Saidit's level of discourse seems to be back

submitted by RuckFeddit from self.SaidIt

After the initial Reddit banwaves, the level of conversation here became terrible and almost as bad as reddit. It seems in the weeks since that this problem has disappeared, probably due to Mag's due dilligence and along with the other mods. While it was sometimes entertaining to watch shills argue with other shills, with them all gone it looks like we're back at the top of the pyramid again.

Thank you to all the mods for the time you put in, keeping this place clean from the bots and shills while at the same time maintaining an open platform for constructive discussion.

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[–][deleted] 14 insightful - 3 fun14 insightful - 2 fun15 insightful - 3 fun -  (4 children)

Well, they're not all gone, but their numbers have significantly decreased. As long as the Marxists have money to throw at neckbeards the'll be shills.

They hate that a place exists with real free speech — and are willing to do anything to tear us down, because human rights poses an existential threat to their ideology and power. But due to the work of Magnora, the other admins, and the community at-large we've been able to defend against this external threat. Big thanks to all yall!

I joined sometime after Reddit's banwaves (not a refugee, just a coincidence), so I can't really compare it to what was before, but I certainly have noticed that discussion has gotten much better.

[–]JasonCarswell 4 insightful - 4 fun4 insightful - 3 fun5 insightful - 4 fun -  (2 children)

If you mean communists when you say Marxists then I'd agree. There is a distinct difference. Most of those BLM "Marxists" are NOT Marxists but are rather communists, totalitarians, thugs, and shit disturbers. Also, capitalists can be just as bad if not worse.

[–][deleted] 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

Capitalism and Communism have more in common than either do with Syncretism. These materialist ideologies focus solely upon items and instant gratification, rather than the bonds between people and their shared commonalities.

Also, you can have Marxist Capitalism. Marxism is simply the application of Communist principles espoused by Marx to aspects of society. It may not be economically Marxist, but it is, indeed, Marxist in all but that. Especially culturally, since that's the entire point of BLM.

You can also have non-Marxist Communism, but it's quite rare, and I don't believe BLM falls into that category. Perhaps certain sects of Antifa do — since Anarchism is more commonly non-Marxist — but still largely embraces the teachings of Marx.

[–][deleted] 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

"We actually do have an ideological frame... we are trained Marxists." - Patrisse Cullors, Co-Founder, BlackLivesMatter

[–]CarlDung 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

amen, and kudos to you

[–]send_nasty_stuff 11 insightful - 5 fun11 insightful - 4 fun12 insightful - 5 fun -  (35 children)

You have to understand though that even though saidit is better than reddit it is not a free speech platform. Magnora7 uses the 'pyramid of debate' selectively and essentially curates the entire site to fit his political opinions. The direction saidit is going is not organic and user driven. It's top down. Checkout poal, ruqqus, or some of the more closed spaces like telegram, riot, etc.

[–]JasonCarswell 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (6 children)

Truth.

I'd like to see a more democratic process. However Socrates has a good point that the uneducated with the power of democracy is dangerous. So perhaps M7 could distribute and delegate to his trusted aids who have earned his trust for a kind of high council to oversee a dedicated open forum for finding solutions.

[–]send_nasty_stuff 8 insightful - 3 fun8 insightful - 2 fun9 insightful - 3 fun -  (5 children)

The problem is that the 'pyramid of debate' is a ruse. I believe in spirited debate that's devoid of fallacy and attack but not all social media is a 'debate' much of it is comedy, rhetoric, propaganda, art, etc. Creating a pyramid of debate as the metric applied across all communities essentially allows what ever king who is in charge of applying it an ultimate power to decide what is and isn't comedy or rhetoric or bad faith argument. A 'council' doesn't solve the problem. Maybe create a two tier site that has 'debate' subs and 'open' subs. Open subs would have their own space and their own rules. "debate" subs would be required to follow the pyramid.

It would be a little like reddits 'quarantine' function but with no negative stigma.

[–]JasonCarswell 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (3 children)

I agree that too much of the "judgements" are arbitrary, without clear examples, but I do like the simplicity and clarity of much of the Pyramid. For example, name-calling is obvious, refuting the core idea is obvious, etc. However, "downward" is not always so cut and dried with much undefined grey area leaving a LOT up to subjective authoritarian use/abuse. To add more confusion, "comedy" is all in the eye of the beholder.

Correct: A council does not solve ALL problems. It diffuses it and make it a systemic problem. Instead of fighting a single "enemy" you'd be fighting an entrenched "system". However, considering that SaidIt is an anti-authority platform (my words, not M7s) run by one dude it needs all the help it can get. If that means delegating the problem-solving to his minions under his veto-powered control, then that might lessen his burden, give him more time to do other things, make things run smoother - and remove much of the "human error" that is inevitably going to happen under one person.

