It’s really bizarre if you compare the Lemmy comments with those on Reddit worldnews. The Reddit comments are generally pro Israël, some even banaly so (in the ‘they had it coming sand the deserve what they get’- territory).
In a forum there should be dissenting opinions, however those are downvoted to oblivion. It feels very weird, I’m reluctant to use the word astroturfing, but there’s a huge difference in the time of the discussion compared to a couple of years ago.
Israel has an app where they post links to social media posts discussing Israel for app users to go astroturf. They take their propaganda very seriously. They have a word for propaganda targeting foreigners: “hasbara.” https://mepc.org/speeches/hasbara-and-control-narrative-element-strategy
Israeli work contacts flooding LinkedIn with their shit is one of the weirdest ways I see this online. It’s usually inappropriate to bring politics into the work sphere but in the days after the October attack, the business world came out in sympathy for Israel, as they should. The problem is that this was cemented as the only business friendly position from that point forward. Nowadays I see Israelis posting raw vitriol while everyone else is too timid to say anything except “we support Israel’s right to exist” or “we hope for peace in the Middle East” and other such fatuous trivialities.
Why is pro-Israel the only business friendly position? Simple. There aren’t any Palestinian startups. There are very few Palestinian CEOs.
When you don’t have a voice: you are wrong.
yeah, like every country, Ukraine does that, Russia pays bot, China concripts bot. And the US have its education system
Authoritarian countries like Russia, China, North Korea, Iran, and Venezuela do it much more than democracies.
I sometimes wonder if they’re just bad at it, so the astro turfing is obvious. The people posting have to be immersed in and understand the western site to blend in while remaining loyal to a very different kind of home communication and they often don’t manage it, and if they do that difference makes them stand out.
While we have dozens of western police show up in any discussion of police violence to explain that it’s really hard. Not even astroturfing, I think, just people being themselves. Aside from being obviously police their posting style blends in perfectly, if there were western astroturf campaigns I think they would blend perfectly and use much more subtle techniques
A lot of them aren’t people, they’re LLMs. And I don’t think the actual people doing it stand out to the average person. They’re not posting “death to America, Putin is amazing,” it’s much more subtle.
A common tactic is divide and conquer. They’ll support both extremes of a contentious political issue like abortion, gun violence, or policing.
r/Worldnews just bans everyone that is pro Palestinian. And it is filled to the brim with obvious Hasbara bots.
Similar to other communities pro isreal communities such as r/Destiny. Every single one of them has banned pro-Palestinian voices.
Worldnews has always been the place where all the bad opinions and misinformed bullshit culminated. I remember threads with hundreds of first level comments all stating basically the same bullshit over and over again with no insight in sight
No that’s because r/Destiny has a rule against political comments you dumb
It is weird. The left leaning Canadian subreddit (r/onguardforthee) is generally pro Palestine but my city’s subreddit is generally pro Israel. I’ve been watching my city’s subreddit move right politically quite quickly.
Something I’ve noticed is that reddit as a whole seems to have gotten a lot more right wing since the whole API stuff. I’m not sure if it’s actually because of users leaving, or if moderation took a huge hit and it’s kind of snow balling into hateful commenting becoming normal.
I’m convinced the rightward swing is from people leaving. I imagine it’s a self-reinforcing feedback loop, too. I wouldn’t mind sometimes or even often being the underdog in a thread, as long as occasionally you could score a small win here or there. But when every comment is just going to get down voted to Hades, it becomes pointless.
It also just makes sense that people who are temperamentally conservative are both more likely to be politically conservative and be slower to abandon ship from a dying platform.
is from people leaving
Nah, the reason is that for the past ten years, discussion have become more and more toxic. Reddit launched a campaign against GOP outlets a couple years ago. This was absolute bullshits mainly because they ardently protect PRC propaganda subs calling for genocide and crypto-fascist subs. And that’s without accounting for islamist, ultra nationalist etc. Mainly because US court will only care about garbage like promoting Jan 6 in term of hate speech. Things that relate to the US.
The thing is that our favorite left wingers at reddit are… usians, and like every left wing usians who isn’t racist, they are ethno centrist. When look for problematic subs I am certain they look for subs in english. I would even bet they only look at subs moderated and created from U.S or maybe Canadian territory. They catch some brits from time to time but speak Spanish and you can explain how a good thing it is to genocide the Yezidis.
So moderate people left, from both side of the political spectrum and now only insane people remain. But no problem said reddit ! We just have to market ourselves as a place of free speech allowing controversies.
