I’ve been using Lemmy for a while now, and I’ve noticed something that I was hoping to potentially discuss with the community.
As a leftist myself (communist), I generally enjoy the content and discussions on Lemmy.
However, I’ve been wondering if we might be facing an issue with ideological diversity.
From my observations:
- Most Lemmy Instances, news articles, posts, comments, etc. seem to come from a distinctly leftist perspective.
- There appears to be a lack of “centrist”, non-political, or right-wing voices (and I don’t mean extreme MAGA-type views, but rather more moderate conservative positions).
- Discussions often feel like they’re happening within an ideological bubble.
My questions to the community are:
- Have others noticed this trend?
- Do you think Lemmy is at risk of becoming an echo chamber for leftist views, a sort of Truth Social, Parler, Gab, etc., esque platform, but for Leftists?
- Is this a problem we should be concerned about, or is it a natural result of Lemmy’s community-driven nature?
- How might we encourage more diverse political perspectives while still maintaining a respectful and inclusive environment?
- What are the potential benefits and drawbacks of having a more politically diverse user base on Lemmy?
As much as I align with many of the views expressed here, I wonder if we’re missing out on valuable dialogue and perspective by not having a more diverse range of political opinions represented.
I’m genuinely curious to hear your thoughts on this.
Given the recent right wing takeover of other social media sites and the glorification of hate speech I am fine not seeing that bullshit spread here.
This is bad for the health of lemmy though, I think. A discussion board/framework should be politically neutral, while still employing rules on hate speech based on the voice of the masses.
If you want to talk hate speech, I’ve seen numerous accounts on lemmy instances of people advocating for murder or other violence against “billionaires” or anyone with a significant wealth. Or same with right-wing ideals, I’ve seen users advocating similar broad calls for violence based on pretty poor assumptions against the entire right-wing USA block.
there’s no such thing as politically neutral
Considering the Overton window, there’s also the fact that what is left and right varies from country to country and culture to culture. For example, a centerist in America would be considered right wing when compared to a centrist from Vietnam or Cuba.
If someone wanted to make a well-formed right wing argument I doubt they’d get too much backlash. But it’s all bigotry and lies and conspiracy theories at this point so they get shitcanned.
Fighting back against the ultra wealthy who are killing our people and our planet is not the same as punching down on minorities who are just trying to exist.
I think the idea that all viewpoints are equally valuable and need to be given equal weight or volume in discussions is incredibly fallacious. Left wing ideals are backed by a multitude of research as well as ethical and moral philosophies. I don’t know how you could be a leftist and say “what this place really needs is more right-wing voices” with a straight face. The whole “im just asking questions, everyone deserves to be heard, i just want to hear both sides of the argument” is a common tactic the right uses to try to seem reasonable and propagandize more people. Some ideas aren’t worth hearing out and can only do damage to those who listen.
A lack of opposing viewpoints is a fast-track to a closed-minded approach to interactions. I see far too many people, of all backgrounds, enter into engagements with a “you’re wrong and I’m right” mindset born from only entertaining their own ideals. Day after day of “other side bad” comments that entirely miss why that other side believes what they do in the first place. I don’t see how that helps anyone unless your goal is to pat each other on the back while the country drifts farther apart. Personally speaking, reading entire threads like this gets tiresome and while I am glad we don’t have the same level of bad faith right-wing spam that other platforms do, I wish we had a more open atmosphere.
Casualy defined leftist as brainwashed lol. You guys seem to love the “How to hate freespeech 101” course.
I would argue that wider community cohesion and thus tolerance of other viewpoints is important. Without hearing and understanding why these other points of view exist, understanding and accepting these people is hard.
Branding someone’s point of view as inherently or even ‘factually’ wrong is pretty blunt, alienating and invalidating IMO. I prefer a left-wing world view that tolerates people who don’t have the same understanding as me.
