There may be an age or generational explanation for this, but I especially notice this behavior on Reddit while not nearly as much here on Lemmy (though maybe that’s also a mater of implementation).
It seems many are so quick to assert overly-confident positions, but then hit-and-run with some smarmy remark at even the slightest challenge, then quickly block. Like, not even crazy stuff. Just basic, civil disagreements. I can pretty well predict when it will happen, and it always feels like such a petty ego-sparing fingers-in-ears denial thing to do, and to me if anything shows they were not very confident in their views being challenged.
I think I’ve only blocked a handful of people over a decade who were actively spamming, stalking, or spewing extremely hateful rhetoric and I just reported them simultaneously. You have to cross a pretty extreme and irrational line for me to do that.
The reason I ask is to see if I’m missing something; to better understand the mindset of those who do.
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I don’t tend to block unless there was clear malice or it is being done in bad faith. Prime examples of this would be accounts that when I look at their history is almost exclusively argumentative posts(this is generally prompted by another reason), people who do personal attacks instead of standard discussion, and people whom it’s clear that they aren’t trying to add to the conversation, and are trying to derail or push an agenda.
People are trying to ‘win the argument’ for personal satisfaction. They’re not trying to self-correct or seek the truth.
I think I’ve only blocked a handful of people over a decade
I’m the opposite; I have hundreds of people blocked, mostly because they are bores.
Another aspect of this that I’ve found is that engaging in benevolent smalltalk with someone here on Lemmy somehow sometimes results in them treating it as an argument.
No, I will not concede to whatever point you’re trying to make; I was making conversation, you were trying to win an argument. I don’t care if you’re convinced your particular approach to a particular problem is better than mine.
And if they then don’t realize that I’m not interested in engaging, and keep the “debate me bro” attitude, they usually end up on my blocklist, or at the very least they end up with a red tag behind their name.
No, u’r wrong 😜
Your mom likes me anyway
She told me likes me more
That’s what she said!
People are trying to ‘win the argument’ for personal satisfaction. They’re not trying to self-correct or seek the truth.
How do we promote more people to cooperate instead of compete in the mutual pursuit of truth while maintaining humility and introspection that their own views could be incorrect?
Not everyone is seeking truth.
That’s the problem
Different format of discussion.
Social media: people trying to win binary points 👍👎
Wikipedia, scientific discussion, or a deliberative assembly: slow process towards writing a statement of a position, with lots of study along the way
There’s such a massive disconnect there, though, isn’t there? I agree the slow deliberative process is key; but there is clearly a missing piece of the puzzle to bridge that gap between experts and laypeople that unfilled leads to well… All this.
I don’t know about this “winning” theory.
Generally, people feel like they’ve won when they get the last word in. If you block someone, you don’t see their replies and assuming they do reply to your last comment, they would get the last word.
Personally, I block people when I realize there’s no point in continuing the conversation. I’m not trying to win an argument, I’m just over it and don’t want to interact with their toxicity.
If you block someone, you don’t see their replies
On both Reddit and Lemmy, blocking someone prevents them from replying. It prevents them from even seeing your final word*
* sort of. Depending on exactly where and how they look.
Pretty sure it doesn’t do that on lemmy. I definitely have comments with blocked responses (they show up a specific way in Jerboa) from people I blocked ages ago. If I open the thread in a browser where I’m not signed in I can see their response clearly.
So they can still see and reply to my comments, I just don’t have to see more than an error message that the comment couldn’t be loaded on my end.
I might be wrong, but I was under the assumption that Lemmy doesn’t stop them from replying. There was a recent conversation complaining because blocking people didn’t silence them.
If you want to test it, feel free to reply and block me, I’ll see if I can keep the conversation going. Unblock later tonight to see if it worked.
I guess Reddit does it that way, but I try not to think about that place anymore.
