The fediverse is small, and thats both a blessing and a curse - one of its several blessings is that in a smaller space we all individually have a bigger impact on what the culture of this space is like.

On this comm (and on lemmy broadly) there’s a lot of discussion about how to grow the fediverse, what to improve, but an easy thing you can do for the fediverse is right in front of us-

  • Be kind

  • Ask people what they think, and why

  • Approach folks you disagree with with curiosity rather than hostility (EDIT: no, this is not specifically referring to Nazis. I get it, they’re the first thing that comes to mind. I’m not telling you to approve of Nazis I’m just saying be kind to your fellow lemmites)

  • Engage sincerely

  • Ask yourself if there’s something nice you can say

  • Make this small space worth being in

A platform lives or dies by what’s available on said platform and often we have this conversation in the context of “content” or posts - and we may never have as much content as reddit does. But content and posts aren’t the only thing this kind of platform offers- it also offers people. It offers community, and human interaction.

Culture and community is lemmy and the fediverse’s biggest differentiator, and we all have a role to play in shaping the culture of this space.

The biggest thing you can do to help the fediverse is make it a place worth being.

  • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
    1603·
    24 days ago

    Here are some more specific examples to think about!

    • Compliment people’s art and ask about their process

    • Teach people about something you’re knowledgeable on

    • Give constructive criticism on peoples projects when it’s welcome

    • Thank people for posting things you’re glad you got to see, tell them you enjoyed it

    • Tell people you’re glad they’re here

    • Tell people you hope they have a good day

    Thanks for taking the time to read my thoughts :) if you have thoughts of your own, I’d love to hear them!

    • Rhaedas@fedia.io
      482·
      23 days ago

      On constructive criticism - definitely rule one is make sure that it’s invited first, but second, the best way to “sweeten” a critique and make it more appealing is to put it between compliments. Don’t have a bare remark about the problems or suggestions, tell them what you like first, then how they might change things, and then close with something else positive or simply thanking them for sharing it. Even if someone says they want to hear what people think, it’s normal to be defensive, so help lower that reaction first, and then leave them feeling appreciated even though you pointed out issues you saw.

        • Rhaedas@fedia.io
          16·
          23 days ago

          I agree it can be used fallaciously, often found in the business world. My point was to include both good and bad honestly and not hide it, and people won’t shut down if they get the good first. It also depends on the subject - if they’re on the right track and your suggestion leads to better results, that’s not as negative as telling someone they’re doing something incorrectly and offering a different way.

          In the end, how you say things is just as important as what is said.

      • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
        4·
        23 days ago

        Absolutely agree, some folks just wanna share, some folks wanna get constructive crit to try and technically improve! Its important to be respectful of what kind of interaction folks are looking for :)

        And absolutely, talking about both good and bad doesn’t just make it less unpleasant or more enjoyable to get feedback, it also makes better, more helpful feedback! (Assuming that’s a thing they’re looking for)

    • Lemmchen@feddit.orgEnglish
      71·
      23 days ago

      I’m not one for religion, but I for one would like to join the Church of Cris.

    • pirat@lemmy.studioEnglish
      2·
      23 days ago

      Are you open to some additional thoughts / feedback on feedback / constructive criticism?

      • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
        2·
        23 days ago

        I am! Thank you for asking :)

        Ive gotten a lot of assumptions about what I meant and that’s a bit frustrating but I really value honest sincere dialogue, if you have thoughts you think would be worth sharing I’d love to hear them my friend!

        • pirat@lemmy.studioEnglish
          2·
          22 days ago

          I thought I had hit reply on your other comment going into more detail (whoops!).

          Like I did in this example, ask if people are open to feedback (if you’re the one giving it).

          Often when I am training groups on how to work together, I always try and frame feedback as a gift.

          If someone is giving you feedback, they are genuinely trying to help you grow - and that’s a gift. The issue here though, is not everyone is a good gift giver - and we can’t control that.

          What we do have control over is how we recieve gifts - often all you need to do is say thank you. Don’t explain why you’re not going to use this feedback (if you plan not to incorporate it). Other than clarifying the feedback to better understand how to incorporate it, saying thank you is the best way to go about it.

          As far as delivering feedback I always say “if you can choose to be anything in this world why choose anything other than kind.”

          It is important to state that “being kind” doesn’t mean not having the difficult conversations or delivering difficult feedback - you can still do that without being cruel. Being assertive isn’t being aggressive.

