Hi! In thinking about how to help the fediverse grow, I wonder if there are more mainstream Lemmy instances?
I’ve pointed a couple folks to Lemmy.world and it’s uhhh, pretty hard Left for them (as one girl, who volunteered for the Democrats said “I just got yelled at because I can’t be Left wing unless I want to destroy capitalism? Which feels weird.”) We’re much farther Left than reddit which itself was definitely Left of centre…
I don’t know if decentralized open source social media actually attracts many mainstreamers but assuming we want to grow the fediverse, I’d like to have somewhere I can point people to without feeling very nervous for them.
Thanks!
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I’ve found that for those moving from reddit, sh.itjust.works seems to be pretty accessible
Thanks, I’ll take a look!
Fediverse is anticapitalism at its core, it’s a way to escape ads and money influencing algorithims and what can be said. If you don’t like power to the people, join truth.social or some other unfederated instance.
I can’t be Left wing unless I want to destroy capitalism?
Yes. Yes indeed you can’t. How to go about that is up for grabs but if you think that leftism is all about preserving the system that allows oligarchs to accumulate more capital and power, to allow a minority to exploit the majority, I don’t know what to tell you.
…besides that you’re probably American because only y’all are so damn confused about the whole topic.
Left “wing” in normie US is a broad neighborhood.
Left “ism” in normie US is a study of progressive politics with deviation from center exponentially growing as you go “more left”.
Lots of “left wing” folks in the US are low on the leftism deviation curve, but due to the way things work in the US they are definitely “left wing”.
So you absolutely get fiscal centrists with much “lefter” social opinions. And other “left-lite” view combos.
I think to grow Lemmy non combative, but non compromising spaces should exist. Much how some are warped right by spending too much time in the “manosphere” content, folks can be convinced of increasingly progressive politics by being welcomed here. Mind, I’m not saying anyone should cater to anything they don’t agree with, but God damn Lemmy could be less combative. Purity testing mild left folks drives them right. You don’t have to compromise your morals or positions to accomplish this.
So I’d close by saying Americans aren’t “confused” about anything, they’re just less exposed with further left policy / theory, due to being exposed most to milder progressive concepts.
On the right, maga is remarkable because it’s drawing many conservatives quickly up the exponential deviation ladder at a quantity not really seen before.
IDGAF about what the US is cooking up when it comes to political definitions, much less so when they disagree with the rest of the world. Anti-capitalism is necessary to be on the left, it’s not negotiable.
Just like you wouldn’t call someone who denies god a Christian. There’s no “but they deny god a bit less than Richard Dawkins, so they’re more Christian”: No, they’re still denying god, they can’t be Christian. If they consider themselves Christian despite denying god, then it stands to reason that they’re quite confused about what being a Christian entails, don’t you think?
You’re ina thread authored by an canadian about “normies”. North American concepts matter.
Edit even wherever you’re from “left wing” (the scope of center to far left) exists, just the starting point of center is unique.
Further, your purity test determination leaves no room for the varied mins of people all over the world. For example fiscal centrists who are socially progressive. You may call that a false leftist, but I’d just say they’re a mild left wing voter. I bet if they weren’t purity tested they’d eventually shift their perspective on fiscal matters leftward.
Point being people hold varied political opinions, sometimes in complete contrast to themselves. I bet there’s some completely theory pure fiscal leftists who don’t believe in abortion rights, or some other bizarre combo
For example fiscal centrists who are socially progressive. You may call that a false leftist, but I’d just say they’re a mild left wing voter.
So you would call Peter Thiel a leftist? A literal billionaire? A literal neo-feudalist? Because he happens to be gay and proud of it?
You are taking a word that has been, since its literal inception (seating arrangements in the French national assembly, as seen from the lectern), been connected to the struggle of the masses vs. nobility/oligarchy, and you’re attaching orthogonal meanings to it. You cannot be leftist if you’re on the side of the oligarchy, if you’re a capitalist.
“Socially progressive”. You already have a term for it. Good. Use it. Don’t dilute other terms, or even allow them to be turned into their opposite.
centrists
There’s no centre point between “believe in god” and “deny god”: Either you do or you don’t, and anything agnostic is not in the centre, it’s not a compromise, but off the axis altogether.
