Call me crazy, but I a) think the fediverse probably doesn't have more 'toxic content', harmful and violent content, and child sexual abuse material then other platforms like X, Facebook, Meta, YouTube etc, and b) actively like the fediverse because of that.

But after a few hours carefully drafting and sourcing an edit to make it clear that no, the fediverse isn't unusual in social media circles for having a lot of toxic content, I realised that the entire 'fediverse bad' section was added by 1 editor in 2 days. And the editor has made an awful lot of edits on pages all themed around porn (hundreds of edits on the pages of porn stars), suicide, mass killings, mass shootings, Jews, torture techniques, conspiracy theories, child abuse, various forms of sexual and other exploitation, 'zoosadism', and then pages with titles like 'bad monkey' that seemed reasonably innocent until I actually clicked on them to see what they were and, well.

I decided to stop using the internet for a while.

I've learned my lesson trying to change Wikipedia edits written by people like that - they tend to have a tight social circle of people who can make the internet a very unpleasant place for anyone suggesting maybe claims like 'an opinion poll indicated that most people in Britain would prefer to live next to a sewage plant than a Muslim' should maybe not on Wikipedia on the thin evidence of paywalled link from a Geocities page written by, apparently, a putrid cesspit personified.

I thought I'd learned my lesson about trusting Wikipedia.

It just makes me so angry that most people's main source of information on the fediverse contains a massive chunk written solely by a guy who spends most of his time making minor grammar edits to pages about school shootings, collections of pages about black people who were sexually assaulted and murdered, etc, and that these people control the narrative on Wikipedia by means of ensuring any polite critics' are overcome with the urge to spend the rest of the day showering and disinfecting everything.

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[–] Kolanaki@pawb.social 2 points 31 minutes ago

It's pretty toxic toward right-wing pieces of shit that espouse hate toward minorities, women and queer people. As it should be.

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world 11 points 6 hours ago

Today you learned any idiot can edit Wikipedia and it is mostly done by pro government entities.

[–] Flax_vert@feddit.uk 9 points 12 hours ago* (last edited 12 hours ago)

I have seen worse stuff on Instagram and Reddit than I have seen on the fediverse... and I use the fediverse far more.

it is impossible for an instance to be "removed" from the Fediverse

That's just how the internet works.

As with Wikipedia, I saw the same stuff with articles regarding religious topics that were just heavily guarded by a neckbeard atheist who had unreasonable expectations.

[–] goat@sh.itjust.works 1 points 9 hours ago (1 children)

Wikipedia certainly isn't wrong, the Fediverse is filled with so much political extremism, made worse by the Tankie Developers

!meanwhileongrad@sh.itjust.works to see more of how widespread tankies and their extreme bigotry and violent rhetoric spreads across the fediverse

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world -1 points 6 hours ago (2 children)

Note this person is a Zionist promoting a community where they encourage Jewish ethnic surpremacy.

[–] goat@sh.itjust.works 1 points 33 minutes ago

That's not at all true

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 2 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

Source needed

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world 0 points 3 hours ago* (last edited 3 hours ago) (1 children)

https://lemmy.world/post/35824465/19372031

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 2 points 3 hours ago (2 children)

Is that the same person?

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world 2 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (2 children)

I got banned by Goat for reporting that person. That person did not get banned.

[–] goat@sh.itjust.works 1 points 36 minutes ago

You got banned for specifically using "Zio" -- A term coined by David Duke. I asked you to use a different phrase instead, such as zionist, zionazi or anything else, but you insisted on using Zio.

Your ban has expired by now anyway, I don't dish out perm-bans unless it's absolutely neccessary

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 2 points 2 hours ago

So no?

I don't think the conclusion you have reached is reasonable. By the logic you are running on every community is every bad thing anyone has ever posted and every ban would be grounds for de-federalization.

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world -1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

For more info see my my post about previous ban there where Goat got banned on DB0 for going full Zionist himself and somehow DB0 is tankies.

https://lemmy.world/post/35172737?scrollToComments=true

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 2 hours ago* (last edited 2 hours ago) (1 children)

Is this the part you wanted to highlight? Because this seems to be about you being a pro china genocide denier who was down voted for that point. I don't get how you are getting "full zionist" from this.

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world -1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

No the rest of the thread where Goat goes full Zionist.