If you look at right wing subs yeah… Otherwise on reddit, denying the Uyghurs genocide and PRC propaganda are very casual
You’d think so, but my city’s subreddit used to advocate for transit, better support for the homeless, healthcare etc and generally be very left leaning. They still are some of the time, but I’ve started seeing a lot of upvoted comments very literally calling for the implementation of drug use policies (ie death) from places like Saudi Arabia or the Philippines.
I guess it’s possible it’s part of the Western move right ward but it’s jarring. I get it, the city’s drug problem is at its current worst, but advocating for the actual murder of users is insane and I can’t believe comments like that are at the top of threads. Even just a year ago those comments would be downvoted out of existence
Reddit is a powerhouse of online discussion. It’s the perfect place for astroturfing. Not to mention, Reddit is so desperate to become profitable that they’re bragging about “we know everything about our users,” so it’s obvious they’re selling data to data brokers, they’re selling data to google for their AI and google did a cool little quid pro quo with them to boost Reddit results in google search…why not get in bed with opinion brokers?
I wouldn’t be surprised at all. In fact, I assume it.
Reddit has been atroturfed to hell for a long time: https://web.archive.org/web/20160604042751/http://www.redditblog.com/2013/05/get-ready-for-global-reddit-meetup-day.html
Most addicted city (over 100k visits total)
Eglin Air Force Base, FL
pro Israël how long since you’ve left reddit ? Because back there in the comments the only thing I saw were :
- nazis
- crypto-antisemitic conspiracy theories
- flat out antisemitism
- islamism
- pro islamist discourses veiled behind an anti-imperialist, marxist, anti-colonialist rethoric
- antisemtism discourses veiled behind an anti-imperialist, marxist, anti-colonialist rethoric
Being pro Israel is being pro a lot of those things in this day and age.
being pro israel is being supportive of islamism thinly veiled in anti-imperialist discourse and antisemitic conspiracy theories
huuum, did you… read my comment
Reddit is 100% astroturfed by Israel, Ukraine, and Russia.
There is no Palestinian/Iranian astroturfing.
It’s no covert secret that Russia benefits from chaos in Israel/Gaza. Russia is 100% amplifying the coverage of the conflict to their benefit.
“Ah yes the rtardd muslims can’t use propaganda It’s true because since they are in 1400 or something according to their calendar they haven’t discovered internet yet. I know it because I live Shitplaceville in Minnesota, US and therefore I know it because americans always know all the things”
Who are you quoting?
“This is the truth, every woke american use -” Mate that’s exactly how you sound. Your opinion is literally “all those states do use propaganda but that one ? Nah thye don’t”. You are trying to explain us that the Iranian government doesn’t use propaganda ? That’s it, they just don’t. Why wouldn’t they ? Because they are nice ? You’re telling me the government that sends their political paramilitary to poison hundreds of high school girls is not only nice but also honest ? Somehow I hardly believe that.
And yes the part about how it sounds a little racist is indeed true because only the middle eastern dictatorship seems to still rely on posters and state newspapers for their propaganda while the white crazies are using internet.
That’s funny, all you’re doing is saying your own words while pretending they’re mine.
I see it all the time and it’s a sign that you spend too much time on these forums.
I recommend stepping outside and seeing the real world. It’ll be good for you.
They’re not opposites, look at the rest of the comments on this post.
In a forum there should be dissenting opinions, however those are downvoted to oblivion.
As opposed to what, Lemmy World??? This place is the same just fewer users.
Not really. If you’ve been on Reddit for more than a decade you really could see a cultural shift. Lemmy feels smaller and more filterable. If you curate your subscriptions and exclude more extreme Instances it’s quite all right.
Whenever I read Reddit outside of my niche subs it just feels almost distopian, is become a very weird place.
When I left reddit, I was subbed to like 30-50 subs, I only went on r/aspiememes despite most of my subs being about geopolitics and history because wherever I went there always were dude promoting genocide while all pretending to be from different side of the political spectrum
wherever I went there always were dude promoting genocide while all pretending to be from different side of the political spectrum
We are seeing that happen on Lemmy all 2024 so far.
please people on Lemmy are less insane than reddit. On reddit the top com would be an islamist guy upholding a KKK antisemitic conspiracies
please people on Lemmy are less insane than reddit
Laughable. Reddit actually bans the insane fringes, then they come here.
Yeah. I believe in the fediverse and really want to see it crush corporate social media, but I don’t even tell people I use it while there’s so much authoritarian propaganda on here.
The fact that some of the most prominent communities are on the garbage instance lemmy.ml is just wild.
