Replace:
X - Earth is round Y - Earth is flat
and read again. Some Y people probably started existing this way, because other Y people didn't reject them even though Y makes no sense and wasn't proven.
... but idk i could be wrong
this post was submitted on 18 Nov 2023
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Most conspiracy theories really have little to do with the belief itself, the people that get sucked in are often just lonely and looking for a purpose.
I also believe that a lot of conspiracy theories were started as jokes, with a core group of reasonably smart people LARPing a ridiculous position. What I wonder about is how many of those people LARPed so long and hard that they came to believe their own BS.
More likely, a bunch of people joined who didn't understand it was a joke (fairly common online)
People being assholes about it is definitely part of why I oppose X
It's not easy, but I think people should have a value system that's independent from how others behave.
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Why let assholes influence your world view at all?
I'm pretty sure he's making a joke about the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.
I was hoping to say both at once tbh
I'm feeling more charitable towards landlords lately, largely because of this site. I might even tip mine next rent payment.
X, the former Twitter, or another company called X?
X, the porn website
X the character as used in math problems.
Are you also so incredibly smart?
That's pretty cringe of you.
My loathing of X grows
So being a dick and acting holier than thou causes people to abandon my cause... Hmm... Maybe I should call those people stupid, that'll positively impact the world, surely.
If a person being mean to you caused you to abandon a cause, you didn't really believe in that cause, you just wanted to be in a club.
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There's actually some useful information here if you ignore the hyperbole.
If you act like a jerk and are mean to people, you will drive people away from your causes, even if you are taking a position that is strongly defensible from a moral and ethical view. If you take the view that "I don't have to do the emotional labor to educate you, OMG read some theory, you're fucking stupid if you can't understand this, you don't deserve to live if you think Y," etc. you aren't going to win people over. And yes, if you are always acting like an asshole, you're probably going to drive people away that believe similarly to you, because they won't want to be associated with assholes. That's human nature, and something that you need to learn to contend with if you want to win adherents to any political or social position.
In other words: leftists and feminists, fucking get over yourselves.. You may not want to put in the emotional labor because it's exhausting, but you know who will? Fascists, nationalists, misogynists, and religious fundamentalists. If you just want to make fun of and vent at people on the right, you're only creating a more insular group that more and more people are going to end up hating. See also: hexbear,
there's a number of inauthentic right wingers that happily pose as leftists online to spur these sorts of things, its not something you can stop by lecturing people in online spaces.
This is good in person advice but in most cases this is a mostly online issue where bad actors and children are over represented.
I've absolutely, definitely met people IRL that have argued in exactly the way I outline. ...Although "argue" is charitable, since they're just haranguing their ~~victim~~ subject. I've also known plenty of people that claim that they know they aren't going to change the mind of the person they're verbally assaulting--because people can't change, I guess?--but that they want to win the hearts of the people observing. ...Which they also aren't doing, since they're appearing to be mean-spirited to observers. (And yes, there's nuance here, and I still firmly believe in punching Nazis.)
David McRaney has been talking for a while about what actually works for changing the way people think and believe (and he just recently published, "How Minds Change"), and Anthony Magnabosco has been posting street epistemology videos on YouTube for years. Both of them have found--to be really reductive--that you need to emotionally connect with the person you're talking to, and you need to ask open-ended questions that allow them to consider the foundations for their beliefs.
And to your point, yes, that's hard to do online. I get it. I often fall into the trap of arguing instead of being empathetic. So I need to take my own advice.
My human nature wanted to rail against what you were saying at a certain point (especially when you called out feminists and leftists) since I can relate to your target audience, but yeah. Good words.
FWIW, I am very much a leftist. I'm mostly an anarchist, although I also recognize that having a large, diverse, functioning society is extremely difficult--bordering on impossible--without some degree of authoritarian control. (And I've also seen just how paralyzed radically democratic groups can get, when they have to vote on everything.) I want the people on the left, the people that want a more equal society, to do better, because I think we can be better.
Being kind to people--not fake kindness, not kindness with an agenda, but just kind--can go a long ways for leftists. For women, well, I'm not a woman. But having women as friends and them being open with me about what they experienced as women went a long way towards opening my eyes.
And, FWIW, I started from a position of being deeply conservative, very religious, and having absolutist views on gender identity and gender roles, and the godly nature of capitalism.
I still remember some redditor arguing over why they believe BLM is bullshit because that one time someone was mean to them on the internet.
To repeat: Disproportionate police targeting by black people is BULLSHIT because they wrote a comment online that someone took offense to.
So it's not really about X; it's about how X made you feel.
Have seen this in vegan groups multiple times. "Used to be vegan, but no longer am because some vegans are mean".