My experience is that on Reddit it replaces the comment with
[], similar to[]when a mod removes it, or[]when they delete it themselves.And that on Lemmy, it depends on client. On lemmy-ui (the default web client), it sometimes shows up as that “1 more reply” option, but when you click it, it never loads in. On Jerboa, it says something along the lines of “unable to retrieve this comment”.
Both of those are what happens when you come across a comment from a person who blocked you in the wild. It may or may not be different when it’s in your inbox.
I’ve been blocked by at least one person on Lemmy, for reasons that I honestly have no idea, and have come across this in the wild a couple of times, including opening something I originally found on my computer in Jerboa to double-check, as well as opening up incognito where I’m logged out and therefore not blocked.
Also replying to @MagicShel@lemmy.zip, @wizardbeard@lemmy.dbzer0.com
I don’t believe they are blocked from replying on Lemmy. That’s the opposite of what I’ve heard, but I haven’t really experimented.
I’ve blocked a lot too. Mostly people who have closed minds and aren’t listening just waiting for their turn to reply. I don’t have patience for that shit anymore, find someone else. *Block
Reddit made that change where if you blocked someone they couldn’t reply to you in a thread.
That was quickly weaponized so that you could ‘win’ an argument. Someone could write something and your reply would not appear, so it looked like you realized you were wrong.
Only way around this is editing your previous comment, though I’ve been told that can sometimes lead to a ban? Never happened to me though.
What really annoys me about that is that it prevents you from replying to anyone ELSE who replies to you in that thread, which is completely absurd.
for some reason ‘editing’ comments is considered horrible and awful.
i never understood that myself.
Views, positions have gotten more extreme and cemented at that. Probably due to algorithms of “traditional” social media, that focus on them to raise clicks. (This trend to extreme positions and freaking out on the slightest trigger is also noticeable in real life behaviour, imho.) I sometimes block folks because I know there will not be a frank exchange of views but pure hate, extremism.
Plus spammers.
Like another commenter said, polarization and cemented views. You’re not going to change their mind on anything, but they’re constantly trying to change your mind on everything. I consider them shills and hit that block button.
I also block people who are here “on a mission” for whatever cause. Social media has enough activists, and even if I agree with them, I’m still thinking “will you shut up, man?”.
I also block people who intentionally take others out of context as an excuse to attack them or inject drama into every interaction. There’s plenty of that to go around, and thankfully, there doesn’t seem to be a limit on the number of blocks I can issue.
Basically, I’m not here for drama or activism or circle-jerking any political cause or to suffer immature edgelords. I just wanna talk about cool stuff with rational people. Blocking helps separate the wheat from the chaff in that regard.
Life is too short to deal with weirdos treating lemmy as their blog. Some are overzealous but you have to curate your own space on federated platforms
Agree with this. I don’t shout my opinion and then block, but I definitely block a lot of users who just have really intense views they want to share, and communities I have no interest in, and over the last couple years my curated space is a reasonable mix of memes, news, and not to extreme of views, and it’s nice.
I love that term curate. I find it funny that people don’t like blocking but are fine with subscribing. Subscribing and only looking at subscribing is akin to blocking everything else. Blocking and perusing all means you will come across new communities you don’t want to block.
I have done this a few times, for me it was just that I was writing a reply and 80% through I realized that I didn’t want to argue any more, so I blocked the guy after posting it, just so I wouldn’t get any more crap to deal with.
So I get this feeling— and I don’t mean to say your mode of operation is not valid— but why not just stop replying? I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve had an argument in a thread and one side stopped talking and it continued for more than two posts or something.
In situations where I do this, I am annoyed at the other guy, and the last comment they made was so glaringly wrong that it was far more important for me to reply and block and just to block.
I know it is stupid, but that is the feeling of the time.
You say “civil disagreements” but from what I’ve seen blocking mostly happens when they sidestep the issue with a personal attack or ad hominid response.
