If I ignore/block them, it allows them to continue unchallenged. I hate getting into it with them, since they are a baseline idiot.
I guess that’s it. I saw a person with a 6 month account spouting garbage, was gonna block but thought perhaps that wasn’t morally responsible. Wondering what the options were.
Did you report this person? Racists are usually quickly dispensed with, because if they’re allowed to continue unchallenged then this will become a Nazi bar.
For sure, it’s great to be in communities like ours and theirs where staff actually boot them all out, and it’s also useful to know tactics for treating those people if they’re in places which idealistically believe in free speech more than saving lives and stuff. Luckily I can’t think of any active instances which don’t have basic anti-bigotry rules, but it’s entirely possible for one to federate and not earn a full-instance ban, at least from the more liberal instances. I don’t think it’s enough to say ‘skill issue don’t use a bad instance’, for example Wolfballs remained in the scene for a while until they were finally considered too rabid for most instances to tolerate.
Don’t feed the trolls. If you find a bigot willing to have a good faith debate, maybe, but there is no reasoning with cult members. They have to want to change.
I tend to not reply because that will just draw more attention to them. I will post a separate top level comment rebutting their statements without referring to them.
Up to you? I used to hang out on a WN part of reddit back when that was allowed and debate people but that’s not a thing anymore. The problem is you have utterly no idea if you’re getting through to anyone. I do feel like people had to back off their angry racial ideas and adopt a softer “racial zoo” argument that made it seem like all they wanted was to preserve racial diversity rather than eliminate any particular race. I mean at times I wonder if they were looking in the mirror going “is that really why I have this swastika tattoo?” but I have no idea.
I do think the far right cannot survive much scrutiny of its ideas because they are very irrational, but to be honest the left has done a terrible job pointing this out. I know many people even on the moderate right feel like there’s a grain of truth to racism that they’ll admit in private with other white people, but then once you confront racism and question common assumptions about race* all that falls apart. Many attack racism as a moral failing and that doesn’t work because it makes it sound like the truth is being suppressed for moral reasons.
*The most pernicious being the idea that a person can have a single race on a fundamental level that isn’t up for debate
WN/neo-nazi communities are classic candidates for bad faith ““debating””. I recall a video interviewing former WNs, one was a WN forum moderator who openly said they didn’t believe half the things they were saying, like Great Replacement theory. Fascists (incl. Nazis) could not care less about democracy and liberalist ideology, they treat the liberalist expectation of free speech as a weakness to exploit - they’ll gladly hide behind cops and claim to be censored until they have the power to control cops and own social platforms.
Jean-Paul Sartre hit the nail on the head in their 1946 essay criticizing the antisemites:
“Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.”
I agree but the goal should be not to win a debate, but use their debate platform to slip some woke mind virus into their drink. I always liked to ask very simple questions that they thought they knew the answer to already and make them defend their inevitably irrational answers. For example I used to ask what race is Mariah Carey, because it’s a question everyone seems to have a different strong opinion on that can’t withstand much questioning. The goal being to make them realize on their own that race is a social construct. Whether that ever worked with anyone I don’t know.
There’s a lot of other good suggestions here, so I’ll just ask, what outcome are you hoping to achieve?
My conscience. assuaged.
If that’s the case, I’d recommend treating them like spam: reply and you’ll get a lot more.
Mostly, it’s a huge emotional and time investment if you want to change someone’s behavior and from what I gather, it’s a one on one type of thing and really hard. If you want to stop them from interacting negatively with others, your best action would be to report them.
If you’re upset and want to vent, then engaging will be fun for a while, but mostly futile in terms of behaviour adjustments.
If I respond, it’s mostly for the ‘audience’. I used to argue on r/libertarian or r/conservative, not to change the other person’s mind, but to add a different opinion to the thread. I doubt I ever convinced the other person of anything, but hope I got other people to think a bit more about some of the policies being advocated for.
This makes it look like the post is popular and draws more attention. Depending on the platform, it signals the algorithm to show it to more people.
Doing this is engaging exactly the way they expect you to engage, it helps no one.
You’ve actually found right leaning people on Lemmie? I thought they were either shoved out, bullied out or pushed out or just given up and left and went somewhere else.
More of a white-supremist/anti-LGBTQ/pro-Israel mashup.