Patience and willingness to educate people is necessary in any community, as is a certain amount of tolerance for disagreement, in topics that aren’t harming anyone or restricting anyones roghts. In our current political environment, the predominent viewpoints of many people are outright dangerous and violent towards dissenters or outsiders, and those views do not deserve to be platformed. This is all based on context obviously, as everything is. If my neighbor is adamant that an unregulated free market society benefits everyone and is the best option despite all evidence to the contrary, and won’t be swayed by any argument or proof i offer, then fine. I just wont talk about the economy with them. But if my neighbor starts to say that trans people are mentally ill, and mexicans are subhuman, and palestinians deserve to be eradicated just for being born, thats a whole other matter. In the world we live in now we have to be very careful about what information is being propagated and consumed and absorbed by people who may lack the skills or understanding to resist it. As i said, some ideas are not worthy of repetition.
Yeah but this thread was supposed to be about whether ideological diversity is important, not whether hate speech is important.
It was about a lack of right wing viewpoints being problematic. Can you give me an example of a right wing viewpoint that is worth discussing, not scientifically unsound, not hateful, and is currently missing from lemmy? Cause if there is value in these ideas being discussed you must be able to give at least one example right?
The value is in being accepting that other people don’t see the world in the same way as you, and treating them with respect.
The value is having a society that is tolerant of diversity of opinion.
This is not an universal truth.
Nazism is explicitly deemed unworthy of respect in some legal systems, like Germany or the UK. MAGAs, white supremacists, and alt-righters are objectively too close to nazism, therefore their opinions are unworthy of respect to start with.
There is also the paradox of intolerance. If you let these people in, to respect their opinion, they will take over and deprive people of the right to live. They don’t play by tolerant society’s rules, so they they don’t get tolerated.
The value is having a society that is tolerant of diversity of opinion.
Here is the opinion of the scientific consensus on transgender people, which is have been so for years, if not decades.
We have been harassed, bullied, doxxed, and banned for bringing those up in all major social media platforms. TERFs, white supremacists, misogynists, racists, have always gotten away in these platforms with punching down on leftists, African and Caribbean reparations activists, feminists, and queer people. They were protected by equally bigoted moderators under the guise of entitlement to their opinion, at the same time that all these other opinions are bashed and framed as “overstepping”.
This is in line with what the EFF and Techdirt, which are both vocal First Amendment absolutists, have already said that what X and Facebook do now is in fact amplifying hate speech and effectively suppressing the free speech of gender and sexual minorities.
And this has been the situation for years, take for example the online harassment of feminists .
It is a deeply systemic bias, due to centrist indoctrination in broader society, that it is the leftist and inclusive spaces that are called out for lack of diversity for responding to harassment and bigotry, when the voices and lives of people are simply dominated and evacuated in major platforms without an iota of moderation and responsiveness to punch-down harassment.
Let alone that in the light of the most recent developments, which consolidates the above tendencies, makes the timing of the tolerance argument even more ironic and dishonest.
There is also the paradox of intolerance. If you let these people in, to respect their opinion, they will take over and deprive people of the right to live. They don’t play by tolerant society’s rules, so they they don’t get tolerated.
Do you not see the irony here of op being intolerant of sharing lemmy with people who do not share their viewpoint? You’ll note from my other comments here that I’m explicitly not arguing for hate speech. IMO this thread was actually about the lack of moderate alternative views on Lemmy, not about encouraging extremist narratives to take over the federation.
What I am arguing for here is to drop the unhelpful us-versus-them narrative and to argue that Lemmy could well learn to tolerate a wider range of opinions. This is not to say extreme and intolerant views such as the ones you have described should be permitted.
Yes and for some topics thats valid, and for some it absolutely is not. Like this discussion isnt even about being tolerant about other viewpoints, its about a lack of other views being problematic, and i dont consider a lack of hateful bile to be a problem in any way. I also dont consider those hateful ideals to be worthy of tolerating. I asked you for an example of a specifically right wing viewpoint thats not false, is worthy of discussion, and not hateful, and you gave none, so what is the point youre trying to make? And why should we make an effort to platform more right wing views when they are basically all hateful?
I think you’re missing my point.
@emeralddawn45 It depends on whether we are talking about the hateful far right or conservatives.