Also I’ve seen some blocking just on people being associated with known bad actors like hatemongers or somebody’s stalker
This is what makes me block usually, a personal attack. Fallacies are hit or miss, I usually use them as an indicator to just disengage cause its not worth the effort, but personal attacks are an immediate yea this isn’t worth it and block
I don’t think I ever blocked anyone on reddit, but I’ve been pretty block happy on lemmy. Mostly because it’s a smaller community. With reddit, it was easy enough to unsubscribe from the big popular communities and focus on my niche interests and rigorously modded communities like askHistorians. That way I mostly saw stuff that was genuinely interesting to me. And if someone was annoying, they were just one voice among thousands.
Here on lemmy, there’s not enough activity to be overly selective, and I actually enjoy the casual vibe of asklemmy, showerthoughts and nostupidquestions. While I’d never visit their reddit counterparts, here the community is small and it feels more personal. But this also means that there’s the occasional poster who I’d rather just not have to see. So, to keep my time on lemmy enjoyable, I block them.
I don’t really think it’s a big deal, I don’t even think it’s a criticism of those posters. It’s really just that the content of their posts / comments are something that doesn’t add value to my experience. I’ve blocked well-intentioned, but obviously teenage, users because I’m not interested in their personal life questions (but they’re entitled to ask!); I blocked someone just for posting too many moth memes when I was getting sick of that fad.
I’m pretty sure I’ve never blocked anyone for disagreeing with me or my beliefs, but if someone seems like their trolling, or simply has such poor social communication skills that they are coming across that way, I’ll block them. I generally look at users history and check if I’m likely to miss anything in the future. But invariably, the type of user I consider blocking generally has a bunch of dumb, negative or uninteresting comments and posts.
Bots, trolls, egomanics, thin skinneds.
Does that leave anyone left?
Most people have egg shell personalities and blocking is their defense mechanism.
Sometimes they even post it to re affirm themselves… It looks pathetic.
Blocking is useful in creating an echo chamber but I don’t think that’s the intent, just a “positive” outcome the again reaffirms the eggashell personality
It also bleeds over into real life too. It’s a habit people develop… just shut out anything/anyone who says anything I don’t like or that causes me to have to think.
I used to agree with you. Ever since I started just blocking anyone that was being annoying my experience on the web has been great.
Honestly, turning inwardly to my family has been great. Especially given the political climate and my general disappointment. Finding “your people” is quite pleasant. Tribalism is sort of ingrained into us at a primate level, I suppose.
Still, I guess I try to strike a balance when all possible because I know the traps of building one’s own silo and the consequences that can have.
Im not advocating for you to turn away anyone that disagrees with you, just those that are annoying about it.
As I get older I value my time more and more, every second spent reading or talking to some asshole online is a second I’ll never get back.
If you are talking about banning people in debate, Then you are not being fair. Any criticism can cause annoyance to some people, even if criticism have pleasant wording
I never said anything about a debate
Follow-up to this question after seeing many responses (and thank you): What is your default mode for self-doubt when engaging in discussions?
That is, no matter how confident you may be in something, do you maintain an open door, or are your beliefs you block over completely set in stone?
For me, little terrifies me more than becoming the thing I hate; to be clouded by my own cognitive bias; to inadvertently throw myself into an echo-chamber of self-validation. As such I try my best to always maintain at least the slightest bit of doubt in even my strongest beliefs, and to that end to at least let dialogue challenging that come through.
Little bit of a pointer but you can edit your post and title.
Anyways, digressing there. But, I am always willing to hear some alternative takes from different people with different perspectives. The dealbreaker is in the approach. If you cannot come into a discussion, a conversation, a debate or anything without feeling the need to put down someone to prove a point or be self-righteous? You can go fuck yourself and be placed in the blocked bin.
And even so, there is only so much irrational and wild things people do and say that just upsets the vibe with someone or groups to where, blocking can be seen as a way to filter that out.
For me, it depends on the context, and how the person responded to the comment.
If the reply had little to no contribution to my comment, that’s whatever I can ignore and move on, but if the reply is a clear “I’m trying to siderail this/ignoring what was actually said” or “I’m attacking you directly instead of the topic at hand” then I’m pretty firm in blocking. I don’t block for disagreement period, it’s when it moves into the unproductive field that I start to ignore or I block.
