I Joined DU To Get Informed & For The Back & Forth Conversation/Debate

[gab13by13]

This discussion thread was locked by EarlG (a host of the General Discussion forum).

Maybe it's just me, but I think DU is changing. We don't get as much back and forth conversations, opinions, ideas, suggestions, strategies.

We are getting quotes from cut and paste articles with miniscule opinions from the posters, same with cut and paste videos.

We still have the human interaction, and maybe I am wrong about this, I hope we aren't becoming disheartened.

Join or Donate to Indivisible.

[Roxi]

1. I can think of at least one reason

Our public words are being monitored.

A lot of people know it’s just a matter of time before what we write here will come back to haunt us. Can’t blame people for being careful.

[PCIntern]

2. They have bigger fish to fry...

In a way they like these message boards: we are here typing away rather than being on the street protesting. Many here and elsewhere think that they’re doing their part in the resistance movement.

[gab13by13]

4. Many here can do his/her part

by donating to Indivisible or the ACLU, or Marc Elias law firm.

I get a dozen texts a day to donate, but I donate to people who are fighting now.

I'm 78 now and live among Magats and I learned how to speak to them. I am not shy, I let them have zingers that they can't respond to. My goal is to get 1 Magat to not vote or switch his/her vote.

I even wrote letters to our local right wing newspaper, got quite the reputation. There were only 4 or 5"leftists" who wrote in. The editor publicly called me his left wing commie-pinko buddy. They began editing my letters so I dropped my subscription, wrote a letter why and walked into the newspaper office and handed it to the editor.

[ColoringFool]

20. Now 76, I Protested On Campus, 1969-70. I Protested In NYC IN 2 Street Marches,....

2003. I protested Dubya and Cheyney on different college campuses, 2004.

I'm passing that particular torch, TYVM. Anyway, the young want me and my fellow Boomers to die ASAP, so AFAIC they can now be the protesters and protectors of their future.

[Haggard Celine]

6. If a DUer was accused of something really bad,

like a shooting or something, it would be ugly. Law enforcement and the press would drag out their old posts and those of other people who interacted with them. That scenario comes to mind a lot when I see some posts around here. DUers do a sort of self-policing here, and I'm not just talking about the system for removing offensive posts. Posts that are too radical for most people either get pushback or they're ignored altogether. It makes people who might cause trouble less likely to post here. I think most DUers are fairly old, not the radical type, for the most part.

[dalton99a]

13. And we are ruled by criminals who murder U.S. citizens and drag them out of the house without a warrant

[Woodwizard]

3. Have used this site for news since Bush

It has gotten a lot more extreme posters since. The whole spillover of toxic social media is my theory.

The video section has so many histrionic headlines without actual substance. But I guess that is the point, clicks and shares is what it is about. To be forgotten in the insanity of tomorrow.

[gab13by13]

8. I believe the opposite

The people here, ahem, who were railing against Merrick Garland were considered the outcasts.

Krasnov has purged the Justice Department of dedicated long term serving prosecutors and nary a peep out of Garland defending them.

Fuck Merrick Garland, he was a nice guy who didn't do his job.

[Fiendish Thingy]

19. C'mon gab, did you post that just to get my attention?

It’s hard to seriously think of oneself as an outcast for “railing against Garland” when those posts consistently get hundreds of recs and rise to the top of the Greatest page, with only minimal “back and forth” from myself and a couple other DU’ers.

Those type of posts largely create self perpetuating echo chambers of doom and mythology.

I do agree (we seem to be doing more of that lately) that DU has changed.

My perception is things began to change in 2024 with the delays in prosecuting Trump, and then with Biden dropping out and being replaced by Harris, culminating in the reelection of Trump that November.

Since then, there has been a drastic escalation in posts about 2024 election denialism, Trump canceling elections, staying president forever, or other themes about his omnipotence. CT theories have definitely made a resurgence over the past year, often fueled by the clickbait videos you mentioned.

While it’s understandable that many have felt overwhelmed, hopeless, powerless or otherwise demoralized, and seek to make sense of it all, I agree that there seems to be less interest in a back and forth exchange of ideas, and more desire for an amplification of shared fear, outrage, etc regardless of the actual facts.

I can tell you my ignore list had about a dozen people on it before the 2024 election, now it has over a hundred. The two main video forums are trashed from my latest page, and my list of words for trashed threads has grown over the past year too. These were necessary steps to make DU a more useful, and useable place to visit.

Your recommendation/referral to Indivisible is a good one, and I would piggyback that recommendation with one to seek out DUer usonian and their posts on activism and what one can actually do to resist this regime.