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I think there is a bit more dissenting opinions over here. At least they catch the eye more as the isn’t hundreds of comments. But even sorting by controversial doesn’t really help as the highly downvoted stuff is usually rather crass.
Happens here to, but not on the same scale.
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Could be. Mainly because of scale is easier to parse too.
Yeah it seems sometimes Lemmy got a hard one for Hamas…still don’t know why somebody would favor one of these two since they both commiting genocide…
Here’s a clue: 31,000 > 1,139
Edit: Oh, you’re German. You know, the mistake y’all made in WWII wasn’t going against Jews. It was committing a genocide. The lesson to learn wasn’t: “Always support the Jews.” It was: “Always oppose genocide.” Not racial essentialism, but moral essentialism. Y’all just swapped out Aryan supremacy for Jewish supremacy. And now y’all are on the wrong side of a genocide once again.
(It’s not the first genocide America’s been on the wrong side of, either.)
what he actually said :
don’t know why somebody would favor one of these two since they both commiting genocide…
what you responded :
wrong side of a genocide
“trust me bro I’m not a nazis”
P.S : please stop equating the entire palestinian populations and even worse the entire muslim population of the region to the wealthiest terrorist organization in the world running a military dictatorship based on corruption throught defrauding and stealing humanitarian aid. That’s kinda racist
I’ll assume you’re arguing in good faith. When I said “wrong side of a genocide” I was clearly referring to Germany as a country, not OP. You do know that Germany has filed in the ICJ on the side of Israel, right?
As to your comment regarding conflation of Palestinians with Hamas, I couldn’t agree more. But it’s Israel who is treating the entire population of Gaza like Hamas by depriving them of food, water, and medicine in a total siege while they indiscriminately bomb them.
In lemmy votes don’t seem to matter that much, unless you’re viewing comments with the “Top” or “Controversial” sorting. But perhaps that’s a symptom of having not so many users.
Meanwhile, civilians in Gaza endure a deepening humanitarian catastrophe. Law and order has broken down across the coastal enclave as Hamas’s civil control over northern Gaza and large swathes of the south has been ended.
I don’t think the problem is Hamas failing to provide “law and order” but Israel’s ongoing genocide that is causing the “deepening humanitarian catastrophe”.
is that analysis based on the fact that Gaza now looks like a Metro 2033 area ?
That was kinda obvious since the beginning.
I’d say it’s kinda obvious since about 80 years. The whole region is messed up.
I’m convinced that Hamas had no plans to destroy Israel with the 10/7 attack, they wanted to show the world just how bad Israel can over-react.
So they went out of their way to commit an atrocity to inspire a genocide.
Not it. They did it because Iran wanted to stop the Israel and Saudi peace talks. And make a distraction for Russia.
That’s literally a transcript of Netanyahu speaking at the UN… Interesting how you consider him a credible source.
Both their official reasons and expert analysis show otherwise. Something about liberation from a violent apartheid regime.
No, they committed 10/7 because they want to wage an endless war against Israel and wanted to show their backers they can throw a punch. They were hoping Hezbollah and others would back them, but they threw Hamas to the wolves.
Permanent occupation is an endless war, not a One or Two-State Solution.
Both their official reasons and expert analysis show otherwise.
That’s an interesting idea. Though i think we must not underestimate internal Gazans cause. The HAMAS is basically running anti PA military dictatorship in Gaza enforcing an islamist rule through corruption of lower echelon political actors. The only way they managed to remain in power despite basically defrauding the UN and the Red Cross is by spreading the narrative “hey, we are yout heroic liberators (and everyone who disobeys us is a ******* jew)”. Not that they’re like the nazis, by “liberation” they mean “genocide”.
The problem is that the HAMAS is… not very good at freeing Palestine. The only way they attacked Israel before is through rocket bombardment using 250$ ammo. Problem is that they never got out to fight Tsahal. However their authoritarianism only strengthen with time meaning HAMAS was very not freeing palestine and very much oppressing palestinians. So people started asking question about what the hell all that military budget and requisition were for. So they planned a “boots on the ground mission”. This was supposed to be a show of force to make them look good. I’d even believen advisors suggested this idea. Except the main issue with the HAMAS is that, to them, all this garbage we call “guerilla”, “civil defense”, “policing”, “resistance”, “show of force” means the exact same thing : good ol’ ethnic cleansing.
