Quo Vadis, Democrats?

[Tamas]

Reddit as a left wing echo chamber though?

I wouldn't go far as to call it an echo chamber but it is quite the hive of toxic far right nonsense.

Depends on the subreddit I think. On American politics I am only getting rabidly anti-trump subs on my feed, although it is indeed much more mixed with UK subs.

[HVC]

Yeah ok I have been told for years and years and years that dangerous antifa leftwing militias are going to seize power any second. Yet the only thugs I see seizing power are right wing guys.

But keep spreading your panic mongering bullshit, I am sure it will happen eventually.

Sorry

[crazy canuck]

Antifa is a loose term and not very organised. At least in the places I know.

The violent right is more organised, and have taken a leaf of Lenin's "vanguard" lessons.

Thus, yes, I think they are more a danger to themselves going up against various more and more organised right-wing groups. And no, I am not talking about college campuses, but in 1930s style street fighting.

My evidence is fairly scarce, but since I have been affiliated with various left-wing groups in the past, I know a little about the ability to splinter even the tiniest group. "Judean People's Front" vs "People's Front of Judea".

As you say, it probably depends a lot on location.  In these parts I don't think it would be accurate to fear for the safety of people taking on the fascists.

[DGuller]

Reddit as a left wing echo chamber though?

I wouldn't go far as to call it an echo chamber but it is quite the hive of toxic far right nonsense.

Most of it absolutely is a left wing echo chamber.  Obviously Reddit being what it is, with every subreddit having mods with absolute power, you're going to have pockets of echo chambers going the far right way, but the vast majority of Reddit is utterly uncritically left.

[Josquius]

Reddit as a left wing echo chamber though?

I wouldn't go far as to call it an echo chamber but it is quite the hive of toxic far right nonsense.

Most of it absolutely is a left wing echo chamber.  Obviously Reddit being what it is, with every subreddit having mods with absolute power, you're going to have pockets of echo chambers going the far right way, but the vast majority of Reddit is utterly uncritically left.

Hard disagree.
Could be we have just seen very different subs but to my view go back maybe 10 years and this would be true, but since covid the right have really seized hold of a lot of big subs.

It's the thing talked about elswhere. Discussion online is quite dead. There are now too many people with resources who see it as all about winning, and these largely come from the right.

I can remember a post some time ago from a mid size subs mod who talked about noticing an increasing amount of inauthentic behaviour and astronturfing, not being able to quit as he knew they would seize it and so on.

[Neil]

It's possible that you guys won't be able to come to an agreement on this, as you can't agree on terms.  Jos' idea of 'the right' is pretty idiosyncratic.  Maybe some of the smaller, UK-centric subs are less dominated by left-wingers.  But for what it's worth, all the posts lionizing the American left (Sanders in particular, but also AOC), as well as the assorted Palestine nonsense and CEO-killing praise seems to indicate a bit of a left-wing bent, if not a very thoughtful one.  I wouldn't consider the Trump criticism to be inherently left-wing, since both sides of the aisle have good reason to be critical of Trump. 

[Razgovory]

It's possible that you guys won't be able to come to an agreement on this, as you can't agree on terms.  Jos' idea of 'the right' is pretty idiosyncratic.  Maybe some of the smaller, UK-centric subs are less dominated by left-wingers.  But for what it's worth, all the posts lionizing the American left (Sanders in particular, but also AOC), as well as the assorted Palestine nonsense and CEO-killing praise seems to indicate a bit of a left-wing bent, if not a very thoughtful one.  I wouldn't consider the Trump criticism to be inherently left-wing, since both sides of the aisle have good reason to be critical of Trump. 

Josq thinks that Stalin was right wing, so his idea of left-right maps closer to what ordinary people think of as "Good vs Evil".  I don't have a Reddit account, really only read it when it comes up on a Google search.  So I don't know much of what occurs on there.

[Sheilbh]

Antifa is a loose term and not very organised. At least in the places I know.

The violent right is more organised, and have taken a leaf of Lenin's "vanguard" lessons.

Thus, yes, I think they are more a danger to themselves going up against various more and more organised right-wing groups. And no, I am not talking about college campuses, but in 1930s style street fighting.

My evidence is fairly scarce, but since I have been affiliated with various left-wing groups in the past, I know a little about the ability to splinter even the tiniest group. "Judean People's Front" vs "People's Front of Judea".