Some things frequently talked about by conservatives, classic liberals, and centrists include:
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Limitations on government power, including how to prevent a politician from becoming a dictator. This includes checks and balances on power, separation of power, and the dynamic between the states and the federal government.
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Protecting peoples civil rights, including the rights of minorities. Opposing police brutality, protecting free speech, protecting the right of association, protections against illegal search and seizures, etc.
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The right of people to own firearms, as allowed by the second amendment. This includes minorities and black people, who have the same rights under the Constitution as everyone else.
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Health care reform. They want health care reform as much as the left does, but they usually disagree on how to reform the health care system. For example, the left usually wants to create a government monopoly, while the right usually wants to break up monopolies and distrusts the government.
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How to give the power back to the people, since corporations and the elite seem to have taken over this country. Like #4, they agree that things need to change, but often have different ideas on how to change it.
I could go on.
Don’t confuse the hateful right with the moderate centrists and right-leaning voters. Most people have the same concerns the left does, but have a different perspective on it. And most people aren’t hateful. Maybe misinformed, but not hateful.
Remember that they asked for things that are currently missing from Lemmy. Do you think any of those are?
Yeah, this is it. There is no moderate conservative anymore. The moderate conservative has become the moderate democrat. The only way republicans win is by strangling human rights and stirring discord.
Try going into a conservative subreddit and argue for any of the things above. You’ll get downvoted to hell or even banned.
Anarchists discuss basically all of that and aren’t right wing
Very well put. The general summaries are spot on.
Too frequently are the concepts overlooked and some specific detail (often trivial) becomes the focus and divisive point preventing discussion or understanding.
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If your goal is to solve society’s problems, you have to listen to everyone, even people you disagree with, in order to identity the underlying problems.
And sometimes you have to read between the lines because they are not politically and economically literate. And unfortunately, that means people often latch onto ideas that sound good to them, but may or may not be a good idea in real life.
For example, some people may blame immigration for their problems. But that is not the real problem. That is just a scapegoat that the politicians use. The real problem is that they are struggling financially, and don’t know how to fix it, most likely because someone is taking advantage of them and/or they don’t have what they need to be successful.
If you fix their economic problems, and educate them on what the real problems are, they will realize that the immigrants were never the problem. This will reduce the tension and hate, and expose the propaganda for what it is.
But you can’t change anyone’s minds if you label them as enemies and refuse to listen to them. And you can’t solve problems if you can’t identify the underlying issues people are concerned with.
I hope you’re not being serious but if you are try to get out your bubble while you still can
I absolutely am. Im happy to discuss and debunk any right wing viewpoint thats brought up, but beyond that, having it repeated ad nauseum is in no way useful. Some opinions are not valid and don’t deserve the space for argument beyond potentially educating people.
The idea that every left wing viewpoint is perfectly aligned with science and critical thought is over reaching
I didn’t say that, and im open to discussion on any viewpoint to an extent. Theres a lot of things i dont agree with even my most leftist friends about. But constantly giving voice to ideas that have been proven wrong, either scientifically or historically, is not helpful in any way. For some things there is a ‘right’ and ‘wrong’ answer. Gender science, economics, racial discrimination, the predominant roght wing ideas about these topics are just false, scientifically. And they shouldnt have to be disproven constantly in a public forum when that work has been done elsewhere.
It’s important though to not fall into the trap of creating false balance, i.e. giving the same weight to a false or harmful statement than to a truthful or good statement, in the name of “fairness” or “objectivity”. Also, conservatives tend to shift to the right currently.
This meme basically:
To OP’s point tho, I think the fediverse is a lot more ideologically diverse than reddit or other corporate platforms. The fact that you can say something positive about the Palestinian resistance without getting banned, or say something positive about a country on the US-enemy list, is a testament to that diversity.
