Researchers at New York University have concluded that social media is not an accurate reflection of society, but more like a funhouse mirror distorted by a small but vocal minority of extreme outliers. It’s a finding that has special resonance this election season. John Yang speaks with psychology professor Jay Van Bavel, one of the authors of the paper that reported the research, to learn more.
Are you me? Literally the same experience. I think it’s bots programmed in a way that follows what you described.
I just blocked the whole of lemmyml and lemmy.blahaj or whatever it is, and my experience has been 100% better.
Honestly .ml lives rent free in the head of so many people that I actually got a better experience by blocking every random who mentions how much they hate .ml in a conversation that has nothing to do with it.
I’ve gotten to the point that I think the US government has paid shills spamming Lemmy with those comments just to make sure socialism doesn’t get discussed at all.
I just went for the heavy use of blocking those types, and my experience on here has gotten way better. Otherwise, my user experience was just a fire hose of outrage and performative pearl clutching.