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Is the bot/troll situation getting worse?

It feels like the amount of both, divisive posts and ghoulish comments is rising again.

One could argue that the world has a lot of divisive stuff going on and lemmy just talks about it. But the way people post about stuff seems more oot and hateful than it has been in the past.

Not saying it is that but if I wanted to bring the Fediverse down or at least keep my customers from going there, I would sow this stuff as much as I can.

I'm blocking ghouls left right and center atm but if I ever asked a friend to join lemmy, I'd hate to think of what they would see that I dont anymore.

Do we need stronger moderation?

  • Maybe ban politics from c/memes?
  • Become a little more stringent on "dont be a jerk" rules in communities?

One thing that really bothers me is the collapsing "discourse". Trying to mend fences and keep the conversation between sides going ime leads to nothing but downvotes and shitstorm.

I feel like a little more interaction (instead of intervention, at first) of the moderators would do wonders there.

Thanks for reading this rant. Have a nice day.

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  • Yeah I've encountered a few accounts lately who either have mental health issues or are bots designs to stir discord. Their entire posting history is divisive shit stirring.

    Funny how every 4 years the internet gets markedly nastier. I wonder why???

    • Yes. Exactly what I‘ve seen as well. The election year thing might be the reason though. I know a couple people with mh issues. They’re no problem. These accounts either belong to severely deranged individuals or bots.

      • Yep I remember this pattern of behavior distinctly from last time.

        One of the big ones that sticks out is you start seeing a lot of people claiming to be democrats or left aligned showing up all of a sudden and being big time concern trolls and talking about sitting out the election and/or claiming that there's no difference between voting democrat or republican, which is demonstrably absolute horse shit.

        And just a lot of added vitriol. It seems like even politically unrelated discussions get meaner and more argumentative. I expect it's just gonna get worse as we get closer to November. It's only the beginning February. Ugh.

        • Yeah, I‘ll just block communities now instead of people, until morale improves. :)

          Thanks for elaborating. I enjoyed reading it.

          One thing that makes me sad about lemmy is that if you find people with „based“ opinions, longer/more regular discussions with them seem impossible. I used to talk to folks in reddit pms a lot when i was at my worst. Helped me immensely.

          Well, have a good one.

      • Not discrediting mental health issues, but being "severely deranged" is a mental health issue

        • I had to check because I used the word meaning something else. You are correct. It is described as losing grip with reality, turning mad or insane. That would by definition be a mh issue.

          What I meant was hurting others on purpose, e.g. for fun or other means. I dont know a good word for that. Maybe evil, abusive?

          To be clear: I dont discriminate based on mental health issues, only on intent.

174 comments