          A bit rambly but if you’re ever working with folx on delivering feedback, I’ve found that presenting these frameworks with it ste super helpful

  • squirrel@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    891·
    24 days ago

    There was a movement in the blogging community ~15 years ago to leave positive comments on posts you like. It was an approach to conquer negative comments and a general destructive nature of online conversations. I still do it to this day. If I really like something or appreciate someone’s work, I leave a nice comment.

    • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      39·
      24 days ago

      Oh neat, being younger there’s a lot of how folks approached the web in its earlier years that I don’t have any experience with, and think there’s a lot to learn from

      I love that!

  • Banana@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    63·
    24 days ago

    I’ve noticed most discussions i have here end with a LOT less anger and a LOT more learning and that makes me happy.

    • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      35·
      23 days ago

      Fuck yeah! I think that’s the thing that makes the fediverse special :)

      We all care enough about the online spaces we choose to inhabit that we leave the big platforms for something kinder. I think that’s worth leaning into :)

    • yucandu@lemmy.worldEnglish
      132·
      23 days ago

      Because there’s fewer foreign bots trying to make you hate everyone in your country, and fewer social media engagement bots trying to make sure you stay online arguing with someone.

  • nickwitha_k (he/him)@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
    601·
    22 days ago

    I disagree with your premise.

    It should be “The best thing that you can do for humanity is to be kind”.

    Seriously. We’re living in a time when fascism is in an upswing and at least one religious leader has publicly called empathy a sin. Kindness and empathy are rebellious acts.

  • kek@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
    569·
    23 days ago

    Great post.

    To add to this, not resorting to calling others tankies or Russian bots when you have differing opinions, especially around politics.

    • Draces@lemmy.worldEnglish
      368·
      23 days ago

      I came to Lemmy (lemm.ee originally) with this attitude. Tankies really made me regret trying to be sympathetic too them. It was the most vile interaction I’ve had on the Internet maybe? You shouldn’t call people tankies if they’re not but real tankies are by far the biggest problem with the fediverse and it’s growth

    • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      194·
      23 days ago

      1 billion percent agree, not everyone you disagree with is acting in bad faith

      • jimmy90@lemmy.worldEnglish
        13·
        22 days ago

        when you’re dealing with fundamentalists or extremists things turn nasty very quickly because you’re questioning their fantasy world

        doesn’t matter if they’re good or bad faith, often they will just ban you

    • saltesc@lemmy.worldEnglish
      142·
      23 days ago

      On Reddit, I once bragged about having universal healthcare and got called a Nazi and a communist at the same time.

      This is what happens when Xbox kids that use the n-word grow up. They learn new “bad” words and throw them around out of context and contradictingly. They don’t actually know what those things are, though, so it never makes sense.

      I’ve been called a tankie here. I didn’t know what it was and looked it up, just to discover it was the literal opposite of the things I was saying. I was very confused and just put it down to frustrated self-projection. At some point they had been called that, it upset them, so now they use it to upset people too but they still don’t actually know what it is they’re saying.

      If I see someone defaulting to Russian bot or tankie, I’ve found another Xbox kid and it’s in my best interests to just move on.

      • davel@lemmy.mlEnglish
        172·
        23 days ago

        Instance admins have pretty good information at their disposal to identify bots.

        I have yet to see any instance admin say that there is any significant amount of bots, outside of the occasional spate of spamming. I only see such theories & accusasions come from non-admins, with no accompanying compelling evidence.

      • Aqarius@lemmy.worldEnglish
        4·
        23 days ago

        I’ve had the thought that if I were to design a psyop campaign, a pretty solid option for dominating the discussion would be to come out swinging and accuse everyone else of being an agent. That way, people have to either constantly defend against accusations, or they conclude, rightly, the accusations are baseless and decide to disregard the very idea that there is a psyop going on.

      • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
        41·
        23 days ago

        I could be wrong but to me it feels odd to think lemmy is big enough to be worth organizing psyops for.

        Not to say it couldn’t be an issue in the future, but it feels much more likely that people expressing pro Russia sentiment are just people who bought into that particular brand of propaganda.

        Which like, to some extent all of our individual world views are shaped by the environment of propaganda we’re exposed to. We’re all products of our social conditioning, and ultimately that’s exactly what propaganda is. Media designed to socially condition people to a certain set of beliefs. All we as individuals can do is be aware of it and be willing to look at our own beliefs critically.

        But at the end of the day I think the folks praising Russia on lemmy are just people. People I personally think are misguided, but I don’t think theyre generally acting in bad faith any more than the general population here.

          • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
            2·
            23 days ago

            Honestly if anyone is doing that I really feel like it would be the US, not Russia.

            Russia’s goal is to sew discord and unballance the populace that drives politics, and for that to work you need a MASSIVE scale that we just don’t really have. They don’t really have much to gain from the IP addresses of a handful of leftists

            But Lemmy is exactly the kind of hotspot for people DEEPLY angry about the government of the US to organize that if we’re big enough to be on their radar, the US government would have a vested interest in keeping an eye on potential dissidents. Unlike Russia IP addresses and personally identifiable information would be useful to them, in identifying threat actors, tracking their activity and volatility online, and building cases that would allow them to prosecute should said dissidents escalate

            That’s how it looks from where I’m standing anyway 🤷‍♂️

        • finitebanjo@lemmy.worldEnglish
          1·
          23 days ago

          Lemmy being splintered and opposed to all forms of authority makes it perfect for radicalizing individuals to commit great harm and violence in their community.

          All movement starts at the grassroots.

    • misteloct@lemmy.worldEnglish
      84·
      23 days ago

      Sometimes they literally just are. Not seen it on Lemmy but on Reddit I definitely interacted with users, age under 1 year, all suspiciously pro-Putin. It’s rare and I’m looking for it, but still.

      • nickwitha_k (he/him)@lemmy.sdf.orgEnglish
        4·
        23 days ago

        It’s rare and I’m looking for it

        Unfortunately not that rare of a POV to find. They just generally don’t do the young account thing. Some are true believers. Others likely state actors. Don’t see as many bots but the greater levels of transparency and lower active population probably makes it less worthwhile of an investment.

  • SuiXi3D@fedia.io
    4811·
    24 days ago

    The second best thing is remember that tolerance of intolerance breeds intolerance.

    • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      183·
      23 days ago

      This is a whole different train of thought (mine is, I won’t speak for yours) and I don’t wanna derail my original thought but that’s a thing I’ve been thinking about a lot lately.

      I agree with you, and subscribe to the idea of tolerance as a social contract that, once broken, is no longer owed to the one who broke the contract.

      At the same time, I’ve also learned that very explicitly, feeling persecuted is a requisite ingredient in radicalizing people into hate groups. And that at an individual scale, it’s generally undeserved compassion that helps deradicalize them. We know this from the accounts of people who managed to leave hate groups- a little while ago there was really good (and long) interview with someone who used to be leader of a white nationalist group where he talked a fair bit about that idea, since he now works with a nonprofit that helps families and friends support and deradicalize loved ones, but it’s far from the only account

      At present I’m really not sure how I personally reconcile those two things I belive to be true. The Nazi bar analogy is real.

      I know wading into this more specific conversion runs the risk of immediately derailing what I was trying to start a discussion about, but I figured I’d share my thoughts. If anyone reads this and has thoughts to share (though I’d prefer not to get 50 comments just saying I suck for having complicated views on what we do about the predicament the US and world is in with the rise of fascist ideology. I’m interested in what’s effective in terms of fixing the problem just like you are) I’d be interested in hearing them. I’m still looking for a way to synthesize my beliefs into a coherent whole.

      Edit: thought I’d add the interview for anyone curious. I don’t see everything exactly the way he does but I think understanding the problem and exactly how it works is necessary of we’re going to address it, and I think his account is a really useful glimpse into certain aspects of how that world works

      • pelespirit@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        83·
        23 days ago

        I agree with everything you said at the top and this comment as well. You don’t have to be mean, cruel, or shitty to the bad actors. In fact the best case scenario is to make your case once and then walk away. It’s much easier to talk about than to actually do, but it’s really effective. If you assume they’re not trolls or bad actors, even better. All of these actions curtail flame wars, which is what they’re after anyway if you’re correct that they’re a bad actor or troll.

        • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
          3·
          23 days ago

          Thanks for your thoughts, thats a bit different of an approach than I’d really thought about, I feel like my thoughts have kinda been stuck at both extremes

          That gives me new things to think about, thank you ❤️

      • dota__2@lemmy.worldEnglish
        62·
        23 days ago

        they’re going to “feel” persecuted, no matter what. might as well make them actually fucking fear it.

    • misk@sopuli.xyzEnglish
      2410·
      24 days ago

      I think part of pleasantness is not bringing politics into things that weren’t intended to be about politics.

      • Banana@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        323·
        23 days ago

        The problem is politics impacts everything and the word “political” means different things to different people.

