this post was submitted on 29 Feb 2024
44 points (82.4% liked)

Unpopular Opinion

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Welcome to the Unpopular Opinion community!


How voting works:

Vote the opposite of the norm.


If you agree that the opinion is unpopular give it an arrow up. If it's something that's widely accepted, give it an arrow down.



Guidelines:

Tag your post, if possible (not required)


  • If your post is a "General" unpopular opinion, start the subject with [GENERAL].
  • If it is a Lemmy-specific unpopular opinion, start it with [LEMMY].


Rules:

1. NO POLITICS


Politics is everywhere. Let's make this about [general] and [lemmy] - specific topics, and keep politics out of it.


2. Be civil.


Disagreements happen, but that doesn’t provide the right to personally attack others. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Please also refrain from gatekeeping others' opinions.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Shitposts and memes are allowed but...


Only until they prove to be a problem. They can and will be removed at moderator discretion.


5. No trolling.


This shouldn't need an explanation. If your post or comment is made just to get a rise with no real value, it will be removed. You do this too often, you will get a vacation to touch grass, away from this community for 1 or more days. Repeat offenses will result in a perma-ban.



Instance-wide rules always apply. https://legal.lemmy.world/tos/

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
 

several posts per day here are a clear troll posts and bids for drama but are not removed. until this community’s mods start acknowledging and responding to this problem, this community is simply providing a platform for drama fiends who get off on making you upset. simply put, this is both destructive and frankly not fun.

and i’d like to point out that reddit’s r/unpopularopinion bans political posts. not saying that this is the best move for this sub in particular, but it is something that can perhaps give guidance on what can be done.

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[–] [email protected] 12 points 8 months ago (3 children)

We don’t have enough good content to be worried about it being drowned out by shitposting.

Heavy handed moderation only makes sense when post volume gets too high for people to just downvote and move on.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 8 months ago

I completely disagree. A well-moderated community is a good community no matter the size.

And high volume is extremely overrated.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago

I feel like more moderation might not be a bad thing. The community can downvote whatever and block users who post it but it still sits out there festering for people who visit the community or sort by new. Sure it adds content but does it benefit the community? I don't really think so. A bot that reposts Fox news articles here would have the same impact.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

i hear you. for sure not calling for heavy handed moderation tho. specifically want trolls to be actually dealt with. if that means losing that 15% of post volume i personally am fine with this because it means 100% fewer gross bad faith debates going on in my feed.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 7 months ago* (last edited 7 months ago)

And the alternative to not getting rid of the bad posts is getting rid of followers. I am about to unsubscribe here due to the volume of posts that aren’t discussing true unpopular opinions. Until then, I will keep downvoting the shitposts

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I don't know if a simple ban on politics would work if shitposts weren't banned "Christopher Columbus discovered and saved America" or "Stoners smell like ass" aren't political but they are bait.

I really just think communities like this are pointless. I feel like there's a reason so many people have been making posts here talking about how people aren't actually voting for unpopular opinions.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

i agree with your assessment. the unpopular opinion brand has always been fairly cursed due to its paradoxical nature and an “impossible” subject to properly moderate. it would be easier if the sub vanished, but here we are.

the community here is in the top 15 on lemmmy.world and the mods need to learn how to wield that power or risk losing it to the trolls. r/unpopularopinion does not experience such obvious bait as the examples you noted, and i believe it is because of its more attentive stance on rules and enforcement.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago (1 children)

i agree with your assessment. the unpopular opinion brand has always been fairly cursed due to its paradoxical nature and an “impossible” subject to properly moderate. it would be easier if the sub vanished, but here we are.

Even on Reddit the premise doesn't work. One popular post from today says ""time theft" isn't a real crime" and I'd say a majority of people agree with that. The posts are only unpopular with a minority of people.

It's basically a shower thoughts community with posts phrased in a way where they are statements instead of opinions.

the community here is in the top 15 on lemmmy.world and the mods need to learn how to wield that power or risk losing it to the trolls. r/unpopularopinion does not experience such obvious bait as the examples you noted, and i believe it is because of its more attentive stance on rules and enforcement.

I agree. I feel like the only reason this community is so popular is because of people migrating from Reddit

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

thanks for your insight.

i think the tldr of my position is i don’t really care about making c/unpopularopinion “work” so much as i want smarmy, debate-lord, (for somereason often vaguely genocide-denial?) shit off my timeline. there are other instances and communities to host that bile, which i have preemptively blocked lol

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (2 children)

How about you link some examples?

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Two examples from today are "Gaza war is a lie" and "Christopher Columbus discovered and saved America"

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

If you report those posts then your instance admins will decide if they want to keep the posts. It's not just up to the mods on lemmy.world, it's your instance admins who are also letting it happen.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Is that how it works? It doesn't go to the owners of the instance where the community exists but to where ever my home port is so to speak?

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

That doesn't seem right. I could host my own instance and if someone was posting extreme content on Lemmy.World I don't think a report would bounce back to me.

If I reported content from exploding-heads for being alt-right because it was against my instance's rules but it was fine on their instance it might make sense but that kind of seems like it's going in circles. Especially when I don't think you can report specific communities. You'd need to either report users or individual posts at that point.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

+1 for a very good question we all seem iffy on. is there documentation on the process and channels for what reporting does on lemmy?

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

I made a post on [email protected] about this you can find here if you want to find out with me. Tagging @[email protected] in case they want to hear from the Lemmy masters too.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

(edit: other users have correctly identified the posts i am referring to.)

i elected not to link posts because that will bring the drama here which is exactly what they want.

you can identify them because there will be one or several comments beneath calling out the OP as a troll. it’s not like they are hard to find.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago) (1 children)

Why not apply as a mod if it bothers you that much?

Get your hands dirty and improve the parts of Lemmy that you think are lacking, which in turn improves it for many other people. That's my favorite part of the FOSS community <3

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

not a bad idea. if i do so, this post is certainly a good first step, sort of getting a temperature reading of if the community even wants the change.

[–] ryathal 2 points 8 months ago

You need several posts a day for there to be several posts that are poor quality. There aren't that many posts.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Troll accounts are pretty easy to spot, especially if it's always by the same group. Block and move on.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 8 months ago

so true. since they are so easy to spot i vote that the mods block them and move on as well.

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

several posts per day here are a clear troll posts and bids for drama

Isn't this the point of this ~~subreddit~~ community? Like, what else do you imagine would people post on a forum called "unpopular opinion"? It will have the same fate as its Reddit counterpart.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

There are a few community archetypes that will always gradually, but inevitably, cease to offer anything of substance without a strong understanding of moderation. Unpopular opinions, communities built around making fun of [topic], any communities that can be used for creative writing, etc.. This community is a step further than most in that its subject matter is actively antagonistic in addition to being a potential space for creative writing. It’s doomed to fail without bizarrely dedicated mods or a queue of posts pending approval.

[–] sentient_loom 0 points 7 months ago

And all the opinions are normal and popular.

[–] [email protected] -3 points 8 months ago

This community has too many unpopular opinions. please remove 3. I am not a crackpot.

[–] [email protected] -4 points 8 months ago (2 children)

You're not helping it any by posting this popular opinion.

[–] [email protected] 10 points 8 months ago

you’re welcome. pls look up what a meta post is.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago (1 children)

What do you expect them to do? Create a separate, even more niche, community for discussing the meta of unpopular opinions?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 8 months ago (1 children)

I expected people to be able to identify facetious statements.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 8 months ago

I get it. It is a popular opinion here but it more so sounded like you were tired of people bringing it up