First, I rarely am fully self-confident about factual matters. I’ve been around the block a few times but I can’t possibly have experienced everything from every perspective or maybe there’s an unspoken assumption that another person has that differs from mine. I see that in a lot of code discussions. You have to do this or that is always bad, but they just work in a different industry and what has been true every single time for them has never been true for me.
Second, I never block anyone just because they disagree. I block them because they are being an asshole about it or maybe because I’m emotionally compromised and need to prevent myself from engaging with them. On Bluesky I’ve created a timeout block list I throw people in when it’s me and not them, and I clear it out every so often.
Anyway, sometimes it’s just not fruitful or pleasant to talk with some people even if they are good people. I wish Lemmy had something I could use as a timeout like named block lists or block reasons. I don’t know who is a spammer, who is an asshole, or who was just on the other side of an issue or post I needed some distance from.
I’ve blocked a couple of people who just wanted to harp on one thing ask day every day and even though I agreed with them or at least didn’t hate them I needed to block them for my blood pressure. I’m not letting any of you fuckers give me a heart attack in the name of civil discourse.
But also, it is doing everyone a favor. I am an AI enthusiast / realist, which means a lot of people who just hate everything AI probably have me blocked. And that’s a good thing for us because we aren’t constantly bickering about it, but also good for the community because no one really likes to watch people constantly argue, no matter how considerately.
Very well said, and I think that’s a reasonable take. A balance between protecting yourself but also not necessarily promoting a self-validating echo-chamber. Temporary blocks are genius.
It’s funny you mention the AI thing. I’m no pro or anything but I am a software engineer and was recently blocked by someone for just noting that AI has its uses in the fight against extremist hate and online discourse and that we shouldn’t necessarily limit our tool box in the fight against fascism — especially when it’s being used against us. That’s actually what spurred my thinking about these knee-jerk blocks.
Basically, I give people one or two chances, and then you’re done.
Esp if they cross the line into insults and bad/false argumentation
Blocking is tempting when someone actively ignores arguments but keeps coming back with the same thing over and over, or can’t avoid ad hominem attacks.
That said, my block list is empty, but I have tagged people so I know if I’m running into them again.
Pretty much exactly the same here. Can you tag people on Lemmy (how?) or do you do it on a separate text file?
I use Voyager and it supports tagging.
I block the moment I realize someone is a troll, or worse. No exception.
Like already mentioned, life is way too short to waste one more second of it with those people desire to be as harmful as they can be or with their constant need for attention and validation.
Edit: typos
Sometimes things are not as they seem due to language barriers or different people from neurotypicals.
Otherwise there’s also a lot of shit going around, so it’s understandable.
Sometimes things are not as they seem due to language barriers or different people from neurotypicals.
Completely agree (even more so, not being a native English speaker myself). If there was any doubt, ‘the moment I realize’ doesn’t mean I instantly block anyone not agreeing with me or publishing something I would consider rude, or useless. Only that, the moment I made up my mind on who the person is, there is no hesitation.
Yes, I noticed that important part. Hence the likelyhood is high but still with a margin of error and not to anybodys fault.
I’ve also had situations where I gave second chances and was stumped, just confirming my prior judgement.
I’m not fully sure what I am trying to add but maybe just being human really is a dilemma and surprisingly hard.
I’m not fully sure what I am trying to add but maybe just being human really is a dilemma and surprisingly hard.
I think I understand what you’re trying to say and I agree. And, yes, it can be hard.
But I’m also probably much older than you (and, hopefully for you, in a much poorer health than you are) and I know my time is limited. Literally, I should have died years ago, it just happened I did not die and have since done my best to preserve what remained of my health. And that includes being fine with making decisions that are helping me waste as little of my time as possible.