I'd add I also think it's based on absolutely bullshit historical analysis. The only example I can think of of a democratic society, democratically stopping fascism is France. There it was achieved by mass mobilisation and unifying into a popular front that won democratically.

The street violence was, I think, generally followed by liberals and centre parties turning to or working with fascists as the "party of order". There is a reason fascists built their power through street violence so much - disorder helped them even when they were the cause of it because they were rarely the sole cause of it. There were Communist and Anarchist and other left-wing militants who were comfortable with a fist fight.

[Syt]

Reddit as a left wing echo chamber though?

I wouldn't go far as to call it an echo chamber but it is quite the hive of toxic far right nonsense.

Depends. The Austria subreddit is leaning a lot more left than Austria as a whole.

[Josquius]

It's possible that you guys won't be able to come to an agreement on this, as you can't agree on terms.  Jos' idea of 'the right' is pretty idiosyncratic

Rabid transphobia, Islamophobia, obsession with (hate of) immigration... I would say these tend to be rather far right.

Non-Israel related anti semitism also seems to be a big thing popping up there from time to time. It's a weird quirk of reddit, or maybe just my feed, that every month there'd be some people who really had a hard on against circumcision.

critical of Trump]
Josq thinks that Stalin was right wing, so his idea of left-right maps closer to what ordinary people think of as "Good vs Evil".  I don't have a Reddit account, really only read it when it comes up on a Google search.  So I don't know much of what occurs on there.

And in he comes with the ad hom

You're the one who thinks the world works in simple goods and evils.

Stalin as right wing... It's complicated. My main point there (when was it we even discussed this here? Absolutely years ago..) is there's far more of a case for this than there is for the typical one your lot throw out about Hitler being left wing.
Look beyond the mainstream surface "duh he was a communist" and the reality is complicated .
Suffice to say if you actually had a clue the idea of stalin as a purveyor of red fascism isn't one to just laugh away.

The version  I would probably lean towards, though again, it's complicated, is that he started on the left though gradually embraced ever more elements of fascism and was quite the far right dictator, over a far left economic system, in his later years.

Left and right isn't a case of "good vs evil". It's about the methods and motivations of the evil. And it does tend to be easier to be "evil" when you're already dealing with the idea some groups are better than others by default than egalitarianism (though through history beers absolutely have been held)

[Razgovory]

Is the red fascism like "Islamo-leftism" that Ivan goes on about?

[Josquius]

Complete failure to engage and just more trolling. On the verge of blocking.

[viper37]

Reddit as a left wing echo chamber though?

I wouldn't go far as to call it an echo chamber but it is quite the hive of toxic far right nonsense.

Most of it absolutely is a left wing echo chamber.  Obviously Reddit being what it is, with every subreddit having mods with absolute power, you're going to have pockets of echo chambers going the far right way, but the vast majority of Reddit is utterly uncritically left.

It depends on the sub.

Reddit, the entity, leans toward the government in power and not making waves.  They will comply with whatever comes from Washington.

The subs, it depends.  Since the last rebellion, lots of mods were purged and replaced with Reddit loyalists.  No particular affiliation.

[DGuller]

Reddit as a left wing echo chamber though?

I wouldn't go far as to call it an echo chamber but it is quite the hive of toxic far right nonsense.

Most of it absolutely is a left wing echo chamber.  Obviously Reddit being what it is, with every subreddit having mods with absolute power, you're going to have pockets of echo chambers going the far right way, but the vast majority of Reddit is utterly uncritically left.

It depends on the sub.

Reddit, the entity, leans toward the government in power and not making waves.  They will comply with whatever comes from Washington.

The subs, it depends.  Since the last rebellion, lots of mods were purged and replaced with Reddit loyalists.  No particular affiliation.

Of course it depends on the sub, but I'm judging from the general leanings in subs that on the surface one wouldn't assume to have leanings.  If you go to neutral subs that are focused on non-political topics entirely, and the off-topic asides that lean politically hard left get constantly upvoted, and reasonable rebuttals get downvoted into oblivion, you can get a sense of the general trend.

[crazy canuck]

Interesting can you please provide us with your statistical analysis of all the Reddit forums you have analyzed in order to make your grins claim that Reddit is riddled with leftists