A few days ago I made an account and posted a few joke/meme comments that got a lot of engagement. Unfortunately, the replies seemed to be mostly personal attacks on me disguised as jokes, when all I was doing was trying to be funny in a harmless way. I deleted that account and this one will be temporary. You people complain about this site lacking content compared to Reddit, about communities with only one person posting regularly and there not being enough niches, but how do you expect any growth to occur if the first thing someone experiences when posting on a new account is getting dogpiled on?
It wasn’t my first account either, it was my latest attempt to reenter the fray after feeling like I was becoming the butt of the joke on an account before that, just engaging with the community in the way that I like to. It almost felt like on both accounts my comments were being deliberately mass upvoted just as a setup to be humiliated. Some people have horrific lives IRL that would make any reasonable person want to kill themselves, and are stuck in those soul crushing situations for years and years with no way out. It would be nice to find a place to joke around and feel even just the simulated warmth of human connection without the same kind of nastiness I encounter in everyday life, so I’ll keep looking.
You say Reddit is toxic? I deleted my account there a long time ago, but my experience was that Reddit is like a big metropolis and Lemmy is more like a small town. Yes Reddit has jerks, but they don’t tag you with their third party app and follow you around, giving you the illusion of being accepted with (probably fake) upvotes while subtly mocking everything you say and passing it off as a joke. You can blend with the crowd there and not become a target. I really, really don’t want to give Reddit and OpenAI my data, but if I want a real social media experience that isn’t being gatekept by assholes who enjoy bullying on the internet because they’re too scared to do it IRL I may have to.
I hope Lemmy can fix itself, but my experience with small towns in real life is that those “big” (small) fish in their small, stagnant pond don’t want anything to ever change because the status quo suits their mediocrity and reinforces their egos. Which would be an ironic fate for the supposed “future” of social media. Almost none of the content, all of the toxicity. Why is it so hard for people to be respectful of others?
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In my experience, Lemmy isn’t particularly toxic, though sometimes you might run across people with a bad attitude or just might have simply had a bad day. Block those sort of people if you need to, or report them, depending on context.
Also, life pro tip, people aren’t too keen on reading walls of text, especially if it’s mostly complaining…
It wasn’t anything bannable, just passive aggressive trolling and obviously trying to paint me into a corner/ruin my day without crossing the line. It was a brand new account, how could they have ALREADY zeroed in on me and decided I was a stupid joke within a single day when I hadn’t even fucked up and made a fool of myself yet? It makes no fucking sense. I have no clue how people like Stamets and cm0002 are so loved by so many and never seem to have those people harassing them. I also hate the idea of there being a horde of blocked users talking shit about me behind my back or trolling my posts and not being able to see it. I want to know how I’m being received, rather than becoming deluded into a false sense of security.
Bro. The amount of harassment I get is fucking unreal, it just happens to usually be from admins more than anyone else. But me and Picard have both had to deal with our fair share of lunatics users. Hell, I’ve got a straight up stalker who won’t stop harassing me with new accounts and shit. We just both kept posting and ignored the douchebags. Now we get regularly pinged by people saying thanks or some other compliment my autistic ass has no idea how to process. Things change.
I was pretty active on my old account. I had some real banger comments, you know? But I drew the line when someone called me a clown in the form of a meme and fucking everyone upvoted it. I refuse to be the punchline to anyone’s joke again.
Catchy title, wall of text, no public context, “You people”, one-sided complaints
10/10 shitpost
What did you expect me to do, invite more ridicule by linking to my profile and the thread I’m upset about?
I did not expect anything, because I don’t know what is going on.
In general I would say trying to own it decreases alienation, but what do I know?
Do you have a link to the post and the replies you found toxic? So we can judge properly?
Unnecessary. He didn’t ask to be judged. He is venting the fact he wasn’t welcomed and I just got the same kind of experience yesterday. My account is brand new and I just wanted to help with some problem reported in a post and was attacked by an asshole I blocked after trying to get an explanation for the attack. It’s not about Lemmy, it’s about people on the social media. Assholes are everywhere trying to find an angle of attack.
It’s you, the type of person I’m talking about. Not surprised. Nice try.
I find it much less so than, say, reddit, or old-school website fora, or talking to randos on the bus, but then I browse by subscribed.
As usual, online and offline, it seems like everyone is having good interpersonal interactions without being bullied constantly except me.
You ever take a moment and think that maybe… Just maybe your jokes just weren’t funny?
And how exactly would you know? It sounds like you’re just fishing for a reaction. But the hundreds of upvotes suggest otherwise.
Ha! You’re cute. Lemmy is mean with all their upvoties!
Fuck you dude/dudette. Can’t tell.
In my experience, it’s just a couple topics that bring out unreasonable assholes. After I spent a little time blocking the assholes, and then using a keyword filter to just skip shit I don’t want to have any interactions with, the experience became much better.
Be the change you want to see and stop making drama.
The AI companies are surely sucking down everything published for federation.
Every time I interact on reddit, I’m reminded about how superior my experience is every day on Lemmy. So I guess what I’m saying is “I don’t see it.” Oh, there are some assholes, alright - but they’re the exception, not the rule.
Also, the relative lack of bots. Reddit is so overrun with bots that in any mainstream sub a genuine opinion cannot help but be drowned in a sea of corporate sponsored bullshit.
I’m sorry you’re having such a bad time. I don’t think that anyone upvoted you with bad intentions. It seems like you are viewing “Lemmy” as a unified entity rather than a community of varied individuals. There are some very nice people here. There are also some douche bags. There are a few prominent posters that are frequently both of those options in quick succession. I wish I had a solution for you. I hope you find a community where you feel safe and seen.
