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A Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web [pdf]

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Re: A Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web [pdf]

#161

Post by dang »

makomk wrote: post #91

Extreme left is probably not quite right, "totalitarian left" would probably be closer to the mark. A left that considers all its views and actions beyond question and wields social justice ideas as weapons against dissent. For example, remember how every criticism of Hillary Clinton the neoliberal warmonger was and still is blamed on misogyny? How Sanders and his supporters were smeared as sexists and racists and al…

> Extreme left is probably not quite right, "totalitarian left" would probably be closer to the mark

The combination of name-calling ('totalitarian') and ideological ranting makes this comment cross the line of what's seriously off-topic here. Please don't post like this.

We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14630220.

Re: A Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web [pdf]

#162

Post by sinxoveretothex »

maxerickson wrote: post #157
sinxoveretothex wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think one has to see populations as distributed along a normal distribution (a bell curve) or some other probability distribution rather than somehow coalescing to a single "representative individual". Protesters represent one tail of the distribution on some measure (e.g. "belief in social justice"). The fact that protests get more intense and/or more frequent and/or more populous are indications of a shift in the…

Even if you do something like assume a bimodal distribution with small variance, the mere presence of protests doesn't tell you much. It's not even particularly clear to me that protests have gotten more frequent. When I was in school 15 years ago there were enough protests; I just ignored them...

Well, yes, if you're asking are there more or less of those things we'd call "protests", then it's not clear at all that there are any more or less than at some other point in time. I mean, I saw a protest on the street the other day: it was two guys and a policeman…

You'll notice however that is a far cry from a representative summary of my point.

Anyway, there are people who've researched this, notably Jonathan Haidt. They created a website to talk about the problem here: https://heterodoxacademy.org/ . And they think that there is a problem of shrinking viewpoint diversity in the social sciences. My experience is that it's gotten worse, but we don't seem to be able to agree on that.

Re: A Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web [pdf]

#163

Post by Shaanie »

nathanasmith wrote: post #98
aphextron wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Extremely doubtful. 4Chan would be considered a "Chaotic Neutral" character. They do terrible stuff and great stuff, but no group can harness it for their own purposes. "Not your personal Army" is a common theme - which the study didn't even pay attention to. If the group smells blood they will attack, no matter who it is or what cause, "4 teh lulz." I mean that's where "Anonymous" basically originated. I think this…

>I think this sums up 2012 4chan perfectly. However things have changed drastically. There is an extremely rigid, narrowly defined viewpoint of alt-right Trumpism there now. If you do not fall in line with it, you will be ostracized and targeted for attack. Before it was all about the 'lulz' and attacking people for no good reason. It is now an organized right wing hate machine with a very specific ideology. /pol/ is…

There are plenty of people that do not see large parts of /pol/ as satire. In fact, I wouldn't be surprised if a majority of the posters on /pol/ largely agree with the general culture.

It's interesting to me that you assume that it's entirely satire because that's not at all the view I have, nor the view of my friends who regularly post there.

Re: A Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web [pdf]

#164

Post by Strang »

aphextron wrote: post #79
devmunchies wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hope its easy to see that the rise of this "cancer" and the alt-right was a natural response to the rise of the extreme left throughout popular media and in society in general. There is nothing wrong with moderate conservatism, but when one must keep their conservative views in the closet, and anything conservative (on Reddit, Twitter, or simply at work) is seen as an inferior view point rather than just a differen…

>There is nothing wrong with moderate conservatism That's the real tragedy here. Intelligent conservative thought has been completely lost to the rhetorical insanity of our current political climate. For a perfect example of this take a look at what has become of the National Review.

I remain an enthusiastic reader of National Review after ~17 years. What do you think has become of it?

Re: A Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web [pdf]

#165

Post by thescribe »

yedava wrote: post #64
fiblye wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think one important question to ask here is: what caused the huge shift? Because it's something I noticed as well. Something happened that has pushed much of the general internet and large swathes of the "geekier" parts of the net to the right, and it doesn't seem to be letting up. The media ran with the "Russian shills" thing for a while, but it seems to be running out of steam and people I've known for years who…

I think part of the reason is the changing demographics of the geekier parts of the Internet. As hitherto absent groups of people entered geekdom, it produced a defensive reaction. The way I see it, it is easier to express liberal sentiments than to actually walk the talk. Kind of like how it's easier to profess feminism when it doesn't require any effort from your side than when you are married and have kids and are…

I know several software engineers who always smile and nod when politics come up, they have been here forever but the last few years has pushed them over some tipping point where they became vocal.

Re: A Study of 4chan’s Politically Incorrect Forum and Its Effects on the Web [pdf]

#166

Post by patrickg_zill »

KirinDave wrote: post #159
patrickg_zill wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

re 1: so only the computer-related companies are smart enough to understand and then take advantage of such effects? The count has remained unchanged since the late 1990s/early 2000s. Yet there are many who have crossed over the southern border each year since then. Therefore ...

Let's split this by paragraph. Sorry to fisk your post so much. > re 1: so only the computer-related companies are smart enough to understand and then take advantage of such effects? I think maybe you're misunderstanding me. Apple, Google, Oracle, and others have engaged in a wage fixing cartel that was exposed a few years ago. A big long summary was laid out here: https://pando.com/2014/03/22/revealed-apple-and-goog…

I think, you don't know anything about the H2A labor program, which is for ag workers. It's as much a wage fixing cartel as anything else. News article that can server as a quick backgrounder: http://www.southeastfarmpress.com/tobacco/north-carolina-gro...

Not really sure how to respond to the rest of your comment. I am stating that I do not believe the "there are 12 million illegals in the USA" statistic, because it has been repeated for about 15 years at this point, with no change. Yet areas that did not have illegals 15 years ago, now do; thus it seems the number of illegals has increased.

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