When did I suggest that would be a leftist? Maybe reread. Specifically the end.
He may hold left opinions on LGBTQ+ issues but hold completely contracting, non left wing opinions elsewhere. We can be sure that’s true. He’s certainly not a leftist, and likely not a left wing voter either.
Ultimately I’d highlight that you are doing the.thing: you are purity testing very broad language in a completely useless way
To be hyper clear for you:
Left WING is not leftIST
LeftIST is left WING
To be hyper clear for you:
Left WING is not leftIST
LeftIST is left WING
Whether -ist or -wing doesn’t matter both still contain the word “left”, don’t they? Therefore, they are either anti-capitalist, or they’re confused. And, yes, much of US politics is terribly confused. The moderate left, in the US, begins with AOC and Bernie, both solid socdems, radical is far a ways off. The Democrat establishment, by and large, supports the oligarchy, they don’t even begin to be on the left.
Don’t expect lefties from elsewhere to play into that confusion.
All I will point out is that the overton window in the US has shifted to the point where a double Sieg Heil at your president’s inauguration is within normal discourse .
Anyway, lemmy can be pretty “normie” for you so long as you stay out of political discussions. But if you want to actually discuss politics within the US overton window, lemmy is going to be very hostile. However if you come with an attitude to learn instead of debating/arguing, then I suspect most people wouldn’t flame you. But if one starts doing genocide denial for Israel etc, then they’re going to have a bad time.
However if you come with an attitude to learn
Translation: if you are willing to swallow the opinion most people have here …
Lemmy is notorious for asking and including sources. It’s part of the culture. I wouldn’t say you’re supposed to swallow anything, but quite the contrary–make your stance.
Db0 is the best instance with the least friction from mods and admins.
shifted to the point where a double Sieg Heil at your president’s inauguration is within normal discourse
Haha thank you. I’m not even American but to me it’s pretty shocking to find out that this place, world of all instances, is too ‘extreme’ for people. Maybe I really am a dirty radical but I think that if people who consider themselves democrats are still fucking clutching their pearls about the left wing being too left wing while Elon Musk does open nazi salutes and trans people get their rights and dignity stripped away, then it’s no wonder the USA is so fucked.
You guys clearly need a new political party because your choices are overt right wingers, or spineless right wingers that like to pretend they represent the left.
Edit: maybe the bad men will see the light if we all hold hands and sing kumbaya. I’m sure that all of the people who are already finding themselves victims will thank you for taking the high road and not scaring too many centrists.
Roughly speaking, Lemm.ee is more libertarian some libright. Slrpnk is libleft but is home to pleasant politics community. Dbzer0 is anarchy leftist. World is closest to US centrist. Lemmy.ca is kind of Reddit’s onguardforthee vibe, Left/NDP wing.
Thing is that influences from other more ideological instances will make it onto All threads. “Lib-shaming” is something some folks at lemmy.ml, hexbear.net and lemmygrad.ml like to do frequently, which is where those experiences might have come from.
Lib shaming is for good reason as the US and most of the western world falls to fascism thanks to libs creating the material conditions for it.
I have to say it again:
- Fascists promise to do fascist things
- Americans elect fascists
- Fascists do fascist things
- HOW COULD DEMOCRATS DO THIS???
It’s a bit more like:
-
Capitalism creates the material conditions that promote fashism
-
Democrates aren’t fashists, but they keep capitalism
-
The material conditions that promote fashism end up happening and fashism props up
-
Fashists end up getting elected
The point isn’t that the Democrats are fashists, but that they would rather continue support the thing that litterally empowers fashism rather than doing anything else. Kinda like a person who refuses to get vaccinated and spreads a disease to everyone else.
-
And I have to say it again: libs created the material conditions to let it happen. Obama bailed out Wall Street instead of Main Street. People aren’t born fascist. They become it. Twice Obama voters switching to trump is great example of that and as usual democrats say nuh uh im not listening!!!
So you’re mad at Democrats for not being fascist enough?
What an idiotic take. Millions of people lost their homes in 2008 and watched those responsible walk away with millions of dollars in golden parachutes thanks to Obama lining his cabinet with Goldman Sachs bros and holding no one responsible. The “tea party” that formed is trumps base today.
Jesus Christ read a fucking book.