Anyone can make their own instance of SaidIt, federated or not - or other similar forum platforms. With two-tiers or more.

I've considered starting a sub to discuss building a new SaidIt clone, how it would be open, transparent, democratic, etc. including predetermining new rules, how subs are created, managed, a new voting system, bot rules, and the need for metatags. Whether it's using SaidIt code or not, it would be nice to federate it too.

[–]send_nasty_stuff 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

Have you looked into lemmy?

https://www.reddit.com/r/linux/comments/hhce69/lemmy_an_opensource_federated_reddit_alternative/

[–]JasonCarswell 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

I know about it, but I don't know the community. I hear they've stalled in their federating efforts. I also heard they're commies though I don't know if that was a joke or exaggeration of the old-left or if they really are far left.

I don't like communism (nor capitalism), I have respect for some Marxism (ie. authentic informed democracy, authentic ground-up movements, all open cooperatives), and deeply care about decentralization.

[–]send_nasty_stuff 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

I think they 'stalled' on the federation efforts on purpose. Some fascists were starting to mess around with the platform and liked it (me and the boys) and I wouldn't be surprised if they were bought off to essentially halt the project.

People that design decentralized systems need to know that they are going to attract all types of groups but especially dissidents. That just goes with the terf. If your platform doesn't support/allow genuine dissidents then it's not a truly decentralized platform.

[–]justcool393 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

this is already the case somewhat. there are rules for moderators but if you don't want to follow them you can get off /s/all. using the quarantine function has much larger implications and is way more restrictive than removal from /s/all.

[–]RuckFeddit[S] 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (26 children)

Can you give examples?

[–]send_nasty_stuff 10 insightful - 2 fun10 insightful - 1 fun11 insightful - 2 fun -  (24 children)

Sure. Magnora7 took several of the subs I mod and blocked them from the s/new feed. He also went into our settings and unblocked a user that had been trolling our subverse. He did this without notifying us or even giving warning that we were violating the pyramid of debate (which we weren't). I have screen shots and proof on all this if anyone thinks I'm making it up.

The subverses in question

s/altrightwebm

s/debatealtright

[–][deleted]  (2 children)

[deleted]

    [–]SaidOverRed 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

    It looks like the altrightwebm (from a quick scan of the rules) does remove posts that are high on the pyramid of debate because those are supposed to go on the debateAltRight area, which appears fine except I do not understand the point of the third rule. If that disallows hypotheticals, then I find that troublesome. If it is of no consequence to those who simply blindly post, but do not lie, then I guess it's okay.

    [–]JasonCarswell 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

    I don't know about your "violations", regardless more communication is critical in these matters. Not his strongest suit.

    [–]AddledCorpse 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (19 children)

    Wait is this why i literally never see debate alt right in the front page despite being subscribed?

    I thought it was just dead

    [–][deleted]  (14 children)

    [deleted]

      [–]bobbobbybob 6 insightful - 1 fun6 insightful - 0 fun7 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

      having the vile hateful garbage that debatealtright spews out shown on the front page, isn't good for attracting new users.

      lol, whatever, loser

      Doesn't mean they can't exist though.

      How fucking magnanimous of you. User for 1 month

      I'm constantly impressed by the sheer level of hubris that drive retarded leftists

      [–][deleted]  (3 children)

      [deleted]

        [–]bobbobbybob 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

        jesus fucking wept.

        That kind of condescending speech might have served you well elsewhere, but here it just gets a swift "fuck off".

        [–][deleted]  (1 child)

        [deleted]

          [–]bobbobbybob 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

          Ah, another new 'expert', not shy to tell us how our own site works.

          This site is about discourse, debate and.... free speech, so go fuck yourself, you condescending twat.

          If you like I can add a paragraph of philosophical musings to drag this up the pyramid of debate, but personally, I like rolling around in the muck when it comes to a bit of mudslinging with leftist retards.

          [–]send_nasty_stuff 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

          So you fully admit that the admin of the site blocks certain subverses from being seen by saidit users? Also you're cool with a social media admin driving the site in a direction that is not organic and not reflective of a good chunk of the actual user base? You do realize that if he's going to do that during the early years of the site he certainly going to do it in the later years and there's a good chance that a community you mod or enjoy will be targeted for the silent treatment as well.

          [–]EuropeanAwakening 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

          Why is it vile and hateful for Europeans to advocate for their interests?

          Because you're an anti White. It's really that simple. You do not attack any other group the way you attack White people. This makes your agenda obvious.

          [–][deleted]  (5 children)

          [deleted]

            [–]Dragonerne 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (4 children)

            You don't have to say that you're anti white. We can smell it from a mile away. It's not racist to assume immigration is part of a sheme in the genocide of whites. How is it racist? Literally doesn't make any sense. Whites are allowed to have their own countries even if jews like yourself want our countries destroyed. It's extremely racist to suggest whites don't have a right to their own countries lol.

