I avoid it as much as I can. I'm not a fan of the outrage addiction, and I'm highly suspicious of gaining any reliable information about events from an echo-chamber, even if it's on "my side" of the political spectrum.
That and even if I agree with a lot of the posts you’ll notice that they’re posted by the same people at a very alarming rate. I’ve ran through and blocked anyone who posts the same topic every 6 minutes. Since then my feed has been less monotonous and slightly more authentic.
I blocked one heavy news poster and am probably about to block another. How do people reasonably find time to do this, precluding unfathomable resources and hired help to do everything but eat, sleep and excrete? Even then, why would you want to? I am a month into classes (they are depressing when you realize how business - centric and human adverse they are, but necessary for reasons), and not doing daily short walks and I already miss them. Even if reading and parsing that much news and politics is humanly possible, why would one want to do that?
In my eyes, there is no avoiding politics. Ignorance is bliss, knowledge is power, and choosing ignorance means choosing to ignore something that directly affects you. I feel I need to know what's happening in politics, so I can know when and how I can be most effective with direct action. Part of understanding what I see in the news also requires an in-depth understanding of history and other seemingly innocuous news stories, so I have the appropriate historical knowledge to understand how and why it affects politics. Staying informed also protects me from being manipulated by politicians and the specific news I consume.
Maybe the question was avoiding discussing politics? It is not like Lemmy being good source of unbiased news…
For me the problem is that virtually all political content and discussion online is very low information. Generally no one is conveying anything I haven't already heard many times, it's mostly remixing slogans and truisms and finding different ways of expressing the same simplified opinion. Questioning that stuff or asking for nuance to be addressed gets met with aggression. The more I'm exposed to it the more I feel like my brain is rotting, definitely does not feel like I'm learning things.
Generally no one is conveying anything I haven’t already heard many times, it’s mostly remixing slogans and truisms and finding different ways of expressing the same simplified opinion.
The problem with never fixing the problems we all face is that the solutions dont change. You're not going to hear any new answers if you keep asking the same questions.
How many different ways should we rearrange the chairs on this sinking boat before we abandon ship?
To expand on what you said, I think many people like that bliss. It’s easier to be ignorant and happy.
choosing ignorance means choosing to ignore something that directly affects you.
what does lemmy have to do with any of this
Like the fucking plague.
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99% of it is American and I'm not. So what the fuck could I even do about it if I wanted to?
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There's nothing I can do to change someone's mind on ANY subject on here.
I'm just here to find interesting stuff, make a funny comment or 2 or find answers to some questions I may have. That's about it.
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Specifically on lemmy, I tend to keep it to a minimum. Lemmy seems to have an issue with one-sided discussion and lack of nuance, even ourside of the blatant propaganda.
Outside of Lemmy, I follow it, but try to keep it to a low rumble seeing as I can't really have any effect on it in my country.
Same here
I try and inject nuance into what tends to be mono-culture leftist discussions and/or propaganda more often than not. However, it rarely results in anything but my own frustration.
I'm not even remotely a conservative, I'm just a liberal (because that term gets thrown around way too much: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liberalism).
I'm moving in your direction ... but sometimes it's really hard to say nothing.
Define avoid? Actively repelled by any political discussion?
Or
Will lerk in a political community and not commenting due to not wanting to dip a toe into the toxic gas lighting pool?
Or something normalized in between?
I’m a political lurker for sure. I want to read about people’s ideas - even if they challenge my own. However, I don’t like to debate or have many in depth political conversations myself.
Yes, avoid.
Try to, comments tend to ruin it
im gonna filter out gaza now.
Yep, that's pretty much my list as well.
You can try to avoid politics all you want, it won't avoid you.
I only avoid discussions with the hardcore leftist anarchist/communist groups because there is a big overlap between those communities and absolutely brain dead moderation policies.
Comments that have been removed/gotten me temp banned from Lemmygrad and .Ml include:
“millions of people died under Stalins rule”(banned, “misinfo”)
Someone commented “nuke Texas” I said something to the effect of “yes blow up the 49% of Democratic voters” -comment removed, comment calling to nuke Texas left up
Having comments edited by bots and mods so you don’t hurt anyone’s fee fees
There are other examples if I go through the mod log. Lemmy.Ml in particular takes an absolutely wild amount of mod/admin actions compared to any instance.