Whatever you need to think to excuse fascists for being fascists, I guess.
You’re way too fucking stupid for this. Complete lack of intellectual ability. Fascism doesn’t exist in a vacuum and as a typical liberal you take the lazy route and refuse to see how democrats played a massive part in allowing fascism to flourish by being failed leaders, just like the Weimar Republic.
Open a goddamn history book for fucks sake. Your ignorance threatens my queer existence.
This is some incel logic.
“Women won’t date me so I’ll call them bitches and sluts!”
“People don’t vote for my side so I’ll say they’re enabling fascism!”
Typical lemmy.world user right there.
I’m a queer woman.
And the logic you’re using is very similar to an incel.
That’s literally how analogies work, you compare similarities in unlike things, e.g., my cat snores like a chainsaw. She is not a chainsaw but has a comical similarity in one aspect, even if she can’t cut down a tree and does not use gas or electricity.
“People don’t vote for my side so I’ll say they’re enabling fascism!”
iconic, I’ve been repeatedly told by liberals that because I voted third party that I’m essentially a trump voter.
that wasn’t what was said though.
they said that liberals created the material conditions for fascism. i.e. by suppressing the left and only offering up warmongering and genocide they created a situation where someone like trump could get elected. again.
a fair number of the people who are on this platform are here specifically because oligarch-owned media sites heavily censor all left wing speech, and have done so for many years.
a fair number of the people who are on this platform are here specifically because oligarch-owned media sites heavily censor all left wing speech, and have done so for many years.
I got banned from every platform, and my account on lemmy.world was also banned.
Capitalist owned platforms support fascists and ban anti capitalists, anti fascists, anti imperialists. We’re a threat to power and profit. Look at all the capitalists lining up to suck trumps mushroom cock right now. They’ll do whatever it takes to make a buck, whores are more honest than them.
I got banned from every platform, and my account on lemmy.world was also banned.
Gee, from your comments on this post I could never imagine how that could happen.
If everywhere you go people smell like shit, maybe you should check your shoes.
I’d strongly suggest that the issue isn’t your beliefs, but that you’re about as abrasive as kissing the pavement at 75mph.
Typical liberal tone policing while lives are at stake.
Everything I don’t like is Liberal: A Guide to Modern Lemmy Discourse
More seriously, lives are not at stake in this particular comment section.
Edit: and I never told you to stop, just that it’s abrasive as shit and likely why you’re being banned so damn much. Do with it what you will. I’m not your parents, the police, or your boss.
Lib shaming is for good reason as the US and most of the western world falls to fascism thanks to libs creating the material conditions for it.
Presumably, there was an alternative group to vote for in primaries or however else this delightful person thinks change should happen. People did not do whatever they think should have happened and thus I will name call them.
There was a primary this time around and it was even more of a farce than usual. The party just straight up ignored all the people voting uncommitted, to all of our detriment.
People did not do whatever they think should have happened and thus I will name call them.
I don’t actually understand what this is saying.
Either way this isn’t the place for a back and forth on this kind of thing, so I won’t be discussing the election further.
To steer back to your original topic though, you seem accustomed to the type of censorship of the left that’s typical on Reddit. Many of the people that are here are specifically here because the left wing communities they were participating in were systematically removed from reddit.
The reality is in a place like this sometimes you’re going to hear dissenting opinions, unless you’re very selective in your instance and only browse local.
(as one girl, who volunteered for the Democrats said “I just got yelled at because I can’t be Left wing unless I want to destroy capitalism? Which feels weird.”)
I get why folks do it, but I’m not sure if they’re going to get people to embrace their philosophy, if they keep jeering at other people like this. There are more cordial ways that one can acknowledge the benefits while showing why the drawbacks outweigh them.
Can vouch for this. I learned a thing or two from people who had the patience to explain. Including some ML people. @Cowbee@lemmy.ml for example has nerves of steel. Permanent snark isn’t useful but it’s understandable, especially coming from people who are being actively harmed. Repeating the same things over and over without frustration isn’t something everyone can do.