            [–][deleted]  (3 children)

            [deleted]

              [–]Dragonerne 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

              The far simpler explanation is people seeking out better lives for themselves.

              It's politically organised and it's against the wishes of the majority of the people. So no, it's not just a simple explanation, although it would be nice if the world was just simple.

              Who is saying white people don't have the right to exist?

              You said that it's vile, hateful and racist to assume immigration is making a race go extinct.
              Whites saying we don't want nonwhites in our countries is us exercising our right to our own countries. You have a problem with our self-determination and wish to eradicate us through forceful immigration of non-whites against the majority of whites wishes.

              Also do you alt righters have an alert system or something?

              I'm not alt right. I am left wing social democratic. You assuming i'm alt right because I proclaim that whites deserve a right to self determination and a right to their own countries is very telling of your entire "totally not wanting white countries to get destroyed"-world view. You probably support BLM too. Hard to be more mask off for you at this point and you're not hiding it very well.

              Please positively confirm:
              "Whites have a right to their own countries"
              "Whites deserve self-determination in their own countries"
              "Whites deserve their own countries like everyone else"
              "Whites have a right to refuse non-white immigration into their own countries"
              "Mass Immigration can be used to genocide a people in an area"

              If you disagree with one or more of them, then just say that you disagree with those.

              [–]send_nasty_stuff 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (3 children)

              Wait is this why i literally never see debate alt right in the front page despite being subscribed?

              Yes.

              I thought it was just dead

              Nope. Very much alive and also on ruqqus.

              https://ruqqus.com/+DebateTheDissidentRight

              [–]SaidOverRed 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (2 children)

              I am wary of censorship, so I subbed and then opened a saidit.net tab. I have debatealtright showing up (down a page and a half), specifically: https://saidit.net/s/debatealtright/comments/6k54/technology_and_liberalism/ 3 hours ago

              Care to post an image of your front page u/AddledCorpse ? Maybe 3 pages down for us?

              [–]send_nasty_stuff 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

              It works for your own homepage but not in the general s/all or s/new.

              [–]SaidOverRed 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

              Isn't that expected based of saidit's FAQ? Like, the people who want that are still getting access. Maybe I'm missing something. Oh, you're saying it's de facto quarantined.

              Well, getting clarification on this would be nice, but first step is to get clarity on which subs are echo chamber subs (ie women only, alt right only, antifa only, etc) and which allow free discussion (like, apparently, the dissident sub discussed): https://saidit.net/s/SaidIt/comments/6esq/pyramid_of_debate_vs_echo_chamber_subs/

              [–]LarrySwinger2 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

              The National Socialism sub got banned. There was no content on it, but magnora7 equates promoting 1940s nazism with promoting violence (which someone else made a good counterpoint against), and the banner was also cited as a reason. See this thread for more information, and this one for the original discussion where you can find magnora7's statements.

              [–]magnora7 7 insightful - 3 fun7 insightful - 2 fun8 insightful - 3 fun -  (1 child)

              I agree it's getting better lately, and I'm thankful to everyone who stuck around and kept posting high-quality posts and comments, even during the worst of it. It took a while to identify and uproot the people and groups causing most of the trouble that was lowering the level of discourse.

              [–]SaidOverRed 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

              Ah man, that feels good. I specifically started participating because I figured that would happen!

              [–]missdaisycan 2 insightful - 6 fun2 insightful - 5 fun3 insightful - 6 fun -  (5 children)

              Also helps to ban women who aren't keeping their opinions to their own subs, right?

              [–]Extract 4 insightful - 2 fun4 insightful - 1 fun5 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

              Nobody bans GC and similar morons from spewing their smoothbrain "opinions" outside of their safe spaces.

              If anything, it's them who screech "MOOOOOOOOODS" every time they are suddenly reminded that most people actually see their self-delusions for what they are.

              [–]Tom_Bombadil 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

              Are you one of those dudes who removed their penis?

              [–]missdaisycan 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

              If you are replying to me, no I'm not. I'm a woman who has heard from banned women, women who did not comment solely on women's subs. No reason for ban given to them, so assuming dudes "got too upset".

              [–]Tom_Bombadil 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (0 children)

              If you are replying to me, no I'm not.

              That's Good.

              I'm a woman who has heard from banned women, women who did not comment solely on women's subs.

              I occasionally comment on the women's subs.
              I don't see any problem with that.

              No reason for ban given to them, so assuming dudes "got too upset".

              You're probably right.

              The women were probably banned by one of the dudes who had their penis chopped off.

              Those dudes have issues.

              [–]SaidOverRed 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

              I know you meant that as a joke, but I specifically gave you an insightful because ... well ... that's what they do. It's kind of funny when they ban people because they think you're a man.