But left-leaning, so they got that going for them.
That’s, uh, not really left leaning… is it?
Left-leaning by what definition?
I’m not saying that as a challenge, I’m legitimately curious what interpretation of ‘left’ tolerates those ideas. Even a bigot with economically social ideas (like a Strassertite) is typically considered ‘right-wing’.
I thought they were either shoved out, bullied out or pushed
That’s not something we should be trying for though. Wouldn’t you be mad if suddenly conservatives came on and said that same thing about left-leaning people?!
Would never say it’s something we should be trying for.
I meant Lemmy as a whole. And I agree with you that we shouldn’t be trying for that. I personally have been bullied and there have been plenty of attempts to push me out–all because I post links to news articles that have conservative points of view. Even when it’s AP News, I get bullied. lol
I personally have been bullied and there have been plenty of attempts to push me out–all because I post links to news articles that have conservative points of view.
Did not everyone immediately agree with you and applaud?
Poor thing.
I have never expected people to immediately agree with me or applaud. But diversity of opinion and thought is supposed the be the cornerstone of Democratic values. But it’s not. Not at all. I have seen more bullying and hate in the name of Democratic values here on Lemmy than anywhere else in my entire life. LMAO
I have seen more bullying and hate in the name of Democratic values
I doubt you would see that unless you were opposing Democratic values. Shit, you should see what happens if you suggest there should be living Palestinians.
I doubt you would see that unless you were opposing Democratic values.
Like what? Because friend, basically I would post an AP News article, and then get called a Nazi and told that I should be banned from the fediverse. My post history is public, see for yourself. lol
nazis are not welcome here.
Good thing I’m not a nazi then.
Hope you’re doing your part to make nazis feel unwelcome.
I don’t know any nazis, but I’ve never condoned nor would I ever condone them. Are you around a bunch of nazis? Where do you live?!
I don’t know any nazis, but I’ve never condoned nor would I ever condone them.
Sure. Let’s go with that.
Are you around a bunch of nazis? Where do you live?!
Not anymore. I left reddit. I don’t want lemmy becoming like reddit.
Good for you! I haven’t come across any Nazis here yet. Thanks for the warning.
Wouldn’t you be mad if suddenly conservatives came on and said that same thing about left-leaning people?!
It’s less about whether I’d feel mad, and more about how that materially affects our community. Left-leaning people are trying to make communities which allow all peoples (but not all ideas, like exterminating races and objectifying sexes), while plenty of conservatives (I don’t think the word ‘conservative’ truly applies, but many identify as conservative) are trying to exclude peoples they consider undesirables. If you wanted, you can walk into an anarcho-communist or M-L organization and, as long as you don’t offend them with any provoking symbols or offensive ideas, be welcomed. Not everyone can do the same in a reactionary community. So I don’t think it’s fair to equivocate anti-rightism with anti-leftism. (and, as a side note, if we want to talk about the rare ultra-liberalist (‘Libertarian’) free-speech everyone-welcome scenario, Lemmy already went through that with Wolfballs a few years back - their admin shut it down when they eventually realized they’d created a Nazi bar and that the WNs weren’t just being dumb and offensive as a joke.)
Furthermore, in the context of Lemmy overall, it was created by communists who were leaving reddit to avoid what you described:
are trying to exclude peoples they consider undesirables
Which is exactly what you and Lemmy are doing by saying conservatives are not welcome here. They are un-desired…ala undesirable. Can’t you see the irony of what you are saying?!
Take what you wrote and switch the words around. Change all the liberal words to Repubiclan. Then stand back and read it. Def sounds EXACTLY like how you all assume republicans talk and exclude.
They are un-desired…ala undesirable.
Well, yes. It’s why conservatives recruit incels.
So there are no liberal incels?!
Looks like I touched a nerve.
You haven’t touched a nerve at all. I simply replied to your question. Is replying to a question or comment “touching a nerve”?!
They are un-desired…ala undesirable.
No, their politics are unwanted. That’s a huge difference, it’s absurd to treat them as equal.
