Not really understanding Mastodon at this point. It claimed to be anti-harassment, yet I've seen some horrifying messages about McCain and his family since he died. It claimed to be an alternative to Twitter, yet every damn message I see on the timelines say "birdsite" (why mention what you're supposedly trying to get away from?). I really don't see purpose of the site if its foundation is compromised/contradicted by its general users. @Gargron
@Gargron The Wil Wheaton drama coupled with the hoards of John McCain "shitposting" (honestly some of the rudest messages I've ever seen on social media) really turned me off from the so-called good qualities this website offered. Corporatized Twitter sucks, but mob-fueled digitized verbal lynching is not a proper or coherent rival. Maybe social media in general needs revitalization and not half-hearted attempts at becoming the "next big thing" in the short attention span of the internet.
@Gargron To summarize, the site has evolved from a good-natured alternative into a "you're either with us or fuck you" social club that seems to exist solely to make fun of those who don't agree, constantly bring up "the problems" with "birdsite", and circlejerk pointless information for the rip-off "toots" that rarely exist as the site is split off into different sub-communities that do not seem to interact - yet all serve the same purpose.
@Gargron Also - basic sociology - when too many categories are created, those categories become worthless. The overuse of content warnings on this site break the overall flow of the timelines and creates a terrible situation where "if everything is content warning'd, then nothing is content warning'd at all."
@josephkaminski I'm not sure why you're tagging me personally like I am in control of every single being on this platform, but all of your complaints are solved by following different people. Just find yourself people who love McCain and hate content warnings. Probably on a less left-leaning server than mine.
@Gargron and there doesn't need to be a political divide between the McCain thing. I don't like him either, but the general consensus here was more toxic and hateful than any other platform I'm on. That's the problem, not the "following" concern. I apologize if I'm coming off as hateful, but criticism is important.
@josephkaminski @Gargron mastodon.social (m.soc) happens to also be where people who got account suspensions on Twitter and are fed up for that particular reason wind up--because it's the top hit on Google. So invariably you'll discover that includes a fair share of shitposters. It's not reflective of m.soc's userbase--it's just that shitposters tend to be loud and annoying and post frequently.
@trayofbees Ironically, having a differing complaint/breaking from the hive mind is the most "action" I've seen here in terms of communication. See the apology I just posted to Eugen.
@josephkaminski You can take one of two tracks if you're not a low-effort liberal who is mostly into social media for communism memes and talking about your butthole---avoid poli (because really, nobody ever converts someone's opinion about anything poli on social media), or you find an instance (liberdon? qoto maybe?) where more intellectual discourse is encouraged
@trayofbees @[email protected] this description summarizes what I'm seeing atm.
@josephkaminski @seanmunger Instance blocks/filter plus flat out suspending/blocking/muting the shitposting accounts clears out the timeline if you're aggressive enough. Most of that nastiness you were seeing--when you go look at the tooter's TL on their instance page usually you'll find a long stream of shitposting