        To some, talking about being gay is political, even though to people who are in that community, it’s literally just talking about their lives.

      • Yardy Sardley@lemmy.caEnglish
        162·
        23 days ago

        To interject with a somewhat pedantic point, nothing is truly apolitical. But there is something to be said about sensing the proper time and place to start a political argument.

    • gandalf_der_12te@discuss.tchncs.deEnglish
      121·
      23 days ago

      i think if someone’s intolerant, pointing out that they’re wrong is something appropriate, but picking a fight over it is not worth it. it makes you like that person in that meme:

      edit: in bad cases, report it and move on with your life.

    • shaggyb@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      23 days ago

      Call them out so that resistance is visible, then block them to remove their agency to engage you.

      • dota__2@lemmy.worldEnglish
        233·
        24 days ago

        it’s only an oxymoron if you’re a moron. tolerance is a social contract. the intolerant break that contract and are no longer to be protected by it.

      • SuiXi3D@fedia.io
        244·
        24 days ago

        Almost as if the statement is referring to the paradox of tolerance.

        By allowing people like Nazis, Christofascists, Tankies, etc. a platform, it only invites more sharing that view to spread their bullshit around. This makes those that don’t share those extremist views uncomfortable they then leave those places. You see it on platforms like Truth Social, X, and 4Chan.

        If this is to be a kind place, we must encourage kindness and rid ourselves of unkindness. You can’t tolerate intolerance, lest it spread and take over.

        • Banana@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          143·
          23 days ago

          If you allow wolves and sheep into a space, that is a wolves-only space.

          (For context, I agree with you.)

        • Ogmios@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
          48·
          23 days ago

          If you actually had a coherent definition of what a Nazi is, it might be possible to agree with you. But in reality, it’s used as a catch all by shitty people to justify their shitty behaviour.

          • fubo@lemmy.worldEnglish
            41·
            23 days ago

            To be clear, I mean people who praise Hitler, get swastika tattoos, blame everything on a Jewish Conspiracy, etc.

            You know, Nazis.

            • JasSmith@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              23·
              23 days ago

              That’s coherent. Unfortunately most people who use it today literally mean “someone who disagrees with me.” It really muddies the water because it’s often accompanied by threats of violence. The net effect is raising the temperature in the room on both sides, because it’s effectively dehumanising others who have perfectly valid political disagreements, and calling for their death.

            • Ogmios@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
              47·
              23 days ago

              That’s what you say today because you think it’s convenient to your argument, but it actually shows exactly what I’m talking about because the definition you’ve offered would make no sense at all to anyone a year ago, but people like you were still calling everyone Nazis then.

      • rocket_dragon@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
        113·
        23 days ago

        Paradox of Tolerance - Karl Poppler - 1945

        It’s a shame that something we already figured out 60 years ago still needs to be learned by most people.

        The good news is, this is an opportunity for you to grow and be better right now. It’s never too late to improve yourself.

          • rocket_dragon@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            52·
            23 days ago

            Wdym financial cashes, pandemic, doomscrolling, Trump got the presidency twice??

            You’re talking crazy it’s only 2005 bro, futuristic computer interface means frutiger aero, I listen to music on my iPod and text on my candybar flip phone </3</3

      • Banana@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
        82·
        24 days ago

        Sure, if you think of it as purely semantic, or a zero sum game with no nuance, but it’s not.

        Gotta be intolerant of those being needlessly cruel to those just trying to live their lives, and gotta be tolerant of those just trying to live their lives that don’t affect you, even if you find it cringey.

  • Angry_Autist (he/him)@lemmy.worldEnglish
    36·
    23 days ago

    I disagree, yes being kind is very important but even more important is people engaging and upvoting comments.

    Reddit was great because of what happened in the comment section, not the headliners, and I see very little voting engagement even in active posts.

    Remember, it’s free to do and it encourages others to engage as well. But yea be kind too

  • SwingingTheLamp@midwest.socialEnglish
    34·
    23 days ago

    I have a couple of suggestions to add:

    I was considering leaving the other site before the API fiasco because it felt like so many users approach engagement as rhetorical combat, that is, the point of discussion is to defeat the other person. Instead, think one of Covey’s habits of highly-effective people: “Win-win, or no deal.” Approach discussion on the Fediverse as a collaborative act, in which you’re exchanging ideas with another person. Even if you disagree, you can both win by respectfully hearing out the other person. And if the other person won’t collaborate? No deal! Just disengage.