A bit like with all the books I will not read, or the movies I will not watch, or the places I will never go (realizing the climatic nightmare we were heading into, some 25 years or so ago, my spouse and I decided to stop traveling by plane and to do our best to reduce our energy consumption and the amount of waste we generate by changing our way of life). So, obviously, we’re missing out on a lot of stuff and nice places. But that’s OK. It’s a choice we made. It also helps focus a lot more on other great things we may not have even considered back then.
As far as potential ‘trolls’ are concerned, it’s a choice I made based on the time I think I have left and the amount of which I’m ok to spend dealing online with ‘maybe’ this or that perfect stranger that have not made the best first (or second) impression is worth indeed one more chance, and me spending a little more of my time listening to them. Frankly, its seldom worth it. Too much hatred (of this or that other person and/or group) and too much anger and desire to manipulate an audience, poorly disguised as ‘reasoning’, ‘facts’ or mere ‘information sharing’. I’d rather read a good book, listen to great music, or even better: spend that time with my spouse ;)
Good answer, thank you!
You’d be surprised though. These are the times I miss direct messages here. One of your estimates about me is wrong (factually, sadly) and the other is debatable, we might be close in age.
I just took another route. I am still in the process of what more and what less to do, while having discovered I am likely an Autist, setting hard limits at some places.
Ans yes, while there is much hate (currently seeming concentrated in the USA) people that open up often also have a lot of reason. Not defending anyones action here though.
You’d be surprised though. These are the times I miss direct messages here. One of your estimates about me is wrong (factually, sadly) and the other is debatable, we might be close in age.
Sorry to hear that (not referring to your age ;)
If you ever want to MP me the simplest way would be to check the blog (in my profile), on its contact page you will find an email
I just took another route. I am still in the process of what more and what less to do, while having discovered I am likely an Autist, setting hard limits at some places.
Limits are essentials. No matter how arbitrary they can be.
Ans yes, while there is much hate (currently seeming concentrated in the USA) people that open up often also have a lot of reason.
No doubt about that but spreading even more hate or anger is very unlikely to work as a remedy. It’s difficult, there is no escaping that alas.
There’s a verbal reference to your blog, but not the link. Or I’m stupid 😁
I think there’s far fewer genuine trolls than people claim. Someone being an asshole because they had a bad day? Not a troll. Someone deliberately pretending to be something they’re not in order to rile up people for fun? Troll.
Most of the time, you’re blocking your brethren on their worst days. Which is your right, but don’t pretend that just cuz your brother is warty that they’re a troll.
I think there’s far fewer genuine trolls than people claim
Most of the time, you’re blocking
Based on what data?
Is it on my list of blocked persons that I don’t think I have shared with anyone? Or on your overall knowledge of humanity in general, or maybe on the careful study of the average user of the Fediverse? Or have we discussed my decision process and how I decide to block a troll or a nuisance? Or is it, I think it is more likely that, based on the fact that I may have used words or expressions in a manner that does not please you, or that may even be incorrect?
For that last possibility, even not knowing where I may have been wrong, I’m pretty confident I can already apologize as I’m not a native English speaker and constantly do mistakes. I would also appreciate if you could tell me what sentences are concerned, so I can learn from my mistakes.
If that is the case, would you feel better if I used the word morons or assholes, instead? Or do you think I should always make a complete sentence? Because to me at least, it’s simpler to use a single word to describe a type of behavior, and even more efficient to use a word everyone should be able to instantly vaguely understand, instead of using a full sentence. I’d rather write ‘I block trolls’ than write‘After checking their behavior, post history, proportion of helpful/contributing content versus not so positive content, frequency of each, their choice of vocabulary and the way they deal with contradiction, I will block those persons that I qualify as trolls but are more exactly excessively obsessed with constantly arguing, proving other wrong (and proving themselves right), creating fuss and drama and triggering emotional reactions when it’s not needed’.
(which, btw, may give you an insight on what criteria I use to decide who is a troll and who is not)
Back to the point.
Someone being an asshole because they had a bad day? Not a troll. Someone deliberately pretending to be something they’re not in order to rile up people for fun? Troll.