And an ethnic cleansing on a population of 7 000 000 000. Which means if you’re an israeli citizens, yoiu likely have connections, be it former classmates or extended family, to a victim of the attack. this did not help with the Israeli state of mind rigth afterwards. [](to show the world just how bad Israel can over-react) That’s exactly where I think they should have stopped being insane nazi islamist and read actual books. See I’m French, here we see U.S forces in WW2 as heroes, they are the “Libérateurs”, same for the Brits. You want to know what’s weird ? We do that, despite the fact the U.S.A.F sometimes entirely destoryed the wrong french cities. Yes that happen, for exemple in Royan. We know that, they killed our own peoples, the Liberation of France wa just american G.Is riding through France to enter Germany, but it doesn’t change our opinion. Why ? Because the Vichy Regime were a bunch of fascistic traitors whose stupid and submissive policies led us to this situation. Same thing for the IIIrd Reich who was occupying the country.
No one will side with the HAMAS, few will side with Gaza despite mainstream media broadcasting many pro-palestinian voices (because now that the war is on it’s cooler). Because people don’t like flat out ethnic cleansing and they especially dislikes when their perpetrators run countries
It’s a complicated history but even the Hamas Founding charter, which is certainly unreasonable in its fundamentalism with Sharia Law and is antisemitic, does not call for the extermination of all Jewish People. The 2017 Revised charter accepts a Two-State Solution of the 1967 Borders. Check Article 7 and 13 of the 1988 Charter to see yourself, compare it to Article 20 and 24-26 in the revised version. Hamas has committed atrocious acts, there’s no need to make things up about Hamas to show they’ve done terrible things.
Ending the occupation and having a Palestinian election for the Palestinian people to choose their own leadership is the way to diminish support for Hamas and other Armed resistance groups. Further terrorizing the West Bank and Gaza will only increase their support, which has been shown historically not only within the Occupied Palestinian Territories but throughout history.
The Blockade, described by the Israeli Defense Minister as a ‘total siege’ long before 2023, was a strategic decision in 2005.
History of Hamas supported by Netanyahu since 2012
Gaza Blockade is still Occupation
Further terrorizing the West Bank and Gaza will only increase their support
That I can fully agree. As opposed to civilian movements and institutions, armed groups tend to survive warfare. Although I doubt those armed group would go quietly as pacification will have to go through a deconstruction and realisation of their atrocities. That means justice, and the armed group won’t like it so we must be ready to see them turn their violence against Gazans. Which they have already done in some way to impose their islamist doctrine. The blockade and especially its enforcement by lots of military forces was brutal and only provided target for the HAMAS to look “badass”. Again we see the deleterious effects of Israeli security policies to consider every form of threat as a sign they’re about to board the trains again. fun facts
Woman in the home of the fighting family, whether she is a mother or a sister, plays the most important role btw on that one, it might seem innocuous but that very sentence and the whole Article Eighteen means that the HAMAS do treat civilians, civilians lives and civilians activities as part of their combat operations. They are a military organization rrefusing to limit themselves to military matters. That is bad
I agree that no article of the 1988 charter states “time for Holocaust 2 : electric boogaloo” however :
peaceful solutions and international conferences, are in contradiction to the principles of the Islamic Resistance Movement These conferences are only ways of setting the infidels in the land of the Moslems as arbitraters. When did the infidels do justice to the believers?
In face of the Jews’ usurpation of Palestine Article Twenty-Two: For a long time, the enemies have been planning, skillfully and with precision, for the achievement of what they have attained. They took into consideration the causes affecting the current of events. They strived to amass great and substantive material wealth which they devoted to the realisation of their dream. With their money, they took control of the world media, news agencies, the press, publishing houses, broadcasting stations, and others. With their money they stirred revolutions in various parts of the world with the purpose of achieving their interests and reaping the fruit therein. They were behind the French Revolution, the Communist revolution and most of the revolutions we heard and hear about, here and there. With their money they formed secret societies, such as Freemasons, Rotary Clubs, the Lions and others in different parts of the world for the purpose of sabotaging societies and achieving Zionist interests. With their money they were able to control imperialistic countries and instigate them to colonize many countries in order to enable them to exploit their resources and spread corruption there.
You may speak as much as you want about regional and world wars. They were behind World War I, when they were able to destroy the Islamic Caliphate, making financial gains and controlling resources. They obtained the Balfour Declaration, formed the League of Nations through which they could rule the world. They were behind World War II, through which they made huge financial gains by trading in armaments, and paved the way for the establishment of their state. It was they who instigated the replacement of the League of Nations with the United Nations and the Security Council to enable them to rule the world through them. There is no war going on anywhere, without having their finger in it.