              [–]Antifa 3 insightful - 2 fun3 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

              The sudden influx of genitalia obsessed identity morons was infuriating.

              [–]SaidOverRed 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (1 child)

              At first, I welcomed them. I thought open dialogue was the best policy. That means putting my mouth where my brain was and trying to open dialogue. Of course, you were right and it just resulted in random bans, stalking, and attacks/insults for no reason like I never actually had happen to me before.

              And I'm not talking about random users. I'm talking about their mods (leaders). Alas, I suppose I was too idealistic. I had never blocked anyone before. For all I know it's still happening and I just don't see the graffiti replying my posts.

              [–]Antifa 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

              The hypocrisy was hilarious.

              'We were censored in Reddit, our free speech taken!' Then they cried out when encountering differing opinions.

              [–]ANIKAHirsch 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (13 children)

              I'm a new user here, so I don't know how it was before. But I think the discourse here will naturally improve as Saidit gains more users.

              [–]bobbobbybob 4 insightful - 1 fun4 insightful - 0 fun5 insightful - 1 fun -  (10 children)

              the discourse was great and THEN we got more users.

              Bigger is not necessarily better, as the cancerous growth and decline of reddit has shown

              [–]ANIKAHirsch 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (8 children)

              Well I just think that more users could lend more balance.

              Reddit went downhill for other reasons. Namely, they sold out to the Chinese government.

              [–]bobbobbybob 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (7 children)

              Reddit went downhill for other reasons. Namely, they sold out to the Chinese government.

              Matter of opinion. The gross leftists circle jerking (yikes!) and development of reddit-tier speech / response patterns (that make me a little ill) grew all on its own, due to large numbers of manlets.

              [–]ANIKAHirsch 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (6 children)

              Not opinion, a well-reported fact.

              https://techcrunch.com/2019/02/11/reddit-300-million/

              https://www.theverge.com/2019/2/11/18216134/reddit-tencent-investment-deal-memes-amount-winnie-the-pooh-tank-man-china

              https://gizmodo.com/reddit-banned-in-china-is-reportedly-set-to-land-150-1832375439

              https://www.fool.com/investing/2019/02/08/tencent-invests-social-platform-reddit.aspx

              https://www.thestreet.com/technology/tencent-invests-150-million-in-reddit-14863248

              https://time.com/5526128/china-reddit-tencent-censorship/

              https://www.reddit.com/r/pcgaming/comments/aoj17w/reddit_just_got_a_150_million_investment_from/

              https://www.bbc.com/news/business-47194096

              https://fortune.com/2019/02/08/reddit-is-blocked-in-china-but-may-land-a-massive-investment-from-tencent/

              [–]bobbobbybob 1 insightful - 2 fun1 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 2 fun -  (5 children)

              Reddit went downhill for other reasons

              Is the part I was contesting, not that they sold out. You have not shown causation.

              [–]ANIKAHirsch 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (4 children)

              Uh-huh.. 150 million is causation enough.

              [–]bobbobbybob 3 insightful - 4 fun3 insightful - 3 fun4 insightful - 4 fun -  (3 children)

              before all that money rolled in, much of the cancerous groupthink processes were in place. those stupid thread patterns u

              ..k

              ...n

              ....o

              .....w

              what i mean

              plus the retarded language. like, yikes! sweetie, let's just stop a moment and unpack this

              etc.

              it was a shithole long before it sold out, which is why there are OLD red-it alternatives for everyone tired of that shit

              [–]ANIKAHirsch 2 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 2 fun -  (2 children)

              That stuff came over from Tumblr, when Tumbler sold out and killed itself..

              There's no doubting Reddit got a lot worse after the deal with China.

              [–]bobbobbybob 1 insightful - 3 fun1 insightful - 2 fun2 insightful - 3 fun -  (1 child)

              There's no doubting Reddit got a lot worse after the deal with China.

              Almost made it to good faith debating.

              [–]forgottenpasswordguy 1 insightful - 1 fun1 insightful - 0 fun2 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

              That's a good point. Quality over quantity. We only need enough people to start talking about more niche topics than politics IMO. I don't think we're quite there yet but we don't need to be anywhere near as big as reddit for that.

              [–]forgottenpasswordguy 3 insightful - 1 fun3 insightful - 0 fun4 insightful - 1 fun -  (1 child)

              Hopefully we attract the right crowd. It seems like the most extreme are the first to migrate from other sites as they get banned, then the rules tighten up again and start to push out the normal people. I consider myself pretty moderate, but I'm big on supporting free speech and platforms that are friendlier towards that ideal.

              [–]ANIKAHirsch 2 insightful - 1 fun2 insightful - 0 fun3 insightful - 1 fun -  (0 children)

              Yes I think that's true. In my opinion, this site is the best alternative to Reddit right now. So I expect to see a lot of refugees from there soon, as the censorship is getting worse every day.