Re:Biography of Christopher “moot” Poole: The Hacker Known a...
by claudiawerner on Friday February 08, 2019 @08:53PM
(#19120204)
I really can't get behind the idea that it's a disgusting place, even now. There are some parts that I was hesitant to use because it would drag me into arguments with right-wingers, but there were many other parts that were just really, really good. The kind of discussion that prevailed was often insightful (if usually short). On /mu/ and /lit/, the kind of people you don't want to be engaging with usually keep to their own threads, because they know their input is worthless in better threads. It is possible for me to have a good discussion about Marx (for instance) on /lit/ with minimal interference. This is an amazing feat considering how 4chan doesn't have the "walling" features that subreddits provide. That's often a bad thing but it's sometimes a good thing too.
Re:Biography of Christopher “moot” Poole: The Hacker Known a...
by komali2 on Saturday February 09, 2019 @01:54AM
(#19121138)
It doesn't have to always be disgusting, to be a disgusting place.
The unabashed use of racial and LGBT slurs is disgusting. So is the gore raids, the frequent suggestions to self harm (regardless of the presence of "white Knights"), general misogyny, frequent jailbait content (moreso in the old days), shit like that.
Not everything there is disgusting. Not everyone is disgusting. But, compared to, say, imgur or something, you are far more likely to come out of 4chan with a terrible taste in your mouth I would say.
Re:Biography of Christopher “moot” Poole: The Hacker Known a...
by seatdrummer on Saturday February 09, 2019 @02:05PM
(#19123974)
You are also able to come out of it with a different perspective you'd never otherwise gain due to up and down voting being missing.
A merit of 4chan is that you get exposed to content you don't like.
Re:Biography of Christopher “moot” Poole: The Hacker Known a...
by newen on Saturday February 09, 2019 @10:53AM
(#19122860)
Yep. It's incredible how you can have a reasonably intelligent discussion in 4chan, while in reddit and similar vote based sites, once the mob comes to visit the site, they take over and no one can have a good discussion anymore.
Re:Biography of Christopher “moot” Poole: The Hacker Known a...
by gjs278 on Friday February 08, 2019 @08:26PM
(#19120114)
4chan boards are fine. there’s nothing wrong with the free expression of ideas. you can respond back to any incorrect idea all you want.
Re:Biography of Christopher “moot” Poole: The Hacker Known a...
by KozmoNau7 on Saturday February 09, 2019 @05:50AM
(#19121725)
You can certainly post thoughtful comments, but they will invariably be shouted down by shitposts and outright abuse. It's not worth it, because the 4chan hivemind doesn't want it. The boards are too hectic and posting moves too fast.
Bad actors would do bad shit there due to the very nature of the site. Probably, the misfits could have found some other, healthier, place to congregate. But they didn't, and so 4chan was important, to many people.
It's a shame it got weaponized by bad actors. There was once a day when such attempts would be met with "4chan is not your personal army." Unfortunately, the bad actors got smart enough to figure out how to turn them into an army anyway.
Beyond that, I believe it's important for social / cultural / political structures I disagree with to exist in small "gardens," left to their own devices - both as a living example of "yup, x or y doesn't work, go to 4chan to see what it results in," but also because sometimes it does work, and it's important to keep those traditions alive.