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The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

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Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#431

Post by LAC-Tech »

wpietri wrote: post #420
civilized wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "my life as a member of group X should be better than that of other groups" is a political position. This isn't at all what the GP said, and that fact is one of the biggest reasons we don't like engaging in these types of conversations: a hostile stranger is liable to stop in and hammer you with a comment that reeks of contempt and disdain, and egregiously distorts what you said. "I don't want to experience all the…

Quoted post unavailable.

It isn't what he said, but it's apparently what he meant.

Again with the mind-reading. Maybe people don't want to talk politics because so many people debate in bad faith and not only put words in peoples mouths, but thoughts into their heads.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#432

Post by kerblang »

shireboy wrote: post #123

I'm in that group. I've consciously cut out Facebook and Twitter in part because of the toxic echo chambers they've become. HN is about the only place I'll wade in sometimes because the level of discourse seems higher. A little rabbit trail though: Looking at the graph in the article, I'm wondering if US isn't ripe for a party system change. It's not _always_ been Republican vs Democrat in our history. Both sides are…

Personally I was encouraged by

> In Gallup's 2021 polling, 29% of Americans identified as Democrats ... 27% as Republicans ... and 42% as independents.

Politics is a dirty but necessary business, and for many of us it's far better to keep parties at arm's length. Of course you can still donate to your favorite candidates regardless. In open-primary states like texas it isn't even necessary to join up, should you feel a need to contribute to certain lesser evils.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#433

Post by 0xbadcafebee »

manmal wrote: post #419
MiddleEndian wrote: post #147

I got my twitter account MyfirstnameMylastname somewhere early in the site's existence, probably around 2009. But never really got the appeal of Twitter so I never used it for anything, I'd check it once every six months or so. I eventually learned I share a name with a tech journalist who is very active on Twitter, and occasionally I would get tagged instead instead of him. Every time, I would respond with the Navy…

Is there something else to learn from this story besides not insulting people?

Yeah, actually a fundamental rule of comedy: always get the audience on your side. If they don't know you, aren't rooting for you, or think you're on the "wrong side", they will misinterpret your joke as a real insult. Comedians directly insult people all the time and get laughs, but only because the audience believes they're on the same side as the comedian.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#435

Post by pxtail »

0xedd wrote: post #399

Don't use Twitter. It's rigged to piss you off. Use federated microblogging and join a like minded instance. I don't know about web 3.0 but the former is very appealing and works ok.

How to discover these instances? I would imagine that downside of this approach would be the danger of existing only within certain bubbles and never being exposed to different point of view.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#436

Post by Wojtkie »

gameman144 wrote: post #383
rNULLED wrote: post #359

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Consider that so many people do not care to preserve the environments of online public spaces. While the pollution of digital environments with semiotic trash is less tangible and persistent than the beer cans, cigarette butts, and used needles on the streets of our cities, can you really defend its production? What kinds of cultures, mindsets, and personalities would this breed? Yes, there are far worse things. But…

One man's semiotic trash is another man's humorous treasure. Note that I'm not saying that I'm a fan of low-quality posts like this, just that I feel that the lion's share of Twitter is low-quality posts, so it seems odd to single out a copy-pasta meme as being unworthy while allowing... well, the rest of Twitter.

Should have pulled a KenM and just replied with extremely geriatric answers and explanations to everything

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#437

Post by trhaynes »

Clubber wrote: post #361
singingboyo wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I generally agree, though I don't think the "saintliness" even matters. The queen as seen by the public is probably a persona, sure, but so long as the persona stays put, she's a symbol of stability, and that is the whole point of the monarchy. This even shows up in tech - Bill Gates isn't exactly known for widespread political opinions, and while we all know he was probably not a great person early on, he's now gene…

>he was probably not a great person early on, he's now generally contributing to universally approved causes, and otherwise just there, so to some extent he's a symbol of the possibilities available through tech. You probably haven't been following Gates lately. His reputation has tarnished in the last couple of years.

Do you have a source or examples?

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#438

Post by dragonwriter »

kerblang wrote: post #432
shireboy wrote: post #123

I'm in that group. I've consciously cut out Facebook and Twitter in part because of the toxic echo chambers they've become. HN is about the only place I'll wade in sometimes because the level of discourse seems higher. A little rabbit trail though: Looking at the graph in the article, I'm wondering if US isn't ripe for a party system change. It's not _always_ been Republican vs Democrat in our history. Both sides are…

Personally I was encouraged by > In Gallup's 2021 polling, 29% of Americans identified as Democrats ... 27% as Republicans ... and 42% as independents. Politics is a dirty but necessary business, and for many of us it's far better to keep parties at arm's length. Of course you can still donate to your favorite candidates regardless. In open-primary states like texas it isn't even necessary to join up, should you feel…

> Politics is a dirty but necessary business, and for many of us it’s far better to keep parties at arm’s length.

Studies of voting behavior pretty consistently show that self-identified independents are, on average, either equally or very nearly equally reliably partisan in voting as those who identify with one major party or the other.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#440

Post by lazide »

sjmm1989 wrote: post #348
madrox wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My favorite theory comes from an HN comment describing it as the "toaster fucker problem." I'd attempt to re-explain it, but the original comment is great (and easy to search for. Not many mentions of the phrase "toaster fucker" on HN.) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25667362

My roommate basically put it in his project for university as a similar theory to Toaster Fucker. I too have a personal similar theory where I just refer to the 'village idiot'. They all basically revolve around one truth I think. The internet doesn't radicalize people. People radicalize people. The internet is just full of people who are already radicalized in their daily life, and they are using the internet to rad…

I don’t think so - my impression is that it’s feed algorithms pushing the most incendiary topics to people because they get the most engagement.

Nothing gets people going like someone saying something divisive or controversial after all.

So pretty soon most of the feed is divisive bullshit.

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