Yes, similarly, I was alarmed to read that qanon type groups gain traction on subreddits like /r/conspiracy. We have a chat channel at work where people post links from that subreddit and joke about it. It’s discomforting to realize we’ve been participating in misleading people by adding to view and subscriber counts.

Same with /r/mandelaeffect. You’d think it was pretty obviously a joke, but I’ve seen posts where people seemed to be dead serious about parallel universe shenanigans.

The lesson here is, don’t create joke or troll communities unless you’d be comfortable with them turning very real.