Think about things from the point of view of someone who has never used Reddit or the fediverse, but you’ve heard about them both from recent news articles and want to see what they are about.
Reddit:- You Google Reddit and your first result is Reddit.com. You click the link and are presented with the front page. You from scroll from a few hours and end up signing up and staying.
Lemmy:- You Google Lemmy and your first result is a wiki article for Lemmy Kilmister… Your second result might be join-lemmy.org, which you’re smart enough to realise it’s probably more likely what the news is about.
You click join-lemmy.org and are presented with a page of information about the fediverse, links to set up a server and pictures of code…
There is very little chance you’re going to investigate further.
If we want the fediverse to replace Reddit then either
A) Lemmy needs to improve its initial impression and Search engine optimization
B) We should be promoting a different platform with a better initial first impression.
I’d recommend kbin personally as it gives the same sort of experience as Reddit from the initial interaction.
It worries me that you get a bunch of downvotes for this. People are way too accepting of political biases if they’re in the direction they prefer.
Because it implies that basic, milquetoast progressive values are “far left”.
No, no there are literally tankies. Lemmy.ml the ml means marxist-leninist and lemmygrad.ml is just straight up tankie CCP apologists
What’s left wing about simping for dictators? Just because they called their countries “communist” to keep people from realizing, they were both effectively totalitarian dictatorships, and that’s about as right as it gets.
@Crankpork they’re left wing dictators? The wings are about economic policies. Communism is an ultra far left economic system like pure laissez-faire capitalism is an ultra far right economic system. You can be authoritarian or libertarian in either group. Or you can have more moderate economic views and still also have more authoritarian enforcement or extreme libertarian/anarchic lack of enforcement
I mean, that’s exactly my point though. People seem to be knee jerk assuming that the “leftist” accusations against the .ml instances are standard issue right wing hyperbole against progressive liberals and that’s not the case. It’s just as much that progressives are complaining because we have no interest in associating with tankies.
I think the only real way for anyone to get it is to experience it. I thought it was bullshit propaganda too and I also thought I was relatively far left before first arriving at the .ml domain and further lemmygrad. I am still kind of surprised that we have a community out there that large that seems to legitimately identify with the ‘tankie’ ideology.
It’s a bit of a culture shock realizing that you might just be a progressive moderate.
That’s actually really good thing. In the U.S. not wanting to kill trans people makes you a “far left” person according to right-wingers. real “far left” people are pretty nuts, man. The vast majority of us are moderates who are now labeled as “far left” in the U.S. political discourse.
I dunno mate. Does identifying with a side lay out your viewpoints on every issue? I live in a communist-ruled state in India and I know of communists who don’t agree with the trans ideology. Due to religion and stuff, we also have far-right people here that consider trans people as gods.
In my experience, lemmy.ml and feddit.de (for example) are in more left wing then milquetoast progressives. It’s faszinating and refreshing, and I don’t mind people speaking their minds. But I prefer moderate, too.
I would rather say that the average Redditor is milquetoast progressive. Heck, I start to really enjoy this phrase 😉.
As my feed is populated by a lot of German threads it is worth to note that moderate depends a lot on the country you are from. Bernie Sanders would probably be considered part of the moderate left in most of Europe while he is considered to be far left in the USA.
It also depends about what specific topic we are talking about.
In many places in Europe, being a social democrat when it comes to economy (like Bernie) might be considered pretty moderate. But then certain attitudes about non-binary pronouns or supporting special considerations for specific groups of people, are seen closer to “far left”.
You don’t see the amount of virtue signaling in Europe that you see in USA media productions, for example.
I think part of it is that leftists (myself included) don’t like being lumped in with tankies. I didn’t downvote though.
The lead devs of lemmy are tankies, basically meaning authoritarian communists of the genocide-apologist variety. They also run the lemmy.ml and lemmygrad.ml instances.
This is also why I signed up on kbin instead of on lemmy. The other lemmy instances are fine, but I don’t want to contribute to the influence of the lemmy devs any more than necessary. Hopefully they try to pull something stupid and get forked off the project.
Why would anyone downvote for that reason though? That reason is why I upvoted. I’m firmly left-wing but absolutely not far enough that I can support their BS views.
Oh don’t even get me started on the downvote brigades from angry leftists around here. Don’t you dare hold a moderate opinion around them, or they call you a nazi and tell you to go back to 4chan. You can read my post history. All I’ve ever expressed is the same sentiment expressed here, and I’ve been met with nothing but absolute vitriol.
Your post history shows you are solidly on the right end of the spectrum based on your expressed opinions while trying to justify yourself as moderate.
How? Why would you resort to lying? I’m pro choice, I despise Trump, I’m pro gay and trans rights, I believe in UBI for everyone (as well as keeping the free market in place), pro legalization (of every drug), pretty anti gun but I still believe it’s peoples right to own them, I think police should be completely reformed and prisons fundamentally changed to be places of rehabilitation. What opinion of mine shows I’m on the right end of the spectrum? Because I believe in nuance and civil discourse? That I think all humans deserve forgiveness and a chance to grow and become better? Please, do enlighten me.
The forced distillation of every single position to being somewhere on this “left” to “right” spectrum is the single worst thing to happen to modern political discourse, IMO.
I’m a fan of the “8 Views” test, which tries to position views along four different axes instead of just one. Four is still too few but it’s way better than what we’ve got now.
Because we saw what happens with Reddit. People come in claiming to be “moderate”, and very quickly shit like T_D starts popping up. Also center of the road politics in the US has had rights taken away from millions of people in just the past year, and it’s going to continue to erode them from more. I’m not telling you to change your political stance, but I am telling you that people see them as an attack because they have literally been attacked by “moderates”.
It’s fair to want to ostracize those who claim to be “moderate” who are anything but, absolutely. Concerning civil and political rights, there should BE no moderate. Either you support people’s fundamental rights or you do not. Either you support everyone’s right to love, sex, and associate with consenting adults or you do not. Either you support people’s right to choose what to do with their bodies or you do not. There’s little left to discuss.
Having said that, the US (and the world generally) has a terrible record, left or right, in supporting people’s civil and political rights. I’m overjoyed that at least left leaning folk now support those rights, but it wasn’t a decade or two ago that those on the left of the political spectrum were parroting many of the same things that the right now parrots. “Marriage is between a man and a woman.” “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” So while I am glad they’ve shifted, I’m always concerned that if the political winds shift again, those in power will sacrifice individual rights in the name of maintaining said power as they did before they decided that advocating for our rights was going to keep them elected.
“Moderate” doesn’t necessarily mean centrist or unalienable, it’s antithesis is extremist. Being moderate and supporting peoples rights to be who they are just means taking a more practical and slow approach.
You need both moderate and more extreme views of progressivism, otherwise you get drowned in either. They support each other, they don’t necessarily oppose each other.
Moderate has taken a negative connotation in the US, alas, where it means “okay with hurting some people but not as many as THOSE folk.” Moderation in approach, I can get behind depending on the issue.
What you call “moderate” is likely viewed very differently by other people, since I assume you’re from the US, and US politics has become a far-right fucking shitstorm. The overton window has shifted so much over there that “moderates” are degenerate cunts to more reasonable people.