How can you tell who they are and are not? I certainly can’t.
So, that’s just your opinion. What’s interesting is to realize that this could also be my own opinion (we all have our bad days, hard to disagree with that) but in any case this would still just an opinion. Not knowledge.
Your opinion is absolutely fine, obviously, but it’s just that: your opinion, aka a gut feeling. So, I hope you won’t get mad at me if I tell you that your gut feeling that I’m being wrong is unlikely to convince me that indeed I am wrong, and should start revising my decision process.
What I don’t consider ‘just an opinion’ is how I feel when I’m confronted to people that constantly/regularly/too often feel it’s ok to share their bad days with the world, or think it’s ok that they want to have some fun (at least, what they think is funny, not sure they would be as ‘open’ to allow what they themselves would consider offensive) by triggering reactions from their reader… A reader which happens to also be me.
but don’t pretend that just cuz your brother is warty that they’re a troll.
If I get this right, when I say I decide to block anyone I don’t wish to read anymore, calling them a troll I’m pretending something about them and I do it wrongfully because I don’t really know them?
(That may surprise you but I would agree if I was doing that, which I am not. Because how could I know them? I’m not even sure I know myself after 50+ years trying. But I also thought I made it clear the only thing I was saying is that I did not want to be pestered by them anymore, that it was my choice to block and ignore them not a call to blame them. Like… Don’t you have a door to your home, a door with a lock? I sure do. What is it for if not to prevent anyone from entering uninvited? It happens I select very carefully the few people I invite to our place IRL as well as online.)
But then, you telling me that I’m wrong, based on even less evidence than me calling them trolls since 1) you don’t know the persons I blocked and 2) you don’t know how (nor how often and how quickly) I get to this decision, this isn’t pretending anymore but it is you stating as a fact that I’m wrong and being a bit too ‘judgmental’ toward those persons, and too quick to block them?
So, like I said, no hard feelings, but I think I’ll stick with my method for the time being. As imperfect as it is, and it is imperfect, it works well enough to let me experiment an almost completely drama/anger/hate-free experience online, help me waste as little of my time as possible, without preventing anyone else to enjoy it. Which is exactly what I want.
And if you’re wondering, no, us disagreeing is not enough for me to even start considering adding you to that blocked list. Far from it, I appreciate being reminded I should chose my words more carefully ;)
Jesus, what is all this? skimming it looks like half of it is a treatise on epistemology. you’re really going to focus on the data?
I’ve been on the fucking internet too, that’s the data. I’m speaking from my own experience in the shared world we’ve been in, like everyone always does. we at least are clearly on shared spaces.
so like, unless the trolls are all in your DMs, can we skip the text walls about data and skepticism and uncertainty principles??
The rest of your reply seems fairly good spirited but I’m not eager to read it when we start off with paragraph after paragraph of “what data”
I’m not telling you not to block people, I would recommend you double check what I wrote next time before spouting off like that. I said something closer to “you shouldn’t call them trolls”. I dont see you engaging with that point anywhere…
Jesus, what is all this?
you’re really going to focus on the data?
The rest of your reply seems fairly good spirited but I’m not eager to read it
That’s called an answer, and yes I will focus on data. It was indeed shared in a good spirit. You’re more than welcome to not give a fuck about my answer, quite obviously. Have a nice day.
I almost forgot:
I would recommend you double check what I wrote next time before spouting off like that. I said something closer to “you shouldn’t call them trolls”. I dont see you engaging with that point anywhere….
Thx for the suggestion. Allow me then to offer you one suggestion too: before deploring someone does not answer your point, you should start by reading the answer they have given, instead of ‘skimming’ through it.
It’s too long a reply for you to be bothered to read? then don’t say a word, that would be fine too. Let me help you, here: you may wish to read the 3rd and 4th paragraphs (maybe also the 2nd one.).
Like I said, thx for the suggestion, and have a nice day.
Because people online are jerks
dunno if you go out into the world much, but they are also massive jerks there too
