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LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

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171–180 of 717 posts

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Counter-point; the world is mostly a neutral, even OK, place It isn't, you are lucky to be in a privileged environment. And I don't even mean warzones. People who live paycheck-to-paycheck with family or medical issues wouldn't agree with you.

> People who live paycheck-to-paycheck with family or medical issues wouldn't agree with you. You wouldn't know if you were talking to such a person right now without making a circular argument such that "a person without privilege cannot think the world is an OK place and since they think that they must be a person of privilege". Existence of depression and anxiety across all socioeconomic strata proves that logic w…

No, there is no circular argument. If someone thinks the world is an OK place, either they're speaking from a position of privilege or they are lying. Assuming privilege is in this case the kindest interpretation of their words.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#172

The world is a scary and violent place. Without Liveleak, you might never feel it. Until you see the actual violence and gore, it doesn't mean anything, it's just empty words. I didn't care at all about wars in the middle east until I saw the reality on Liveleak. Seeing dead children and people with their legs blown off made all the commentary on CNN and Fox seem so understated. A lot is said about desensitization as…

I remember American TV regularly showing things like Palestinian children blown to bits back in nineties, or atrocities of wars in Africa, and then it somehow just disappeared.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#173

The world is a scary and violent place. Without Liveleak, you might never feel it. Until you see the actual violence and gore, it doesn't mean anything, it's just empty words. I didn't care at all about wars in the middle east until I saw the reality on Liveleak. Seeing dead children and people with their legs blown off made all the commentary on CNN and Fox seem so understated. A lot is said about desensitization as…

While I think visibility of these horrific things is important, watching too many or dwelling on them just isn't healthy. It reminds me of this opinion article on watching police videos:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/06/12/why-i-can...

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#174

I happen to think a lot of the pandemic denial and downplaying had to do with the media's refusal (for valid privacy reasons) to show what was actually going on in ICUs everywhere. The lack of graphic coverage kept the pandemic's worst effects out of sight, out of mind for a lot of people, allowing them to focus on and rage against the less important side-issues like how awful masks are and how upset it made them to…

I took it really seriously when I saw videos of hospitals in NYC stacking bodies in a freezer truck because there were just too many. They should have shown that more. I usually assume anchors and reporters exaggerate for ratings today, so they've lost a lot of credibility. When I see a video, I get an unfiltered view of what's going on.

As a side note, I implore people to watch police interaction videos and how often they are captured on video casually violating civil rights as standard operating procedure. YouTube has endless content of this. It will make you think twice about the reality of world you live in. If it bothers you, call your mayor or city government.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#175
post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The only thing Reddit is killing right now is Reddit itself, with their odd UX redesign decisions. Also, Reddit went from being a place with a lot of room for freedom of speech to a place that disallow a lot of discussions on different opinions and wedge issues. Even Twitter is now more open to diversity of opinions.

No, the 1-2 punch of Reddit and Discord have all but decimated the old vBulletin forum days. If you have a niche interest, Reddit and Discord are pretty much the only place to find a community for it. It's very dominant in that space now. I'm pretty much forced to use Reddit or else disconnect from communities I'm interested in.

> No, the 1-2 punch of Reddit and Discord have all but decimated the old vBulletin forum days. If you have a niche interest, Reddit and Discord are pretty much the only place to find a community for it. It's very dominant in that space now.

You missed the point. Reddit redesign is ensuring everybody flocks back to a more readable form of social media that does not look like reddit redesign.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You consider Reddit usable? I stopped using Reddit a few years ago, recently came back and tried both the website and (dark-pattern driven) mobile app. It's distinctly worse. Everything seems to have been re-engineered to drive "engagement" and/or mindless consumption.

If they ever kill old.reddit.com, I'm outta there. The redesign was awful.

Try using one of the few alternative front-ends like Teddit or Libreddit

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#178
post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think the very fact that reading those descriptions is confronting, if it is to you as it is to me, is evidence that you do need exposure to understand that horrible things happen in the world. I understand it academically, but every time I see or read something like this I realise that I don't really understand it.

it's just sick entertainment covered by explanation "I need to see how horrible the world is", and being the audience you create demand for future shock content at expense of human lives. There're better ways to educate yourself and make the world a better place.

On the contrary, I don't find it entertaining at all. In fact I generally can't bring myself to watch LiveLeak videos, those text descriptions are my limit. But I do think my understanding of such situations is poorer for not doing so.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#179
post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The world is a scary and violent place. Without Liveleak, you might never feel it. Counter-point; the world is mostly a neutral, even OK, place, with also violence in it. Our cognition is heavily biased towards saliencing and preserving the scary bits, and being exposed to a planet scale showcase of those bits does not necessarily make us wiser (e.g. better decision makers). At least for me personally it took a dec…

>it also had an inherent grounding in bare reality, compared to the narratively embellished one of mainstream media I disagree. It will only show one side of the bare reality, as the actions taken by more organized militaries will prevent their footage from ending up there. An Al Qaeda execution could end up on there, but the video of the execution of someone like Bin Laden rarely would.

LiveLeak was essentially ISIS propaganda.

Re: LiveLeak shuts down after 15 years online

#180

Four LiveLeak videos will always stay in my head. WARNING: even in text this stuff is horrifying. Stop reading if you don’t want to have nightmares. 1) an ISIS video where a 7 year old kid or so goes through a building where a bunch of hostages are tied up. He shoots them dead in succession. He looks like he’s about to cry throughout the whole video — but he doesn’t. 2) a completely covered up woman(?) in Iran is exe…

LiveLeak definitely had the ability to change you. There was a video from a dashcam where a couple is driving down a road, and a brick or rock falls off a truck driving the opposite way. It bounces on the road before slamming through the windshield and instantly killing the wife sitting in the passenger seat. Whenever I feel like a member of my family has gotten on my last nerve, pushed me to my limit, I think of the…

Be careful with that stuff. There are only so many scars you can accumulate before it really affects you. Life will give you scars all by itself eventually, no need to seek them out.
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