When I used the term ‘undesirables’, I didn’t mean literally ‘not desired’. I meant it in the context that reactionaries like NSDAP (Nazi Germany) and their modern fans use it - it referred to peoples like Slavs, Romani, Jews, black peoples, people with disabilities, homosexuals and ideological opponents, and more[1]. People, just because of their lineage, were considered subhuman (Untermensch) and sent to be deported or exterminated. And it’s absolutely applicable to the section of modern US conservatives (including their national leaders) who are currently embracing similar oppression of selected races and conditions. That’s the allusion I was making with the borrowed term ‘undersirables’, not just a person who is being offensive, starting fights and told to leave.
Identifying politically is a choice. One can refine their political positions, or even just be diplomatic and respectful, at any time, by choice. It’s very easy.
Being identified as a race, sex, or other similar category, is not a choice. So if you feel excluded because you named your account after two racist cunts and openly identify as ‘conservative’ in an anti-racist space, that’s something you can easily choose not to do if you actually want to be included. Don’t expect us to take you seriously when you compare that to the Republic party’s form of exclusion, oppressing people for how they were born, not how they choose to act in a society.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nazi_Germany, introduction, paragraph 3 and more ↩︎
No, their politics are unwanted. That’s a huge difference, it’s absurd to treat them as equal.
So because someones politics are different than yours, they shouldn’t be treated as equal. Hmmmm…
Now image a republican saying that about democrats. Imagine your outrage. LMAO
See, regardless of what Lemmy says, not every republican is a Nazi. This is why you all lost the election. Because you don’t account for how many different kinds of republicans there are.
And you’ll lose the next one if ya don’t wake up.
So because someones politics are different than yours
No.
Stopped reading there. If you’re just going to invent strawman arguments no-one said, instead of trying to read and reply to what I wrote, why even talk with you?
Stopped reading there. If you’re just going to invent strawman arguments no-one said
Guy, you literally said: “No, their politics are unwanted.”
Which means they are different than yours. I mean, hey you are free to stop reading. Def nothing says we have to have a conversation.
But unwanted politics means they are different than yours. Not sure why you found that so controversial.
I’m not gonna change your mind. You’re not gonna change my mind. And that’s ok. Carry on your way, and I’ll go mine.
Call them a dumbass bitch idiot
Very rarely do people like this actually want to discuss why they are the way they are. They don’t care about your opinion, and will actively react negatively to any push back. Of course, you can always block them, but there is another choice
You’re not gonna change their mind.
You’d be better spending your time breaking a brick wall with your skull.
Fuck em. Block em.
Sometimes, it’s not about changing their mind, but influencing the many others who are less certain in their beliefs who are just reading along.
In that case, it’s better to just make a top-level comment that’s far more likely to be read than a response 4 replies deep in an insufferable debate. You don’t continue the chess game for the sake of spectators once the pigeon has shat all over the board and knocked the pieces on the ground repeatedly. They’re just wasting your time at that point, which for most of them is their only goal in the first place.
Also, people vastly overestimate how many people are actually going to read an argument between two online people. Only the most chronically online of redditors read that shit. Most people find it very off-putting, and you actually risk losing credibility if you continue to engage. (Said as someone who has very much and repeatedly made the error of continuing to engage.)
i find this very satisfying: gently disagreeing with them via a short single positive message like “gay people do deserve respect”, then letting them throw a very lengthy, time-invested tantrum before gently and completely disagreeing with their comment with another short sentence, over and over until they get tired.
i find that both very funny and I’m putting out positive messages that negate their bigotry without too much time or effort.
that’s just if you have the time and inclination to engage, you aren’t morally obligated to subject yourself to abusive behavior.
if it’s real bad, they’re probably violating a rule, and reporting them will get them banned
Ignore them, then vote accordingly. Nothing you or I say will have any effect
Report their comments, most instances will ban them unless they comment on a Nazi instance in which case good riddance.
If its a nazi instance, ask your admin to defederate.
Politely ask them to snap a pic of their hog and post it.
I’m here for entertainment, as I assume most people are. If seeing that sort of rhetoric is a negative to you, block it. Marie Kondo your online life and yeet anything out the window that doesn’t spark joy. Put your anti-MAGA efforts towards improving your IRL community where you don’t have to futilely battle pseudonymous trolls.
Well said!
Doxx them.
What, that isn’t allowed? Well neither is white supremacist hate speech. Fuck that trash.
Stop calling yourself leftist you hateful fuck.