[Swede]

7. Try the lounge for casual, relaxing back&forth. GD is full of fear and righteous anger (ain't nothing wrong with that).

But GD has plenty to offer in these trying times.

[Scrivener7]

10. In every thread that suggests something we can do to improve our response to the current existential

crisis in our Democracy, we have to wade through five or six posters who will argue to the death that we are bad Democrats for having such a discussion. It was true when we said Garland should do more, and it's true now when we say our leaders should do more.

[gab13by13]

14. People who complained about Garland, ahem, were looked upon as outcasts.

Look at today how Krasnov has purged the justice department of patriotic long time serving prosecutors because they won't fluff Krasnov. The least that Garland could have done was to speak out against this shameful purge and have the backs of the people who were ousted, but once again, crickets.

[hamsterjill]

11. For me, it's something a little different perhaps, but along the same lines.

I see more posts by members who, in my opinion, have a very predictable agenda. I see their posts over and over and over again defending the same, old and tired arguments, and berating anyone who dares question what is happening on our side. I've learned to watch these because I've felt several times that I'm being set up for an alert.

We should ALWAYS be free to question what is happening and what is being done by our side. That falls within the lines of freedom of expression in my view. The constant "what would you HAVE Democrats do" is always a red flag for me. My answer is "their job", and it is not up to me to figure out how they should do their job. That's up to the ones who campaigned and sought an office AND who accept a salary for having that office. Polls will show that is what voters want, and that many Democratic voters do not think their elected representatives are doing enough.

One poster yesterday insisted that *I* was helping fascists because I am questioning the Democratic leadership. Nope. I'm not and I don't accept that kind of crap. This poster insists that I'm keeping voters away from the voting booth because I've questioned what leadership is doing. I disagree. What is keeping voters away from the voting booth is the inaction that they see from their elected representatives. More action gives more hope and motivates people to become more involved. We need BOLD leadership; not milk toast actions.

[gab13by13]

15. Keep standing your ground, Jason Crow agrees with you.

A couple of days ago, on live TV, he said there are 2 camps of Congressional Democrats; those with courage who want to fight, and those who want to wait trump out and beat them in elections.

That was Jason Crow's public statement.

I feel that Schumer and Jeffries can best energize the base by getting out in the streets of Minnesota and Maine, get arrested if it comes to that.

[dalton99a]

17. +1. We have so-called leaders who are worse than useless.

It's mostly see nothing, hear nothing, say nothing


Every damn fucking day

[Scrivener7]

18. Cannot rec this enough. Our Democracy is falling down around our ears, and

there's a small posse here who insists we behave like dim cheerleaders toward Democratic leaders who often act against our wishes and the wishes of their caucuses, and who appease the madmen in power time after time.

[Kaleva]

12. This has been a complaint since I joined back in 2008

[gab13by13]

16. Am I mistaken? I value your opinion.

[FakeNoose]

21. Maybe it's just me, I don't know

We seem to be way less patient with one another these days. Or maybe DUers are no longer interested in giving polite, thoughtful answers. I've seen a growing number of rude and quick replies, and several arguments where people just won't give it up.

I'm much more likely to put a certain TYPE of poster on "ignore" rather than engage in angry back-and-forth with that person. I've been a regular on DU for going on 8 years now, and I didn't put anyone on "ignore" for the first few years. Now I'm doing one or 2 per month.

[EarlG]

22. Of course DU has changed

DU has been in existence for 25 years and it changes constantly as times change, the culture changes, and posters come and go. The majority opinion is not going to be the same here as it was a year ago, let alone five years or ten years ago.

This opinion -- that DU has changed for the worse because of x, y, or z -- has been posted by DUers since the first year of the site's existence. By the end of 2001 -- and probably earlier than that -- people were already posting that DU had changed for the worse. Thus it ever was, and thus it ever shall be.

Unfortunately, this opinion is most often presented as a problem caused by vague "others" on DU. When threads like this are started, which point the finger at "posters" who are doing something the OP finds problematic, who stand accused of "changing" DU for the worse, these threads inevitably turn into a simple list of grievances where respondents think that it's okay to come in and complain about any other DUers that they might happen to have a problem with.

My advice is the same as always -- use the tools provided to you, like the Ignore function and the Trash function, to get rid of the people and threads you don't want to see.

But please do not start threads to vaguely call out groups of other DUers whose opinions rub you the wrong way, under the guise of an assertion that those people are ruining DU for everybody.