Appreciate the kind words! You’re 100% correct in saying that snark isn’t useful but is understandable. Many good people are being actively harmed and are out of patience in explaining how and why said harm exists, and how we can move beyond it. Ultimately, what I’ve found is that most people aren’t going to be convinced of something that seriously challenges their worldview in a single conversation, but through compatible life experiences make themselves more open to new ideas. Those are the ones that end up listening to others genuinely and taking to heart what the other person has to say.
While I do think some ways of communicating are certainly more effective than others, social change also requires some amount of tension to be effective. Cordial methods are often the first to be tried, and are also most often summarily ignored.
Moderates often find tension emotionally distressing because it pierces their perception of themselves as a morally just person. They sometimes perceive what is often valid criticism as being yelled at. This tension is required in order to enact social change, though.
As someone who has been on the receiving end of that tension before, I can attest it’s an unpleasant experience, but it passes, and hopefully leaves room for some amount of contemplation in its place.
I’d highly recommend reading MLK’s “Letter from Birmingham Jail”, as he bridges the concept much more eloquently than I could ever hope to.
Queer people like myself are currently in the crosshairs and don’t have the energy or patience to put up with this shit.
I’ve been screaming from the top of my lungs since 2000!!! about how we were heading towards fascism and nobody listened. I’m out of fucks to give. If they’re too stupid to see it that’s on them. In my book lib shit behavior is complicit in the rise of fascism.
Then maybe don’t waste energy being shitty online and instead build the local community and personal resources to protect your ass.
If I was in your situation looking at the changes Trump did in just the executive orders his first day, I can tell you one thing that would be at the absolute fucking bottom of my todo list: argue on the fucking internet.
I’m currently extremely ill and bedridden with a painful and dangerous dental infection that I’m struggling to get adequate treatment for thanks to capitalism.
But yeah, do tell me how to live my life. Typical liberal scolding.
Also I LOVE the assumption that I don’t normally make community when I’m well. 🙄
Please, Slrpnk may by attractive for different kind of people due to aesthetic and design buy its core philosophy is not Lib, is Anarchy.
Lemmy world left??? Lol they’re milquetoast liberals and capitalism is garbage. Your friend needs to grow up.
Yeah, this is exactly the childish annoyances and unpleasantness I’m talking about.
Sorry not sorry. The world is falling to fascism thanks to the conditions created by capitalism and your friend needs to grow the fuck up and read some history. Lemmy world is centrist lib shit takes, if your friend thinks that’s “left” then maybe they should go to a fascist platform like meta or x where they belong.
Mate, you’re not going to deconvert libs by pushing them towards the fascists. You don’t have to be so antagonistic all the time.
As a queer person I’ve completely lost my patience with shit libs. They’re fascists.
Also if they’re that easily pushed to fascism they had it in them all along and were never an ally and don’t belong on lemmy.
If you are making alternatives to republicanism more unpleasant and unappealing to the people whom we need to persuade, well, it seems like you are aiding fascism…
alternatives to republicanism
You calling spez’s little playground and a far right “enlightened centrist” instance like . world “left-wing” makes it abundantly evident to anyone with more than half a brain and the slightest bit of education that any supposed alternatives to fascism you’d find acceptable would be effectively indistinguishable from fascism.
Only fascists and idiots would want to be appealing to fascists.
It’s a very good thing that you don’t feel welcome outside of your fascist echo chambers.
If it’s that easy to support fascism you’re a fascist all along. Typical liberal.
You’re missing the point.
By being wildly unpleasant at people, you’re making it less likely they’ll read the news you agree with, read the same books and come to the same conclusions…
“Oh good, that person who called me a fascist is recommending something! I’ll definitely read that!” - said no one ever.
Fine, you don’t have to have patience with them, but that doesn’t mean you have to jump in and start flaming when they’re not even making reactionary statements. There’s others who do have the patience to help deconvert them.
Calling lib shit lemmy world “too left” is reactionary
Wouldn’t really make much of a difference in what server you choose, if the goal is to get “away” from Lemmy.world. The majority of users is from there.
Maybe it’s not the server, but more the community that’s an issue for you?
That’s funny because the majority of Lemmy.World are people who left Reddit during the 3rd party app-ocolypse. Though I suppose many of them also saw Reddit becoming more and more pro-Nazi as time went on. The loss of the apps was just the kick in the pants needed to actually leave.