I actually had this experience recently. I grew up eating meat but have been considering giving it up and eventually becoming vegan. Thing is, no one around me is vegan so I'd need some kind of support network. It's hard to walk away from ham if that's what you know and love. I posted a pretty innocuous question to one of the vegan communities and the general response was that it was a stupid question, I should already know the answer, and I shouldn't waste time posting questions like that. All that told me that if I were to go down this road, I'd be walking alone. So making the switch feels a lot harder and seems a lot more daunting. Not saying I'm giving up on it, but I definitely find it more intimidating knowing that if I try to find a network, I'll be scolded for being a newb.
I only became vegan once I moved to a city where that was more socially accepted. 8 years later, my family is still warming up to the idea. Having vegan friends definitely helps in the transition.
In the meantime, make better choices whenever you can.
Yup, trying. The siren call of milk and cheese is strong, but my red meat consumption is definitely down. Most pork is gone from my diet. Even bacon is a rarity. I recently discovered that I don't hate oat milk. So I'm making progress, but still have a lot more to do.
After years not touching dairy, milk and butter taste absolutely putrid to me. Oat milk is the best taste-value wise, but soy is still king nutricionally.
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You would think that they would be overly helpful when all they do is say it's the moral way to eat. Looking down on everyone who eats meat and then give you shit for trying to be on their side....weird.
I've personally spent a decent amount of time in vegan and vegan debate subreddits, so I could probably offer a bit of insight. My general approach goal was to be helpful and non-judgemental as possible, but to also be assertive. There are a few caveats in no particular order:
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If a post hits r/all, you get a lot of mean and rude people, as well as trolls. Suffering them gets draining. It's basically the cashier "it's not ringing up so it's free?" joke equivalent, but worse since it's not even in good faith. There's only so many times you can read "loll bacon" without getting a little depressed about humanity.
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For those that aren't trolling, many are highly misinformed. It can be challenging to manage their experience and present information in a way that doesn't bruise their ego a little. I've slowly learned to get better at this, but it's a process.
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Both people who were helpful and those who were rude helped me transition to veganism. The "rude" vegans often raised cognitive dissonance the most and really forced me to think things through myself. I'm sure there are plenty of people who might not respond in this way, but it did help me, and a lot of other vegans have said the same.
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Being vegan can be kinda depressing. When the large majority of society performs actions that you believe to be immoral, and you still have to integrate, it starts to tear at you a little. Sometimes it's just too much to put up with, and a mean little joke at someone else's expense slips out. That's why we had places specifically for that sort of venting. But then people (usually with an agenda) would point to those places, and use them as examples, and you get the MEAN VEGAN stereotype.
Exactly! It felt like going to a church that immediately condemns its parishioners and then wonders why it has no parishioners.
A lot of them do it for the dopamine of feeling better about it. Not out of a rational decision to be better. Most people live and die by what gives them their feel good chemicals
It's just human psychology. A lot of them do it as much because it makes them feel superior to others as for moral reasons. People failing at it makes them that much more special for succeeding.
Yeah that’s the thing. Difficult changes are difficult. Sometimes that’s not an excuse for pushing labor on strangers. Walking away from bigotry is hard but vulnerable people shouldn’t have to constantly justify their existence. But a lot of the time you need to answer the stupid questions you may not have asked. I went pescatarian quickly, and it was less hard than expected, but it took several people I know doing it before I felt comfortable.
Newbs are how you get people in your group. Nobody wants to join groups that were mean to them even if they want to do the thing the group does.
The big thing for me is that if you think a question stupid and not worth your time to answer, you can just not answer. You can keep scrolling. To take time out of your day to inform someone that interacting with them is a waste of your time, when you can choose not to interact at all, seems extra unnecessary.
I looked at your post briefly, and it seemed like asides from one or two down voted responses, you got a majority of fairly informative answers, no?
I know when I've had a conversation that I've felt was overly negative, sometimes I'll go and review it again after a time so I can be a bit more objective and consider if negativity bias wasn't playing a part in my initial assessment.
If you've got any more questions, I hope you'll still ask. I think the majority of us would be happy to answer!
Can we be friends, internet stranger?
Sure! ^_^
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Vegan subreddits are so aggressively hostile.
But then being mean to vegans seem to be normal in so many places.
It's a strange circle.
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If you shift your diet over people being mean to you, I really worry for you.
Im not even vegan, but if you want to eat a specific way and you stop because someone called you names on the internet Im not gonna lie, I do think youre kinda dumb. The internet trolls should not impact the food you order or cook for dinner.
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I am not incredibly smart, but I am smart enough to be aware of my own shortcomings. And those confirm this. I do often find myself supporting irrational positions because I don't want things to go the way that lots of awful people want it to. My desire for their cause to fail is stronger than my rational ability to analyze what would actually be best. That's how the human mind works.
People are complex. We are not binary.
It's why we should always call out whataboutism.
Hating mustard doesn't mean you support ketchup.
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