Hi all, as with most of you, I’m an immigrant from Reddit. I never used to go on to the NZ or regional subreddits because frankly, I felt very unwelcome and those places were extremely negative.
How then do we build a new community that is based on being positive and accepting, even of those with different points of view, political leanings, religious beliefs or lifestyles? Everyone deserves a voice, no one deserves to be shouted down or made to feel unwelcome or belittled because they have differing thoughts.
Even festering cunts like Brian Tamaki and his ilk, deserve a seat at the table. We live in a free country and that means everyone should get a voice. Everyone gets to speak their piece, even if you don’t like it.
How do we stop this community devolving into yet another online echo chamber?
I’ve upvoted you for the discussion, but I completely disagree. Nobody deserves a seat at the table. Tamaki has more than enough voice as it is. He doesn’t need to be handed one in our online communities.
Having tolerance for both bigots and the targets of their hate means very quickly that the people being persecuted leave.
There’s even a name for this - Karl Popper’s Paradox of Tolerance.
At this stage in human history, a community or forum where all are welcome is impossible. If one leaves a forum open for those who are intolerant, then the forum effectively becomes closed to those that they are intolerant of. It’s not a problem with forums or how communities are managed, the problem is humans being humans. Maybe in a thousand years time or so …
At best communities get to choose what they tolerate. I’ve found in the past that those who demand tolerance of fairly toxic views, fail to remember that tolerance isn’t, nor should it be, unlimited.
Ignore Tamaki, he was just a useful idiot for the purposes of discussion. What I am trying to get across is that a truly open and free space for the exchange of ideas can only be hindered by restricting what can and cannot be said, and will ultimately create an echo chamber. We live in an increasingly divided world; we are divided politically, religiously, ideologically and plenty of others. Restricting what ideas can and cannot be spread can only serve to widen those divisions as those who are being restricted to retreat to their own echo chambers and find more and more extreme ideas.
If we want to create a truly open place where people can come and share their experiences, their thoughts and their ideas, then we do ourselves a disservice by restricting what can and can’t be said, or who can and can’t say things.
But it’s okay if the Nazis come in and restrict it for us by chasing away the people they hate? No thanks. A truly open place can’t permit people whose agenda is quite literally anti-diversity.
So, that’s nominally a good goal - but what do you do when the Kyle Chapmans of the world come and try to make a home here?
Agreed. Letting everyone have an equal say just leads to shitty online forums (Facebook, Stuff comments for example) where misinformation gets spread easily, and hateful content is propagated. I don’t want to see that happening here.