Why not just join non-political communities and focus on the content that they enjoy. If people are nervous about meeting assholes on the internet perhaps they should stick to cable tv or netflix.
I think one of the issues is “normies” do not want to learn the lore like:
“don’t bother with anyone with lemmygrad after their name”
“Block these communities on day one”
“Be sure to pick an instance that you researched aligns with your moderation tolerances”
If you have to do setup stuff, many folks are already out. Someone may see that as a feature, but I don’t see Lemmy growing much more with that “feature”.
So if you’re happy with the size of things, mission accomplished. If you want to discuss “how to grow Lemmy” well, the above topics need to be addressed.
Lemmy is different from Reddit in one important way.
Reddit is a product. You install the app, you look at the ads, the mods and admins curate an endless feed of cartoons and safe ragebait and awwwunexpectedsmiles.
Lemmy is an environment. If you’re passive, then any random thing may happen to you. So you have to be proactive in this environment.
- You could subscribe to communities that are non-politics/news, non-meme, non-tech, and browse these “subscribed” communities.
- You could use blocklists, as described elsewhere in this post.
- You could find an instance that does some of this work for you, by defederating and blocking certain types of opinions and behaviors. This seems to be what you want, and many people have provided suggestions.
These are all ok. But the one defining characteristic of Lemmy is that it is not just another product.
Mods please install an upvote twice button.
Interesting take.
I think what you‘re talking about is called „anecdotal evidence“. Destroying capitalism is definitely not the „mainstream“ on lemmy, far from it. Although We dont have „normie-lizing“ moderation and bot armies that bury every post thats out of the norm.
Of course we attract a lot of freedom loving people. Freedom, turns out is an extremist left view. Asking to be paid for work done, asking to be able to work from home, etc.
I would ask your friend to show you more than one incident and also ask them to be open to making a new experience.
And although everyone will hate me for it: if you want fediverse lite (or bastardized corpo fediverse) you can always test bluesky and threads. They are more mainstream since they have larger user counts.
Not sure this is the way to share comments but in this post we already have people arguing about liberalism creating fascism etc:
https://fedia.io/m/fediverse@lemmy.world/t/1703782/-/comment/9075608
I think she deleted accounts but if you really want I can hunt down the last time folks got angry at me for the same thing.
Are you aware that when they use the term liberalism, they likely mean economic liberalism?
I didn’t delete my account I blocked you. Open up a fucking history book, look at the Weimar Republic, then look what came next.
As a queer woman I’m so fucking sick and tired of liberal bullshit. Liberals create the conditions that allow fascism to flourish. In America, when bush couped in 2000, they rolled over, leading to citizens United, 9/11, the patriot act, the afghanistan and Iraq forever wars. In 2008 they bailed out the bankers. In 2016 they fucked over Bernie and lost to a fascist. In 2020 they fucked over Bernie again and the only reason biden won was because of covid. In 2024 they proudly support a genocide and gaslight the public about the economy - just like the Weimar Republic selling out the Germans in their ww1 concessions.
You liberals just don’t fucking learn. And now my life is on the line. Either fight capitalism or get fascism, your fucking pick liberal.
You should block better or.something?
And the people who failed Bernie were the voters who didn’t show up. Age wise, the youth got their heads kicked in by the seniorsin the primaries by a depressing margin. If you don’t vote, you don’t make differences.
I mean, bailing out the banks as a failure? Shit, there shouls have been regulations (like Canada had) to stop crazy trading but unless you wanted a lot pf people to lose their pensions and life savings, this is an impressively silly point.
Edit: also, the she wasn’t about you it was about the person whom OP had asked about. (Yes, not everything revolves around you, though admittedly that wasn’t super clear from the paragraph construction) I just used you as an example of lemmy’s delightful crazies.
I think the way to do it would be this but you probably can do it a lot more ways.
Lemmy (and the fediverse as a whole) are not supposed to be a drop in replacement for reddit and other corpo media. No central moderation or “direction”, just a ton of servers with very varying user counts, ideas and ways to do things.
When on the fediverse, you will definitely encounter bad stuff. You will learn to use the block button and maybe block whole instances. Thats how you make your own “bubble”.