Sure, there are many servers on the fediverse that are anti-communist, and orientalist / western supremacist, and block leftist ones, copying reddit’s moderation policy. But on the US-run corporate platforms(FB, reddit, twitter, bluesky), you aren’t given any option: that’s a non-negotiable default that you must accept. Here you can always join a server that’s willing to federate with leftist ones, and is okay with ideological diversity, even if you don’t consider yourself one.
Its not just about not getting banned, its also that were not dogpiled by Zionists calling us anti Semites (for the most part).
Those people seemed to give up once they realized no one was paying attention to their flameposting outside of the fediverse. The media doesn’t pick up on it (which is what they really want) unless you’re on one of the corporate social media sites where they can leverage their legal/monetary powers to amplify/silence the discussion per their will.
its also that were not dogpiled by Zionists calling us anti Semites (for the most part).
Seeing zionists ops flame out on here was beautiful. They don’t really try that here any more.
The new narrative is not all jews are Zionist which is true but genocide in Gaza ain’t about the Jews in the US lol
The issue is the genocide and not majority of israle being Jewish. Not all Jews are Zionist is propaganda tactic IMHO
This is one of the reasons why the US federal government wants to ban TikTok, a highly unpopular among the US general public. TikTok isn’t moderated in ways that suit US ideologies and propaganda, which means more leftist content leaks through to the masses.
There appears to be a lack of “centrist”
“Progressive” liberals in fact the centrists—they’re center-left at best—and there are plenty of them here.
right-wing voices (and I don’t mean extreme MAGA-type views, but rather more moderate conservative positions)
These people are liberals as well, but because they usually break Lemmy’s code of conduct regarding various bigotries, they get usually quickly the boot.
non-political
Everything social is political, and the fediverse is social media.
These people are liberals as well
Linking to the general page for liberalism instead of classical liberalism when talking about right wingers… huh sloppy
Given how likely right wing conservatives tends to spread misinformation and cite low quality sources, I honestly don’t mind the lack of right wingers.
obligatory reminder that us-american domestic politics are so skewed to the right that what appears “moderate” in the usa is right to far-right anywhere else
your “liberals” are right-wing
your “conservatives” are right-wing
both are liberals
I would say that what is considered “liberal” in the US is more “center-right”.
Your comment leaves no room for nuance, and anyone who has paid attention to US politics at all for the past 2+ decades knows that there is a massive gulf between how Democrats govern vs. Republicans. Anyone who suggests otherwise is full of shit.
I hate how it feels like I have to defend Democrats on this site, because they are pretty shit as a party, and yes they are liberal.
democrats are enthusiastic supporters of US imperialism and neoliberalism. they’re right wing. end of story
the only difference between republicans and democrats is that they sell US imperialism to different portions of the population. republicans are more honest about their intentions, but if there were only republicans, that would risk massive revolts from the more progressive-leaning portion of the population. this is why the democratic party exists: it allows the us govt to sell the same underlying project with a different face that’s more appealing to the average progressive voter
edit: to really drive my point home ask yourself: what is the official stance of the democratic party regarding free and public healthcare, free and public education (including higher education), progressive taxation, public transportation, labor legislation (especially regarding maternity leave), etc? not what some more left-leaning factions of the party say, i mean the actual official party stance. because these are absolutely uncontroversial among the left-leaning parties worldwide
Yeah, this is the shit I’m talking about. You’re clueless.
If you lived in the US, you would understand, on a very real, tangible level, the difference between living in a state with a Republican governor vs. one with a Democratic governor. Or for those in big cities, a Republican mayor vs. a Democratic mayor.
Any person older than 30 in the US that is not all of the following: white, cis-gendered, heterosexual, will tell you just how wrong you are.
You make leftists look bad, and I wish you’d stop. Use some critical thought. Recognize nuance. Don’t let ideology cause you to ignore objective reality.
