The Chit Chat Thread - General Discussion Forum - Page 466 - Page 466 of 466

pushsquare.com:

@Yousef- If by these days, you mean the last few years, then yes.

@Yousef- Agreed, though the comment sections are way worse on social media sites like Instagram. I think it’s the bad moderation on that site that enables everyone to be negative. Thank goodness that PS, NL, and PX have active and kind moderators that make sure the site is safe and positive I like these sites way more than social media sites for that reason.

[Edited by Pastellioli]

@Yousef- Yes, civility is in short supply in recent years. Discourse has trended toward absolutes and name-calling. As @Pastellioli mentioned, it seems worse on social media at large, which is one of the main reasons I avoid the likes of Twitter/X, Tik Tok, Instagram, FB, etc.

I think I discussed it before, but there’s studies on social interaction to suggest that people respond most openly to changing their minds when spoken to face-to-face, especially if it takes place in a friendly setting (over dinner, for example). Also, people tend to have stronger opinions when they feel like they discover something for themselves and come to their own conclusions, rather than being convinced by someone else. — So in other words, when a person blasts another through the confidentiality of an online argument it’s the least effective form of debate and the involved parties just dig into their positions deeper and deeper.

So I think this is why comment sections spiral into a more toxic atmosphere of polarized extremes. People so rarely talk to each other face-to-face anymore. And everyone has access to mountains of misinformation from which to draw their own erroneous conclusions. Then you end up with large swaths of the populace suffering from the Dunning-Kruger Effect, more and more convinced that they’re right about something, despite them actually knowing less and less about the subject.

Edit:
“Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively