Does the reddit style format breed toxicity?

Does the reddit style format inherently make for a toxic environment? Or is it a culture of toxicity from the influx of reditors? For lack of a beter example, on stackoverflow, when someone down votes you, it comes with a comment saying how to improve. On mastodon, people can’t downvote you. These platforms are a joy to use, lemmy is depressing if you post. Its depressing because every post or comment, no mater the quality comes with downvotes, and usually no criticism to accompany it, you are left not knowing if youve made a mistake, or if its just trolls, bots, or idiots. At the end you feel insulted not improved. What do you think?

dudewitbow,

Not necessarily toxicity, but echo chambers. Echo chambers could then be used to be toxic.

Joe_0237,

At least here in the free world we have to manually build echo chambers and “The Algorithm” does not build them around us without our consent.

Solgrund,

Personally core belief that people create and breed the toxicity. Use any system you want if people behave toxic it will become toxic.

Joe_0237,

a lot of it could be the no-face aspect, we where that a lot

Steve,
@Steve@compuverse.uk avatar

I’m thinking you care too much about the thoughtless reactions of anonymous strangers.
Remember… In this game, the points don’t matter.

Joe_0237,

its strange because its not the disapproval that gets me, its not knowing why. I guess the lesson is that if someone did not even say why, its not really something anyone actually cared about.

Mutelogic,

This is exactly it. They don’t care about your post or you or anyone really. For them, it just feels good to bring down others.

Joe_0237,

i hope/believe that the intent is rarely malicious, that its not really a significant thing at all on that side.

luthis,

Downvotes are not a reflection on you, they are a representation of how much everyone else agrees or disagrees.

I don’t personally want the downvotes hidden or removed like how it is on Youtube.

DuskLoaf,
@DuskLoaf@lemmy.world avatar

I’d like an option, user side perhaps that just tucks it away, doesn’t remove it just don’t show it

Joe_0237,

they did remove downvotes on youtube tho :(

scrubbles,
@scrubbles@poptalk.scrubbles.tech avatar

This is why I’m in favor. I’m not the hugest fan, but if the alternative is YouTube or facebooks like system then I’ll take the downvotes. Otherwise you get the low quality like farms where minions memes are uploaded everywhere and there’s no way to say “we hate these, stop posting them”

Joe_0237,

lol that is a very good point

s6original,
@s6original@lemmy.world avatar

I like the way it was here. Points seem to be working correctly or did. I think it’s a bad idea to put point totals on a users profile for everyone to see. I don’t think totals are or should be important. But upvotes and downvotes are indicators of how much value a reader thinks a post/comment has. You can’t tell the temperature in a room without numbers. But I would rather not see a reddit-like karma system.

can,

Yet every app seemingly wants to show me a total :(

XiELEd,

Yeah, I wish there was a feature that lets you switch between total-only and lemmy format.

SkyNTP,

For lack of a beter example, on stackoverflow, when someone down votes you, it comes with a comment saying how to improve. … These platforms are a joy to use

I don’t know what part of the internet you are from, but where I am from, Stackoverflow is looked down on as the quintessential example of toxic behaviour.

I’ve found some of the most dismissive people in tiny stack exchange groups, and experienced similar unexplained downvotes.

What SO, Reddit, and Lemmy maybe all have in common I think, is people tend to agree or disagree based on their convictions, as opposed to agreeing or disagreeing as a means of interaction.

I guess this puts the conflict and disagreement front and center. But at least then I know where people stand.

Perhaps it’s important to not take opinions too personally, and remember that incencere agreement has its own problems.

Joe_0237,

I disagree about SO, though I am not a fan of it for other reasons. Interesting thought about acting on convictions. Thanks.

Scooter411,
@Scooter411@lemmy.ml avatar

I’m not trying to be negative here with you - but anyone complaining about downvoted will often get another downvote from me. Say what you want to say, stand by your convictions, and don’t worry about what the internet thinks about that.

saddlebag,

I don’t see the poster explicitly complaining about getting downvoted. How I read it is that they think that downvoting encourages people to be negative and weaponise their downvote. And, given what you’ve said, they’re spot on and you inadvertently proved their point.

Scooter411,
@Scooter411@lemmy.ml avatar

I saw the post more as someone who is too worried about what the group will think of their comment to allow for dissent.

That being said, what I meant about people who complain about downvotes was the old Reddit trope of “edit: really? Downvote me for asking a question?” On a comment less than an hour old.

Crackhappy,
@Crackhappy@lemmy.world avatar

I upvote anyone who disagrees with me, as long as they’re not a complete brute about it.

Joe_0237,

I’m not upset of complaining, I’m observing and philosophizing, this has been an intellectual pursuit, thanks for the reply

lagomorphlecture,

The only place on here that I’ve noticed downvotes is on comments that have been obviously social media shills (reddit or meta) or right wing type comments that are not the type of thing a community should support in my opinion. I’m not saying you’re doing either of those things and if you’re being downvoted in another context I don’t know why.

That said, downvotes shouldn’t really get you down. If you’ve said something awful then you deserve them and should reassess your outlook if you were unaware that your views or attitude were unpleasant. If you’re getting downvoted on a tech related thing then I don’t know what that’s all about but I would try not to worry about it too much because it doesn’t really affect your life, it’s just a fake internet down arrow.

Joe_0237,

Thank you, interestingly the thing that prompted me to ask was a tech joke, all (4) down-votes, I removed a jab at Apple and added a picture and the the responses was positive. The lesson must be one of these: That we have mostly strong apple fans here; jokes need a picture even if it does not add anything; or people look at the vote total to decide their mindset while reading and the first vote was down by bad luck. Or some combination of these.

lagomorphlecture,

Oooooh yeah people love their apple and I think you have your answer!

neko,

Instance admins can simply disable downvotes. You don't need them.

schwim,
@schwim@lemmy.world avatar

As a former Redditor, I can only say that I’ve not yet begun looking at votes. Why do you determine the value of your post based on that? Make your post, read and respond to people who comment and have a great day.

Joe_0237,

That is the trap, isnt it. Votes are an awful metric for approval, and approval inst always needed.

slimsalm,

Imo, downvotes is just a disagreement. Being offended by it sounds like a “you” problem, we all have to deal with it.

Upvotes normally give me answers I need for at that moment. Downvotes makes me reassess myself.

I dont think you must read to much into the downvotes. Understand the situation why people might have downvoted you, understand why other people get upvoted, assess the situation. And most of all, understand that not everybody will always agree with you

Joe_0237,

What? people wont agree with me? LIES! (<-- that is a joke). I’m not offended, and i agree, i here, am a truth seeker looking for insight, thanks!

borlax,
@borlax@lemmy.borlax.com avatar

Yearning for affirmations via fake internet points is the toxic part, not the format of a website.

Barbacamanitu,

Took the words right out of my mouth. Take my downvote.

Joe_0237,

Yes, although your comment seems to me to be correct, it misses the point of the question, and the actual question has been answered quite well already by others. Surely the format is not in and of itself toxic, and I personally find it a little strange to think of a format as toxic, though I suppose one could create such a format. Rather, the question is weather the format of the website encourages or indues so called “toxic” behavior or leads to the perception there of, among groups of humans using software in the format in question. Maybe because “yearning for affirmation” is a near universal human trait and the format of the site provides its human users access to a convenient but unreliable metric by which they may measure the approval of their peers. Some of us suppress this drive for approval with to strong self awareness or self esteem or lack it entirely due to mental illness, but it is in almost every human, and of course, our need for approval is of course a double edged blade. It makes society possible, and makes us hate to take part at times.

Barbacamanitu,

I would always cringe so hard whenever I saw someone on reddit talking about downvotes, lack of upvotes, or karma at all. It’s silly. Quit worrying about it.

Don’t change the way you express yourself just to make yourself more acceptable to the internet hivemind. The internet is a toxic place. Lots of people simply find joy in anonymously hurting others. Just comment and move on. And maybe reply to comments that are made in good faith.

Joe_0237,

Thanks for the advice

HobbitFoot,

It is a problem of an Eternal September. Reddit was set up where the downvote was supposed to mean more than just disagreeing with people, but the influx of users, especially those only participating with Reddit by upvoting and downvoting, couldn’t be taught what you were supposed to do.

Joe_0237,

Eternal September

i genuinely love that i had to look that up, and i learned something! Thanks!

Mastersord,

The karma/upvote/downvote system encourages engagement and gives users an idea of how others perceive their posts. It also encourages people to think about their posts and it helps keep garbage from clogging up the feed.

The problem is that posts are now “attention-centric” and that might lead to people posting stuff that’s more controversial or even “rage-bait” because it gets a reaction.

But honestly though, the toxicity was always there. It’s just that now people express it with an arrow click instead of a flame post calling out the OP’s mom.

I think anonymity or at least the perception of it on the internet breeds toxicity because it’s easier to hurt someone when neither party has to look each other in the eye.

rm_dash_r_star,
@rm_dash_r_star@lemm.ee avatar

I don’t think it’s the format. Forums generally get toxic when they’re too big. The negative influence of a toxic user is much greater than the positive influence of a non-toxic user. The bigger the user base the more toxic users. Eventually it gets to a critical mass where you’re seeing enough toxic replies to make the whole platform seem toxic.

Reddit is 18 years old. Lots of time to attract toxic users. I wasn’t on Reddit from the start, but people have said Reddit didn’t suffer toxicity until after it was around 10 years old. Lemmy is four years old now so it will be a while. Though Lemmy may attract a smaller less toxic crowd and avoid toxicity indefinitely.

I don’t have a high opinion of community at Stack Overflow as it started out elitist by nature of its policies and rules. Yeah that’s going to breed toxicity right out of the gate. I have to admit Stack Overflow has been a really good resource for technical information at times, but its community is harsh. As much as I’ve used it to find good technical information, I’ve never made an account there or had any desire to post there.

Barbacamanitu,

That’s a good point about toxic users having a bigger influence than non-toxic users.

It’s easy to see a comment that you mostly agree with and just not upvote it. But seeing a comment that’s factually incorrect or toxic will both welcome downvotes.

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