“less” right wing is still right wing
i’ve been made aware of how miserable living in a red state is. but being not as rabidly misogynistic and racist as republicans doesn’t make the dems “not right wing”. implementing better domestic policies doesn’t either. at the end of the day, both parties represent the interests of corporations, will implement austerity measures that widen your already massive wealth gap, and will make sure the us-american empire keeps the rest of the planet in a stranglehold
edit: as for you saying i’m ignoring reality, again, i’m aware republicans are worse for you, but i need you usians to truly grasp the reality that, unlike most other democracies, your two major parties are right-wing and ultimately uphold the same project. any right-wing politician for europe or latin america would feel at home in the democratic party
If you lived in the US, you would understand, on a very real, tangible level, the difference between living in a state with a Republican governor vs. one with a Democratic governor.
And if you lived outside the US, you would understand that it doesn’t make a difference if the bombs leveling your city are painted red or blue, and the minor difference in domestic policy between the two factions of the genocidal empire really don’t matter to the people you’re exterminating.
Yeah, it’s not a minor difference. A fact that people are about to wake up to in a week or so…
Yeah, I know Americans have trouble believing that foreigners are people, but believe me: for us, the difference is negligible.
I know you love to get to make a snarky reply, but no.
You are in for a rude awakening.
The differences between the two are NOT minor, but I support your second point completely.
Or foreign policy families have been staggering, no matter who has occupied the White House.
For you the difference may not seem minor, but when your entire country has been leveled by American bombs, the slight difference in social issues that applies only to comfortable Americans who are not living in refugee camps being hunted by sniper drones seem basically negligible.
@BrainInABox
I get what you’re saying. We have been very fortunate here, but that has been the limit of our lived experience, so to us, it is not minor. In the big picture, you are correct.
This guy gets it.
We already have people praising Liz Cheney.
You could say “I am noticing a distinct lack of Neo Nazis on Lemmy”.
To which I say why change that.
I’ve seen right wing liberals, left wing liberals, marxists, stalinists and anarchists just to name a few. If anything there is more diversity here than other platforms as it isn’t just various shades of liberal.
Conservative and/or right wing, authoritarian, reactionary (feel free to pick your favorite analogous label) views are ethically wrong and lack evidence to add a worthy perspective to discussions. Capitalism is a belief and should be discussed as other religions.
lack evidence to add a worthy perspective
That’s exactly the point. “Conservative” most of the time means rollback to segregation and discrimination whereas the only chance of humanity lies within compassion and cooperation.
I think there are some conservative opinions that are worth discussing. For one example, I’ve seen conservatives talk frequently about protecting children from an increasingly secular world. Comparitvely, that topic rarely comes up in normal lemmy topics.
Truth be told, I generally am progressive on this, but I sometimes wish I could discuss this with someone whom I may disagree with, so I could better understand where I would stand
Protecting them from what now? Exactly what are we protecting them from in a ‘secular world’?
I think you provide the perfect example of what OP is talking about.
In my experience this kind of comments and “far left” views are the norm on Lemmy. I think that in this regard Reddit had (I have not been there since the API shutdown) a much more balanced and wide spectra of political views. Not to mention that everything wasn’t political there. Here I feel like everything takes a “far left”/Marxist turn.
To me, this homogenous political environment turns me off and is one of the primary factors behind me not really using Lemmy that much.
To be clear I do not think that your views should be silenced and whatnot. Just agreeing that this is indeed a “far left” echo chamber.
In my experience this kind of comments and “far left” views are the norm on Lemmy. I think that in this regard Reddit had (I have not been there since the API shutdown) a much more balanced and wide spectra of political views …
redditors (like most americans) proved that they believe a genocide is acceptable political collateral damage and that facism is okay; that’s fucked and not at all balanced in any way.
Yeah. Why go through all the effort to cover up the true nature of your actions if your beliefs and views are so much more balanced. While the speech here may be more absolutist, I don’t think other people who don’t factor in these untruths or use them to make their points have much to add to the conversation. It’s just talking points.
Can anyone translate this vaguepost?
I just saw a revised death toll in Gaza. Lots of people have been downplaying this. This is only one example.
I’m not talking about whether the content of an opinion is balanced or not. I’m talking about that if you take into consideration all the different views; are there just a few vs many, are the views leaning heavily in a specific direction (right/left), etc.
