There may be an age or generational explanation for this, but I especially notice this behavior on Reddit while not nearly as much here on Lemmy (though maybe that’s also a mater of implementation).
It seems many are so quick to assert overly-confident positions, but then hit-and-run with some smarmy remark at even the slightest challenge, then quickly block. Like, not even crazy stuff. Just basic, civil disagreements. I can pretty well predict when it will happen, and it always feels like such a petty ego-sparing fingers-in-ears denial thing to do, and to me if anything shows they were not very confident in their views being challenged.
I think I’ve only blocked a handful of people over a decade who were actively spamming, stalking, or spewing extremely hateful rhetoric and I just reported them simultaneously. You have to cross a pretty extreme and irrational line for me to do that.
The reason I ask is to see if I’m missing something; to better understand the mindset of those who do.
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I’ve got better things to do than read a load of horseshit from bad-faith weirdos, so I block them. No point engaging with them and reading their opinions makes my day measurably worse.
Because people online are jerks
dunno if you go out into the world much, but they are also massive jerks there too
Don’t make them my friend group pal
Counterpoint- why hasn’t blocking been more common?
I’m a millennial, so I’ve basically grown up with the internet. Blocking has been a feature on basically any website, app, etc. that lets you interact with other people for as long as I can remember.
And I’ve never been afraid to use it. I’ve blocked probably hundreds of people across countless platforms over the last 2 decades or so, and I think my Internet experience has been better for it.
When I was in school, and I assume still to this day, one of the big things that always seemed to have people’s feathers ruffled was “cyberbullying” and other sorts of online harassment.
Now I’ll admit, somehow I ended up a reasonably well-liked, maybe even popular dude, (no idea how my weird, antisocial, probably-autistic ass pulled that off) so I was never really the target of it myself.
But it always baffled me how people let it be a thing. A whole lot of those problems always seemed like they could have been solved by just hitting the block button.
Not all of them of course, but a lot of them. Blocking someone of course doesn’t stop them from talking about you to someone else, but at that point a lot of it can just be out of sight and out of mind.
Back when I still had a Facebook, I had probably half of my town blocked because they were always posting dumb shit in the local groups. I had a bunch of businesses blocked because they spammed advertisements everywhere. I had actual friends who I hung out with IRL blocked or at least unfollowed because they flooded my feed with shitposts. Half of my family was blocked because I just didn’t want to deal with them on social media. I preemptively blocked people I work with or otherwise knew casually because they don’t need to see what I’m doing online.
I have never blocked any one on the internet. And I probably have been in online conversations for longer than you have been alive.
I find it so strange that people do that. We learned in the 80’s that people are probably liars and there are trolls. So just ignore them.
Turns out a lot of people may have something that gets you annoyed while at the same time have something worthwhile to say about a different topic.
And how are we ever going to learn from each other if we just block each other all the time?
Blocking is a VERY GOOD THING.
The internet is a cesspool. You need to curate it.
Only issue I take with this is that the last year has shown us the internet represents living people, even if we put them out of sight.
That said, I don’t exactly know how we “solve” that cesspool.
You don’t. It’s on other people to fix themselves.
Sadly, they think you’re a cesspool too for not agreeing with them. I’ve noticed my opinions have become super controversial now because I’m not a polarized person. And non-polarized viewpoints are EVIL to anyone who is an extremist, and all the extremists think they are moderates are the only ones who see ‘the truth’.
They never said otherwise. They’re just talking about a relatively recent cultural shift towards blocking people for no real reason
Personally, I block people who espouse things I believe are genuinely spiteful, hateful, or shitty. Generally, I use the block button to “curate” my experience with the intention that I can use Lemmy as brief escapism when I’m in the bathroom or on the train without having my mood affected by somebody posting something shitty.
I don’t block anyone for normal disagreements, because I’m a relatively normal adult and as such that sort of thing doesn’t bother me.
I think it’s more of a space curation thing. As a tumblr user mentioned, “I pressed a button to get rid of an annoying guy and I would do it again”.
Social media split and modified people so much they’re often immediately feeling threatened and block that out, imo.
I’m quite happy to have had some discussions (!) on lemmy where I or the other person could explain the view or clear the (mis)understanding and both be wiser people afterwards.
I think there is a difference between different people - and maybe it has changed generationally too. I can think of some obvious potential reasons though:
- the number of people who are being horrible is increasing. The increasing division in society is reflected online. That means people have more reason to block people.
- the proliferation of social media bubbles makes people less used to encountering opinions that differ significantly from their own.
I usually find myself blocked by people who just disagree with me. I (increasingly) rarely lose my rag online, but people find it annoying to have someone reply to them who disagrees on certain things and who doesn’t just shut up and go away quickly.
I have a pretty high tolerance for that kind of irritation but after a few dozen replies back and forth I’ll also use the block button. It’s less about not seeing their posts in the future, more as a way to force myself to disengage and get annoyed again.
People don’t like being forced to engage with belligerent reactionaries.
Most people have egg shell personalities and blocking is their defense mechanism.
Sometimes they even post it to re affirm themselves… It looks pathetic.
Blocking is useful in creating an echo chamber but I don’t think that’s the intent, just a “positive” outcome the again reaffirms the eggashell personality
It also bleeds over into real life too. It’s a habit people develop… just shut out anything/anyone who says anything I don’t like or that causes me to have to think.
Life is too short to deal with weirdos treating lemmy as their blog. Some are overzealous but you have to curate your own space on federated platforms
Agree with this. I don’t shout my opinion and then block, but I definitely block a lot of users who just have really intense views they want to share, and communities I have no interest in, and over the last couple years my curated space is a reasonable mix of memes, news, and not to extreme of views, and it’s nice.
I love that term curate. I find it funny that people don’t like blocking but are fine with subscribing. Subscribing and only looking at subscribing is akin to blocking everything else. Blocking and perusing all means you will come across new communities you don’t want to block.
I have done this a few times, for me it was just that I was writing a reply and 80% through I realized that I didn’t want to argue any more, so I blocked the guy after posting it, just so I wouldn’t get any more crap to deal with.
So I get this feeling— and I don’t mean to say your mode of operation is not valid— but why not just stop replying? I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve had an argument in a thread and one side stopped talking and it continued for more than two posts or something.
In situations where I do this, I am annoyed at the other guy, and the last comment they made was so glaringly wrong that it was far more important for me to reply and block and just to block.
I know it is stupid, but that is the feeling of the time.
Blocking is tempting when someone actively ignores arguments but keeps coming back with the same thing over and over, or can’t avoid ad hominem attacks.
That said, my block list is empty, but I have tagged people so I know if I’m running into them again.
Pretty much exactly the same here. Can you tag people on Lemmy (how?) or do you do it on a separate text file?
I use Voyager and it supports tagging.
I see, thanks!
last I checked I had over 220 users blocked. now it’s probably 250.
I block people who are willfully ignorant or trolls.
I constantly block both users and communities on Lemmy. Mostly because they are spouting doomer nonsense, and I ain’t got no time for their bullshit.
There’s definitely an addicting trend to making people more scared than they should be. News falls to it, individuals seeking attention fall to it too.
Quake is better anyway.