Tl;Dr: yes but not because of politics, because Lemmy leftists are the fucking worst
I filter out a few keywords so I don't get inundated with politics but can still get a little news in my feed. Just enough articles slip past the keywords to keep a good balance.
I never comment in political threads.
Is that even possible?
I would think.
oh 100% i avoid it completely. i advocate for things in my own space and my own community. I'm not wasting my time talking about this shit online with any of you. i already know what im doing in november and i know what i gotta do in my local community and i dont give a flying fuck what anyone on here has to say about any of it. aint trying to change a bunch of random stranger's minds (especially when i know we already pretty much agree on all the shit im already going to be doing)
and instead of policing my communities to attempt to help create a politically tasteful environment for myself, id rather just ... fucking avoid completely any political environment. problem solved, life easy
PS if you block ads, you should block most news
No, I don't avoid it. I love to discuss with my fellow impassioned Lemmy users be it politics or any other topic and I don't mind being heavily downvoted once in a while.
I hate politics because it's always the same argument; one side believes that humans are people and deserve to have rights, and the other doesn't. The fact there is even an argument over this shit at all makes me want to just blow this entire planet to fucking pieces.
It makes sense to temporarily avoid politics to stay sane, compartmentalization. To completely avoid politics I don't see how one is not either very low intelligence to not realize their apathy harms people, or is smarter and aware their apathy harms others and is ok with it. Either dumb or bad.
I try sometimes but as you can tell by my history, I often fail. I need people to populate the other communities more, though, so I can avoid politics lol. Find other communities and comment or post, try different sorts, like scaled or new, instead of just Top or Active.
This is my dilemma too! Most of the threads in my instance are politics.
It doesn't help that I'm actually quite interested in politics.
I just don't like discussing them online because of the minority of people can't remain civil.
No
Mods in many of the major communities are removing a lot of the comments that disagree with far left and socialist ideologies. Soon it’ll really just be the echo chamber it was always intended to be and this won’t be a problem.
im more eco-centrist (last political compass test), and hate russia
You should make your own community and do it right!
Do you mean politics as in the details of elections and minutia of governance?
Or do you mean the discussion for how we ought to live together?
The answer is not really to both.
I do try to avoid authoritarian idiots spouting fruitless nonsense, but they seem to be a tragedy of the commons for public discourse.
I try to (except from here I guess). I feel like a lot of political discussions here lack any nuance, and are often very US-centric. I'm moderately left wing myself, but I still often feel like I have little in common with the sometimes extremely left viewpoints here. They are usually also seem to be defended in a very black and white way. If you don't agree you're quickly deemed a fascist or nazi.
Honestly, I feel like online discussions often don't really achieve anything. Differing opinions are downvoted and often met with name-calling or accusations. I'd rather discuss in-person with friends and colleagues across the political spectrum, that tends to actually lead to a friendly sharing of thoughts rather than the unsatisfactory hate spewing you get online.
Most political stuff on Lemmy is either hardcore communist or US centric, neither of which I know much about so avoid.
I only pay attention to the UK centric stuff as that's what I understand being that I live here.
I generally avoid discussing it. I don't really hide my views in any way, but the threshold for me to partake in a political discussion is pretty high, as those tend to devolve into partisan shitflinging pretty quickly.
The modern political climate in my country is bad enough to make me suicidal, so I avoid as much of it as I can.
Good.
Mostly, yeah.
My politics don't conform to most parties or ideologies so I will almost always piss someone off. I look at most issues on their own and decide what makes the most sense to me. So I'm left on this and right on that but not part of any party.
Most of the time, yes. It always make me feel angry or sad.
Feel like here is one of a few places one can have some nice discussions, while for sure there is a general bias in opinions but people seem to at least sometimes read and answer on topic.
I do not.
Kinda? I decided to avoid political-discussion communities, but if politics comes up in anither community I might offer an opinion.
Nope. Politics to me is what everything ultimately comes down to. People have thoughts, and those thoughts are sometimes ideas, those ideas can then form philosophies, which when explored in the context of the world forms ideologies - logically reasoned systems of ideas that can be broken down into decisions and modifications that allow it to be implemented, which is politics.