And you continue to prove the point that Lemmy has a “far left” overweight. I’ll remind you again that I’m not talking about whether I think you are right or wrong, just that it’s an echo chamber for opinions like this.
And you continue to prove the point that Lemmy has a “far left” overweight. I’ll remind you again that I’m not talking about whether I think you are right or wrong, just that it’s an echo chamber for opinions like this.
genocide is never acceptable and facism is never okay; these are facts, not opinions.
I never alluded to these being ok? I agree with you here
They’re big parts of the American Overton window now; yet you called their consideration
a much more balanced and wide spectra of political views
Not sure what you mean to be honest. What do you mean by “yet you called their consideration”?
What I meant earlier was that the way that you express
redditors (like most americans) proved that they believe a genocide is acceptable political collateral damage and that facism is okay; that’s fucked and not at all balanced in any way.
is (in this case left?) misrepresentation what others (or most other) believe. I don’t know if this is in bad faith or if its because of “echo chamber radicalization”. I do have a hard time believing that “most americans” or “redditors” (as in most redditors?) approve of genocide or facism. They might have other/more nuanced ideas on some issues than you. But for the record I’m not American.
I do believe that you will be able to provide examples of crazy comments on some issues. But in my experience, when you leave the internet and talk to people in real life - most people are sane, moderate and do not hold far left/right opinions on most of the issues discussed like this on the internet.
Removed by mod
you’re on the wrong instance
To be clear I do not think that your views should be silenced and whatnot. Just agreeing that this is indeed a “far left” echo chamber.
We, just like you, have been bombarded incessantly from birth with the hegemonic bourgeois ideology. It is inescapable. Most people don’t even realize they’re soaking in it, because they’ve never been outside of it. For most people it’s just “common sense.” It’s literally impossible for us to escape to a “‘far left’ echo chamber.”
Who is really in an “echo chamber”: those who have investigated outside of our hegemonic liberal/capitalist/imperialist culture, or those who never have?
We don’t cite Gramsci here
We often do. There are 17 pages of hits in the search results: https://lemmy.ml/search?q=gramsci
It pops on on lemmy.ml alone dozens of times: https://lemmy.ml/search?listingType=Local&q=gramsci
If a view isn’t based on truth, it just simply doesn’t matter. It’s not a matter of silencing, which there is no need for
https://fosstodon.org/@bragefuglseth/113809233797180679
This post appeared in my timeline yesterday. Thought I would share it with you.
The phrase “are ethically wrong” is hilarious. According to whose code of ethics? How are their ethics more moral than someone else’s set of ethics?
There’s literally entire branches of philosophy dedicated to the concept of morals and the concepts of good and evil.
Edit: Also, to add on to this, something can be ethically right but morally wrong, or ethically wrong but morally right.
Liberals are not leftists.
yeah, liberals are conservative scum lol.
liberals are literally on the left wing of the spectrum, but apparently that’s not good enough for ‘arbitrary decider of who’s a leftist’ here
Leftists are socialists. Liberals are not socialists, they are liberals. Liberalism is founded on the right to private property, otherwise known as private ownership of the means of production, while socialists call for the abolition of private property (not to be confused with personal property).
You have to be at least anti-capitalist to be a leftist. That’s the bare minimum.
Lemmy liberals are centrists. They favor capitalism with regulations and social welfare.
You have to be at least anti-capitalist to be a leftist.
oh I must have missed the “YOU MUST BE AT LEAST THIS ANARCHO-MARXIST TO RIDE THE LEFTIST LABEL” sign at the front of the line.
damn is this really how you think? are these really the thoughts that just bubble up in that grey matter?
way too much time on your hands if so
you’re so fucking busy delineating who’s not a good leftist that the conservatives are going to destroy you all and you’ll be quibbling about who was a real one and who’s faking being in the concentration camp.
No, liberals just aren’t leftists.
But literally, you do need to be anticapitalist to be a leftist.
Where did you learn your stance from? Its wild.
This is the result of a century of communist/socialist purges and of cold war propaganda in the US. Most Burgerstanians haven’t known their asses from their elbows politically for generations.