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 2 hours ago (2 children)

This whole thread does not make you or the dbzer0 community look the way you hope. Honestly this reads like some hexbear level horseshit. If you have some actual evidence please just post a screen shot or a link to the actual thing you want to show us.

[–] goat@sh.itjust.works 1 points 35 minutes ago

It is Hexbear level horseshit. Dbzer0 is federated with Hexbear and most of these users come from Hexbear or have Hexbear alts

[–] IndustryStandard@lemmy.world -1 points 2 hours ago (1 children)

I already did once and you tried to ignore it so go look for the rest yourself.

[–] M0oP0o@mander.xyz 1 points 1 hour ago

Are we seeing different links?

[–] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 27 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

it looks like somebody who just saw this post edited wikipedia for the first time to remove that. this is why wikipedia's wonderful: it's that easy. i have this quirk where i wanna debate anyone who distrusts wikipedia or claim its rigidity

[–] technocrit@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 7 hours ago* (last edited 7 hours ago) (1 children)

lmao wait until it's reverted, argued over, then the editor gets banned.

[–] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 4 points 6 hours ago

go on, show me

[–] moubliezpas@lemmy.world 7 points 10 hours ago

They did! The change log shows the main section of 'I found a single paper criticising the fediverse so here's 600 words on how terrible the concept is', and also reassured me that I wasn't just being lazy in not wanting to trawl through the text to edit it to be less awful.

I'm bizarrely excited about it too. You can't thank anonymous Wikipedia editors, so I'll throw a vague 'thank you!' out into the world and try to pay it forward.

My next battle: figuring out why I can't edit this post, lol (maybe a mobile problem) and long term, why I didn't think of 'just edit it anonymously'.

[–] dontbelievethis@sh.itjust.works 3 points 15 hours ago

I think Wikipedia itself says that it is just an entry into topics. To confirm the things that are written there you check sources.

[–] glimse@lemmy.world 90 points 1 day ago (1 children)

The crappiness of this section has been noted

[–] moubliezpas@lemmy.world 11 points 10 hours ago

Someone put that on in the last 12 hours, and since then, some anonymous person just deleted the entire section lol.

I legit feel really grateful, I'd been going down a bit of a 'either every source of information is corrupt and there's no hope, or I'm losing my mind' rabbit hole. I haven't quite pulled the plug on Reddit yet, which may be contributing to that.

I prefer the whole 'major additions and changes should be introduced in the talk section of a page so it can be discussed by the committee of reasonable good faith adults with lots of spare time and patience' approach to Wikipedia editing, but in retrospect that may be a wee bit idealistic in current times. So the 'one person complains and documents, another person flags, and another just deletes the entire thing' is a process that may be a good compromise between The Way Things Should Be and how to edit Wikipedia with consensus and without being harassed by neo Nazis.

[–] Auster@thebrainbin.org 97 points 1 day ago (12 children)

Skimmed through the article and something picked my attention, the numbers given in the "325000 posts analyzed". The way its given, it makes seem like big numbers, but if you calculate what is the percentage of the numbers given, it's less than 1%. Can't check the linked source, but it seems like a classical "lying with statistics".

And besides, text seems written in a way to give the impression site moderation for smaller sites is too stupid to block bad actors, and that only the paternalism of bigger sites can solve this implied issue.

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[–] OpenStars@piefed.social 11 points 22 hours ago (6 children)

Beware of unearned knowledge.

You "lose" 100% of the battles that you choose not to fight.

Besides, people here are reporting that the content is already gone. Even if it comes back, it likely will bounce around back and forth but not return to this same state, so this was transient.

Even so, it seems not wrong? "toxic or abusive content being common in the Fediverse", regardless of how precisely that is measured, seems entirely accurate to me. YOU (and I) may choose to block such content, in part by being on an instance that enacts this choice for us, but that does not mean that such does not exist. Head on over to Chapotraphouse@hexbear.net to get a taste of what the Fediverse offers. It does exist, and while Lemmy.World defederated from it, so many other instances including Lemm.ee did not. Or Lemmygrad.ml.

It is so easy to forget about what was shoved under the rug, but the Fediverse is more like 4chan than most of us care to admit. Just because there are no Nazis currently standing in your little corner of a Nazi bar does not mean that you can invite your Jewish friends over to walk (safely) through the front door.

The Fediverse can be quite toxic. So much so that I've entirely stopped recommending it to people irl. We need to be more acceptable to people if we want to change our image, not just pretend that we are fine.

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