Since the fediverse is federated, horizontally organized and has freedom of association, it is hugely different from any other social gathering in the outside world. All our Lives we live in hierarchical structures: Families (more or less), Schools, Companies, etc. That can be the reason why it feels alien. But I dare you to try and see if “freedom” cant feel nice to you.
It will never feel like reddit or other places on the corpo web. If you need that, its not the place for you. If you can be open to a new experience and just decide between listening to an opinion or blocking it, you might have a lot of fun. Good luck
I don’t think it’s the non hierarchy, I think it’s the being called a fascist enabler for supporting mainstream Democrat positions etc that is offputting.
I have trouble recommending this place to others because of some of our less than delightful members.
Reddit was big enough that once you got into niche communities, the angry crazies were either banned or hadn’t found community or whatever. Lemmy is still small so we don’t have that. So, was just hoping for an instance or whatnot that was less communism and linux and more friendly to an average person.
Yeah, i cant help if you wont use the block button. The not banning people is part of the horizontal structure. I suggest you open up to the concept. Otherwise youre just out of luck.
Also nobody here gives a shit if you recommend lemmy to anything. Thats reddit thinking. We dont make money, dont have the slightest benefit from someone getting a recommendation coming here. au contraire, we give people refuge who are sick and tired of the way reddit treats its users. If your friends are happy on reddit, please god leave them there. We do not want them here.
There have been a bunch of pleas to grow the fediverse, as stated in the opening.
And the block button isn’t a particularly good recommendation for new people.
Out of curiousity, say there was an instance that allowed all speech and had great content. Would you tell a trans friend “hey it’s great, just block every time you see something hateful.” Or can we see how that would be an unpleasant experience.
Anyway, if you don’t want a larger fediverse, that’s groovy but that seems contrary to the nature of almost every post here.
We‘re talking about different things.
I have trans friends that are fine here. They will absolutely shit on you for not dismantling capitalism though.
See my point?
Everyone has the right to their opinion. You want extras? Either get on an instance that backs your exact flavor or make your own. Freedom of association, baby!
Also, you know what I dont like? Smartasses. Yes, there are people here that dont want this place to grow and others do. Neither of them is wrong. The only one who is wrong is the one trying to convince them otherwise repeatedly.
If you have any other questions, I‘ll gladly help. If you want to convince me why I‘m wrong, you‘re getting the block treatment. Your decision.
The instance you’re on only matters in so far as which other instances they’ve defederated.
You can probably find more centerist instances, but it doesn’t really matter because your friend is probably just going to be in the same communities anyways.I’m not really sure I’d call reddit left of center, though.
"I just got yelled at because I can’t be Left wing unless I want to destroy capitalism?
Based
Also shows a fundamental misunderstanding of the difference between leftist and left wing from someone but this is America dammit it’s the culture
I’m on sh.itjust.works. Which is actually run like a democracy, funnily enough.
According to a post made in our Main Community, sh.itjust.works is the fifth largest Lemmy instance by total posts, after lemmy.world, hexbear.net, www.hexbear.net, and lemmygrad.ml. So figuring Hexbear got duplicated, and anyway hexbear and lemmygrad are commonly defederated with because tankies, that puts sh.itjust.works at #2 on this side of the Silicon Curtain.
It shows lemmy.world at 390k total posts, with sh.itjust.works at 65k. Sh.itjust.works has very, very few of THE communities people use. !Games!games@sh.itjust.works is the biggest one by subscriber count.
So sh.itjust.works is a popular place to access other instances from, and I think others like lemm.ee and lemmy.ca are in the same boat.
“Join this instance, they’re not as radical left as lemmy.whatever” misses the point. Who cares which door of the building you walked in through when everyone congregates in the same room anyway?
Does hexbear run two instances or is that a mistake?
Lemmy.world is too left?. It always looked normal to me. Although, I do want the total annihilation of capitalism, so…
Normally big instances are the most generalistic and less “politically biased”, but sometimes a more small and focused instance could be better for the things you want.
It’s… Fine for me, I’m learning to just eye roll and move on but it can sometimes be fairly u pleasant and aggressively Left. (I think I got called a fascist for pointing out problems with PR electoral systems with a “how dare you oppose a system that…”
Too bad that’s your experience. Yes it is true that some comrades can get “intense” at times. I think that, more than the ideas, it is how to express them that is at fault by their part.