That’s the problem with labels. They often mean different things to different people.
Yeah, there’s the academic record and then there’s random forum posters. Different meanings, sure: with one worth discarding.
It isn’t a purity test, anticapitalism starts at some form of Socislism.
The liberal wants to preserve some parts of the capitalist tradition while enacting some social reforms. That puts them in the center.
You want to talk about concentration camps? The US has the largest incarcerated population in the world, and it has my entire life, since Clinton introduced the Crime Bill. The prison population almost doubled from 1990 to 2000. That’s liberalism.
Yeah, in the interest of not having a bloody, civil war, I’d rather try to correct the economic paradigm that we have rather than instill a new one that will have its own set of unique and terrible problems (for example, see nomenklatura).
The chaos that will arise from the transition will be deadly, terrifying, and profound. It is not something I wish my children to have to go through. So, yeah…of course I’d rather work to fix the system that we have.
Okay, but that’s why you aren’t a leftist.
Personally, the reason I have an .ml account instead of an account on one of the farther left instances which aren’t federated with .world is because I want to argue with people like you. I welcome the diversity of opinion between leftists and liberals, I deliberately expose myself to it. Liberals keep me sharp without being emotionally exhausting the way people farther to the right are.
(for example, see nomenklatura)
We have nomencultura at home, in the Professional Managerial Class: the college educated labor aristocracy that serves the capitalist class.
These are well established political definitions, not something we just up and decided a few days ago. Political position along a left and right axis, defined in the context of the economic present, with a pro- or anti-capitalist stance on either side. “The Left” has more or less been defined by an anti-capitalism - pro-socialism stance for a long time, despite whatever labels some news outlets choose to use to demonize liberals and Democrats. They restrict definitions to the Overton window, just a sliver of the full political spectrum, which is firmly planted rightward, and promote the idea that the left side of the window is “The Left”. It isn’t. Many iberals and the democratic party are firmly pro-capitalist. It isn’t that they are good or bad leftists, they just aren’t leftists at all. We aren’t too busy figuring this out, we’ve been clear with these definitions for forever.
Liberals support capitalism, ergo they are on the right.
liberals are literally on the left wing of the spectrum
They literally aren’t
Liberals are auth right on the political compass.
Leftism is anti-capitalist.
The Political Compass is generally a terrible way to view politics, I wouldn’t put any stock in it.
It’s an oversimplification and has its limitations but that’s often what’s needed to reach mass appeal and be useful in discourse.
On the contrary, it makes little sense at all. Ideologies can’t be put on a compass like that.
On the contrary, it’s is a useful heuristic, even if it’s not perfect. While ideologies are complex and multifaceted, it provides a framework to map tendencies. It simplifies ideologies, sure- but that’s precisely its value & the social/cultural dimension and is harder to map
When you simplify ideology too much, you ceate more confusion, like elsewhere in the thread when you categorize Marxist means as auth left and ends as lib left, despite Marxism being consistent in means and ends. There are far more issues with it than it solves.
But that’s just it - it’s not a useful heuristic, it’s a delusional framework, even more than the geocentric model was. We were mapping the planets onto that, but that didn’t make it useful.
Hearing from “both sides” and coming to some compromise/middle ground only works if the following is true:
- Both parties are acting in good faith.
- The viewpoints expressed are close enough that they don’t require a total departure from one’s current viewpoint.
- The disputed topic doesn’t have a obvious or clear correct answer.
The problem is, at least in the US, none of these are true for right wingers and even many “centrists.”
You cannot talk to somebody and try to find common ground if they don’t believe in statistical studies by government agencies, they don’t believe in scientific studies by major universities and research institutions, and don’t care about the rights and protections for minority groups.
The older members of my family are almost all conservatives, MAGA supporters, and fundamentalist Christians.
They genuinely believe that Evolution is a myth and the Earth was created 6000 years ago. They believe that illegal immigrants are invading this country and that Democrats are secretly allowing them to. They don’t believe humans have any effect on climate change. They don’t think Covid was anything more than a common cold that the government used as an excuse to try to control people. They don’t believe in vaccines.