Oh that’s why. Article 22 is pretty much a summary of the Protocols of the Elder of Zion, the document used to justify every antisemitic persecutions throughout the 20th century and the Holocaust. So they did not say they’re going to do it, though they use all the reference, all the concepts, and all the propaganda tactics of the one who did it before. I… don’t trust them Especially since reforms of the charter did not actually translate into any change or improvements in education or internal propaganda. Though fighting them only pushes them abroad only to come back right after. Right now we see that the HAMAS is already back at securing their political alliances by diverting aids towards their smaller political allies so they can resell it at high prices. All that hit won’t end HAMAS, even militarily speaking the current tactic is unlikely to work. It probably worked damn well to liberate Caen from the 12th SS Division in 1944 but the situation now is pretty different
Hamas and their supporters need to be burned out of Gaza.
They are getting what they deserve then. October 7th was an atrocious terrorist attack. It was not an act of war, its victims were not legitimate targets of war. They were children, the elderly, and concert goers.
You think the ten year old who has been told his whole life that the highest purpose he can serve is to jihad against Israel deserves to be killed for it? What if he hasn’t even done anything?
Maybe you think he deserves death for his “crime”. I have a bit more empathy than that.
Adults giving material support is closer to what I meant. Sorry it’s been a long day. But for the adult Palestinians that actively took part in Oct 7, yes absolutely. Also for those that continue to use civilians as human shields, or use hospitals, mosques and schools as weapon caches.
What’s “material support”? Bread? Does giving bread to someone who hates Israel mean you deserve death?
What if the person encourages attacks on Israel? What if it’s a mother feeding her Hamas son who joined Hamas because the IDF shot his brother’s kneecap? Does that mother deserve death? What about the families of these other 42 palestinians?
I’m just curious how far this death by association should go.
Their supporters are 72% of Palestinians. That would be genocide. It’s not that simple.
Well it happend in the past with the Nazis, despite the large number of supporters for them the Allies attacked and as a german I must say it worked out pretty well for us.
We did not kill 72% of the Germans, or even 72% of the Nazis in WW2. I do not support Hamas, but I don’t support genocide either.
Thats his point. No need for genocide if other options are available. Many many Germans supported the Nazis and denazification after ww2 was a thing
I’m not sure there are realistic strategies for the region that would be similar. Who is going to take over administration of Gaza when Hamas is out? Israel is. Germans didn’t hate British people. They did not spend generations teaching their children that Americans were subhuman scum. Your average German was able to snap out of the delusion easily. You and I both know that isn’t a plausible reality in Gaza.
I’m not saying there is a need for genocide. But Hamas could agree to terms tomorrow and the war would end. Then it would start again. There can be no peace in that place. Not while both peoples live there. Maybe when Iran builds nukes? MAD is pretty high price to pay but it might sober everyone up a little. Hard pill to swallow.
We did kill a lot of them and a lot of them were supporters. By that time it was pretty much the whole country and the they stil decided to attack them.
I’m not saying that killing a lot of Hamas fighters and supporters is the solution, you also have to change things in Gaza drastically, like let them live and rule independently because this whole tyranny over them pushed the people into the arms of those degenerates of the Hamas. But having that much supporters should also not prevent us from fighting the Hamas.
The allies did specifically bomb civilians in WW2 though. And Nazis weren’t usually using human shields.
No, they were using them as target practice like they did to my great grandfather. First they took him to concentration camp, then they took him and others to the forest to have some moving target practice. Thankfully he was able to run away and hide.
When it comes to human shields, the only independent verification back in 2014 (Amnesty link) is of Weapons (not rockets) hidden at a vacant school, situated btwn 2 UNRWA schools housing displaced people, by a Palestinian armed group.
The Guardian journalists had encountered a couple individuals in 2014 too.
HRW on Laws-of-War Violations 2009
Amnesty on Hamas War Crimes 2023
Yet none of those come remotely close to making hospitals and schools bombing targets. Even if all the IDF claims were true, that does not exempt those hospitals and schools as protected under international law.
Additionally, let’s look at how the IDF uses Human Shields including Children (2013 Report)
We didn’t fight Nazis in a dense urban environment.
This is just flat out, totally, and utterly wrong. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Berlin
https://taskandpurpose.com/history/a-look-at-urban-warfare-on-world-war-iis-western-front/
Sure, you can point to some urban warfare during WWII but for the most part it was maneuvering armies in the field. That’s where the big casualties were at.
Take the L. You’re wrong.
spicy comment of the day
