbear, which helped a lot.

          Technically they pulled a “you can’t fire me, I quit” and defederated first, but whatever.

          • DrRatso@lemmy.ml
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            10 months ago

            Yea, they tend to do that, think they did the same with blaahaj. Pretty funny tbh.

      • teawrecks@sopuli.xyz
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        10 months ago

        You read my mind. It’s the same feeling I got when a reddit sub would degrade into a toxic circle jerk, and I’d have to unsub. Except it feels like it’s a lot of lemmy communities lately. I feel like I can’t respectfully disagree with anyone without being met with ad hominem attacks. I don’t think something like changemyview could survive.

        Also reminds me of those anti-moderate subs, which is a sentiment literally synonymous with radicalization. I’m all for free speech, I would just rather they state whatever take they have with a calm, measured demeanor.

      • SorteKanin@feddit.dk
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        10 months ago

        Well remember that any instance you federate with also gets to vote. If you feel like votes aren’t matching your values, perhaps you should try an instance with more of the “aggressive” stuff defederated.

        • Ghostalmedia@lemmy.worldOP
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          10 months ago

          Possibly, although those instances also have less content. I remember starting out with a BeeHaw account like many of us here. Trade off was often less content, no ability to create your own communities, but less people lashing out at each other.

          • SorteKanin@feddit.dk
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            10 months ago

            Beehaw is very selective though (and that’s fine). There is a middle ground between lemmy.world and Beehaw though.

            But you said elsewhere that you go on American political communities. I’m not American but from what I’ve seen, it is hardly surprising that those places would be toxic. I think at this point, arguing US politics online seems like a lost cause. You’re probably better off discussing politics IRL.