Controversial - the place to discuss controversial topics

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Controversial - the community to discuss controversial topics.

Challenge others opinions and be challenged on your own.

This is not a safe space nor an echo-chamber, you come here to discuss in a civilized way, no flaming, no insults!

Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence, "trust me bro" is not a valid argument.

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Hastur

Calls for defederation - Is the idea of the open marketplace of ideas outdated? (self.controversial)

submitted 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) by Hastur to c/controversial

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Lately I see a lot of calls do have specific instances defederated for a particular subset of reasons:

Don't like their content
Dont like their political leaning
Dont like their free speech approach
General feeling of being offended
I want a safe space!
This instance if hurting vulnerable people

I personally find each and every one of these arguments invalid. Everybody has the right to live in an echo chamber, but mandating it for everyone else is something that goes a bit too far.

Has humanity really developed into a situation where words and thoughts are more hurtful than sticks and stones?

Edit: Original context https://slrpnk.net/post/554148

Controversial topic, feel free to discuss!

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[–] Shihali 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

I think your idea of ten ~~thousand~~ million small instances is what the fediverse was meant to be, but if you don't have the resources to run your very own instance and you have multiple small interests instead of one life-consuming one, it's a severe problem. Do I join the instance dedicated to bullet journaling, or the instance dedicated to Final Fantasy XIV, or the instance dedicated to Tolkien? Which instance will tolerate me posting on a debate instance and posting in a language other than English?

It's much easier to join a generalist instance that will tolerate all of that, but that means the generalist instance has to be willing to tolerate the debaters (who will break down into rude squabbling), a Tolkien fan saying that Tolkien probably wouldn't have approved of the new MtG cards, and other things of which censorious progressives disapprove.

I'm interested in an answer to the problem, because having too many instances to choose from and that choice mattering a fair bit is a big barrier to more people joining the fediverse.

P.S. This is the third time I've had to restart my comment due to vanishing. Is there a known issue with comments in progress vanishing?