    Just like in intimate relationship, use “I” statements instead of “you” statements. Telling people who they are and what they believe is not only disrespectful, but probably wrong, often exaggerated or distorted for rhetorical combat purposes. People get angry when their identity gets poked at. One exception, of course, is when giving advice, like, stick to what you know, and share your thoughts and your reactions to a topic.

  • Alaknár@lemm.eeEnglish
    33·
    23 days ago

    I’ll add: “be supportive and helpful if you can, and just shut up if you can’t”.

    Fediverse is sometimes suffering from the same kind of people that Linux has - “oh you have a problem? Well, here’s the GitHub repo and a project Wiki, figure it out”.

  • mke@programming.devEnglish
    32·
    23 days ago

    Most people know this in some capacity, but it’s not talked about enough: the shape of the platform massively shapes its culture. Every mechanism, intentional feature or not, is a factor in resulting user behavior and should be accounted for.

    Reddit Karma was (shitty) reputation from the start, but Slashdot user IDs became one despite being mere sequential identifiers; negative user feedback such as downvotes can be harmful to communities (yet, users without an outlet may lash out in other ways e.g. reports); even how the platform communicates with users influences them; and so on.

    I’m not saying you shouldn’t be nice and incentivize others to do the same, but unless the system naturally leads to the desired behavior, you’ll have a bad time in the long term because building culture by interactions doesn’t scale. By the time you realize there’s a shift, it’s too late; interactions will compound and affect how the average user acts faster than you can try to course-correct.

    I wish lemmy was more experimental, because by building a clone of reddit, we’ve copied too many of its faults. We’ve already got gatherings to complain about mods, and the one time devs considered changing a core component, discussion was killed by an onslaught of users. Problems with the current setup that were brought up then will likely never see that amount of people thinking about how to solve them.

    Contrast with Mastodon, which gets crap for not being a faithful copy of twitter, but their reasoning for not including quote-reblogs is understandable. They’re now putting a lot of thought into how to add them safely. Not ignoring functionality users want, but also not ignoring how it will affect culture, that’s compromise.

    I’d like it if we could talk more about how our platforms work and, particularly, how they affect us, because that’s a big way we can build better platforms, right up there with being nice.

  • shaggyb@lemmy.worldEnglish
    3913·
    23 days ago

    Unless you’re a republican or other type of nazi. Then you can absolutely go all the way to hell.

    Tolerance got us here.

  • WhatSay@slrpnk.netEnglish
    25·
    24 days ago

    The last time I went to Reddit, I felt like everyone was trying to pick a fight, and would jump on me for any tiny reason.

    No point being part of a community like that, the whole place is a dumpster fire, but if everyone is either trolling or turning on each other, it’s much worse.

    I hope as Lemmy gets more popular, it doesn’t inherit those problems.

    • Cris@lemmy.worldOPEnglish
      12·
      23 days ago

      I think as early members of this small online space we have to potential to cement a kinder culture that can influence even what this platform is like many years from now, with users that won’t be here for a long time!

      People tend to match energy with the people they’re engaging with. When you show people kindness they intuitively respond the same way, and when that’s the culture, I think it can profoundly shape people’s social behaviors :)

      And this space being as small as it is, we all have an outsized impact on that culture compared to something like reddit where any given user makes up such a teeeeny tiny fraction of the social interaction there.

      We can all create that kind of culture that leads with kindness and prompts others to follow suit

    • magnetosphere@fedia.io
      11·
      23 days ago

      I used to use reddit constantly, and did so for years. That level of hostility took over so gradually that I didn’t even consciously notice. I used Lemmy for a few weeks before it really sunk in that nobody had jumped down my throat over a minor, irrelevant issue (like a careless punctuation or grammatical error).

      People here tend to give each other the benefit of the doubt, which had become virtually unheard of on reddit. Even when people make replies I don’t agree with, they’re usually discussing the point rather than the way that point is presented.

      I will never, ever go back.

    • Gormadt@lemmy.blahaj.zoneEnglish
      81·
      23 days ago

      I’d say there’s also some corners of Lemmy that feel like the slightest provocation leads to an absolute dog pile of people being super angry looking for a fight.

      That aspect blows but it’s usually helped by making sure that the instance your account is on is federated (or specifically NOT federated) with specific other instances.

      Though this place is so much more chill than Reddit it’s fucking mindblowing

    • misteloct@lemmy.worldEnglish
      3·
      23 days ago

      I swear Reddit has bots/trolls/AI designed to argue and rile you up to increase engagement. We see it in reposts/titles, why not in the comments?