I find Lemmy to be very refreshing. I get news from a diverse collection of Leftists sources. Anarchists, statists, weak socialists like the AOC/Bernie types, government studies, independent guerrilla journalists, Communists, Mutualists, Marxists, etc.
But I have no interest in further “diversifying” by adding right wing “sources.”
Cookies can taste good with many different ingredients, but no cookie tastes good with horse poop.
@Lettuceeatlettuce
I could not agree more.
Given that in the US leftist perspectives on anything are few and hard to come by, I welcome Lemmy’s primarily leftist slant on things. Should one want to get a fascist or center/center right perspective, pretty much everything in the mass media in the US will provide that.
Reddit is mostly left
Reddit is mildly left of center as a whole. It is not leftist. You do not find many people there who are genuinely anti-capitalist, which is a prerequisite for any flavor of leftism.
Reddit leans progressive liberal, and that, in America speak, is the left
Americans talk Newspeak thanks to a century of socialist purges and red scares. Their “left” is so far right that the actual left is silenced, is outside the Overton window. In terms of political vocabulary, Americans don’t know their asses from their elbows.
Thank you! This is how I have felt, as an American, for a very long time!
The BIGGEST issue we have here, IMO, is APATHY. So many Americans “don’t watch the news” or “didn’t like to talk about politics” or can’t handle anything being talking about the weather and other bland topics. I find it depressing and annoying.
I fucking wish
Everywhere else in my life is centrist or rightwing. I enjoy having somewhere to escape it.
- There appears to be a lack of “centrist”, non-political, or right-wing voices (and I don’t mean extreme MAGA-type views, but rather more moderate conservative positions).
I see plenty of them. They’re just mostly on other instances to me (like your home instance).
Furthermore, while it’s tempting to see the so-called ‘left’ and ‘right’ as equivalent mirrors needing to be balanced for diversity, the reality is far from it. After seeing Wolfballs in action (that instance died before the reddit API fiasco), I can tell you we don’t need to be balanced out by ‘white genocide’ discussions and more open anti-semitism. I know that’s not what you proposed, but it’s to illustrate that sometimes there isn’t value in arbitrary balancing the ‘left’ and ‘right’ on these websites.
is it a natural result of Lemmy’s community-driven nature?
It’s also a result of Lemmy’s history and appeal. When reddit went on sprees of deleting subreddits, the right-wing hate groups made their own reddit clones, anarchists typically went to Raddle, and when GenZedong and ChapoTrapHouse went down, they went to Lemmygrad.ml (as a result, it became the largest instance) and created Hexbear respectively. So there is a long history of larger communist communities from day one which was the status quo until the reddit API fiasco.
The Fediverse also tends to attract anarchists and other socialists by the appeal of its decentralized nature, along with a few right-libertarians who see it as an anti-censorship tool. So one could say there’s a bias there.
How might we encourage more diverse political perspectives while still maintaining a respectful and inclusive environment?
That’s tough, because you inherently limit which political perspectives you can encourage.
It is just an extension of the “Paradox of Tolerance.”
It is not a paradox at all, it’s just intolerance that doesn’t deserve a platform.
Lemmy has always had the Communists and Anarchists, from what I understand. Liberals largely came during the Reddit fiascos. Overall, I’d say instances are becoming more homogenous, but I don’t think that’s a bad thing necessarily. I’d rather have more leftists and fewer liberals seeing liberals convert to leftists, IMO.
Liberals largely came during the Reddit fiascos
Even before there were several instances like beehaw or sopuli regularily coming out with shitlib takes (and they still are, some comments below in this thread there is a sopuli user alluding genocide denial and whitewashing nazism).
Ah, gotcha. Still, the bulk came with Reddit I think, right?
Yeah. Before there were mostly few people in threads. Abovementioned shitlibs were not very numerous too, just few recurring nicknames and few others getting banned and coming back under new nicks every few days.
The ones that keep making new nicks are still here, lol. At least, some of them.
