> Twitter creates the instantaneous illusion of social equality between influencers and normal people, but then it periodically reminds you that it’s an illusion.
I noticed a kind of "illusion of community" on Reddit.
E.g., you arrive late to a sub where, say, a female poster complained about her boyfriend. Skimming the comments you see a fairly wholesome thread. Thoughtful comments, innocuous thread-game digressions, good faith advice and disagreements, etc. You even see the OP responding to these and it all seems like an obviously valuable conversation.
Then you start unfolding some of the lower-scored comments. You find trolling, misogynistic statements, nasty insults, bad faith questions that turn into abuse. Worse-- you find OP had the bad fortune of interacting with many of these low quality posters before the mods and participants cleaned up the overallcontent by hiding them.
If you skim the top subs of Reddit, you're almost always following this pattern of reading the moderated content of a thread that originally had a much higher percent of visible abusive content. It seems like the digital equivalent of enjoying watching an organized sport, then joining the team and getting hazed in the lockeroom.
I noticed a kind of "illusion of community" on Reddit.
E.g., you arrive late to a sub where, say, a female poster complained about her boyfriend. Skimming the comments you see a fairly wholesome thread. Thoughtful comments, innocuous thread-game digressions, good faith advice and disagreements, etc. You even see the OP responding to these and it all seems like an obviously valuable conversation.
Then you start unfolding some of the lower-scored comments. You find trolling, misogynistic statements, nasty insults, bad faith questions that turn into abuse. Worse-- you find OP had the bad fortune of interacting with many of these low quality posters before the mods and participants cleaned up the overallcontent by hiding them.
If you skim the top subs of Reddit, you're almost always following this pattern of reading the moderated content of a thread that originally had a much higher percent of visible abusive content. It seems like the digital equivalent of enjoying watching an organized sport, then joining the team and getting hazed in the lockeroom.