To truly know what goes in the world we have created is to know politics, therefore to be uncurious about it is to be uncurious about the world itself.
I know people who are like that, and it seems they just consume products instead and get excited for the next product, I try not to think less of them, but if I'm completely honest it seems very childish to me, it's one thing to be ignorant of politics and history when you're 14 because all you care about is xbox, but when you're in your mid to late 20s struggling to parse basic allegories or recall what was in the news that year, its not great.
I avoid politics everywhere. I'm happier now than I was when I didn't avoid politics.
That’s good, glad to hear it!
I do. I hate politics.
I don't avoid it, but also don't comment my thoughts and opinions on everything because of narrative rules. I don't want to be harassed for a difference of opinion.
Also, I used to filter out trump, but stopped because of the upcoming presidential election. I'll probably filter him out again after the election. I also filter out elon musk.
what do you mean by narrative rules?
By the time I've blocked all the posts about sports ball, the politics can't fit through the filters. It's pretty relaxing. If I ever learn how any sport works, I'm gonna have to learn a new approach.
Avoiding politics is fucking gay, amirite bois?
No. Being politically active is of the upmost importance to me right now. I'm exhausted, but this election year is a matter of survival for queer people.
No, I just try to. My blocklist is like forty miles at this point
Edit: always entertaining to read rationalizations of "exposing myself to the constant depressing drudgery of political news coverage is like a moral imperative or some shit" btw
people 1) obsess over gathering intel as if they need to figure out what to do and then 2) stress over not doing enough and then 3) post shit online to feel like they're doing stuff and 4) continue the cycle so that they never have to look inward and work on themselves. focusing on systems is the ultimate distraction. but i guess folks caught in the cycle would say that focusing on the self is a distraction from systems... what a sad, miserable life it must be. i hope one day they see that systems are just made of people are try to help those around them first and foremost.... but it's always people with the most fucked up personal lives that dive deep into politics
Everything is political. It doesn’t have to be partisan but even saying, “A plague on both your houses” is political.
I sway back and forth. I'll get into a heavy debate about something. It just burns me right up. I need to chill afterwards for a week or so.
Me.
Block certain communities, block certain people that sometimes go outside them with political posts. I'm guilty of that now and then so you should block me to.
My bad, I am posting while on my breaks at my part time jobs so sometimes I screw up. But lemmy is for everyone, you should make it how you want. Start utilizing the tools here to shape it your way.
Peace.
I try
Not necessarily, but I do engage less with it because there seems to be a lot of group think here (seems the majority are leftists and alternative viewpoints get downvoted).
If it was more distributed across the political spectrum, I might be more interested.
Yeah, Lemmy is a fairly extreme echochamber.
if a dozen people independently decide that your ideas are indefensible, to you that looks like a group, but really it's just a bunch of people reading something shitty. to dismiss that as "group think" sort of highlights something about you more than the platform, doesn't it?
no one told me to say this
You seem to be assuming the platform is a random, representative sample of the general population, which I don't think holds up. I think it's much more likely that there's a reason the platform skews left, and my guess is that it's a mix of:
- the devs are pretty hardcore socialists, so the people who could put up with that in the early days were left-leaning - this is backed up by lemmy.ml generally being more leftist than most other instances
- people too far right for other platforms probably already left for places like Truth Social, Voat (is that still a thing?), and similar platforms
- people too far left for other platforms didn't have a clear place to go AFAICT
- people annoyed by Reddit's corporatism probably lean more left on average; Reddit already leans left, so this would attract the more extreme of that population
That's my take. I honestly don't read too much into it, so I generally don't bother with the political posts because the discussion seems a bit too group think-y to really be constructive.
If you have statistics from a broad, random sample that demonstrate that lemmy opinions are well distributed, I'm happy to change my mind. But "eat the rich" as a meme here really isn't a thing I've experienced in real life, so I really don't think lemmy is all that politically diverse.
Sometimes.
I just don't get too too invested into it. A lot of people just like to make wild assumptions, they love to pretend that they know more than what's already available for information, the equally wild takes, the baseless accusations and the word salad that they all actively scramble to sound smart.
I give an opinion of my own most times, but I don't breathe politics. I know where I stand, so it is just personally amusing for people to always sort me into where they think I am because they all think black and white towards anything.
Why would I avoid politics on the politics platform?
