Reminder: reddit may be dead, but trolls are not.
drumdonuttea@kbin.social to 
Reddit Migration@kbin.social – 235 points – As we start to see more users join, it's inevitable to see trolls (especially low-effort trolls) making more of an appearance and trying to be controversial and noticed.
Best just to scroll past them. They want to spark unwinnable arguments and rack up negative rep. If something seems absurdly ridiculous or inciteful, just move on. It's not even worth down voting.
Actually, they should be reported. Don't just scroll pass if you see harassment or hate speech.
How exactly do you report them? I tried to report one troll I saw, but couldn’t find the option.
more > report
Ahh, I see! I was trying to report them from their page when I went to block them, like you do on Mastodon, and the option wasn’t there. Thanks!
There's a few things in the works to improve the moderating flow / processes, for now it's just easier to use 'more > report' and hopefully that should be enough for now.
Is that all it takes to trigger you?
Thanks for providing a comment to test the report feature with.
Not sure there’s anything to report with the previous comment; yet I don’t disagree with it being a dick thing to say.
Way back in the way back we used to call comments like that “flame baiting”. It’s trying to start a fight, nothing more. Forums and BBs I moderated used to technically ban it, but generally the rule has always just been “don’t feed the trolls”. Meaning: don’t comment, don’t downvote, don’t bother reporting. They just want attention, the only thing that hurts them is realizing that this board will ignore them just as completely as their parents already do in real life.
Yes. Back then there wasn't any upvoting or downvoting, so the only way you interacted with a troll is either engage them or ignore them...preferably the latter.
Images like this were typical...yet helpful.
Holy crap this is an image I hadn't seen in ages! 😃
better yet - create whole sections of lemmy devoted to trolls and their fun times. this is the best answer. it also helps ensure that lemmy can never be sold or made profitable. thus avoiding the horrible dying mess that is reddit.
The k-soc terms of service state:
Now, I can't read ernest's mind to determine what he meant by this line exactly, but this kind of mean spirited, bad-faith jab falls under "harmful behaviour" in my book.
i think it's dangerous to be too broad with this definition
harmful in my mind is saying explicitly racist, homophobic, promoting violent, etc type of stuff
i think freedom of expression is something we should not give up easily. in actually harmful speech, i think the pros outweigh the cons. but him saying the word "triggered" is not harmful
It implies that being against hate speech and harassment is a wrong opinion and while completely isolated and out of context it might not seem harmful, it's part of a cultural shift towards normalizing those things, and implies that anyone who cares is wrong. Seeing that go unchallenged just emboldens buttholes like that.
If you want to be neck deep in that bullshit, you're more than welcome to join exploding-heads.com. Can we have ONE space online that isn't infiltrated by assholes?
You don't have to be a dick to others on the Internet. You can make that choice. Just because you CAN post hateful shit anonymously and not have to face real life consequences doesn't mean you HAVE to.
Some people literally would prefer to see the world burn. No idea what’s up with that form of psychological gratification from destruction, but fuck them.
Guys that think the joker and homelander are the best role models.
You either haven't been on the internet long enough to recognize this very common slippery slope, or you do recognize it - and you're rooting for the slope.
Why not both? Don't feed the troll, report for breaking the rules, and then if you're extra salty, block them too.
But also, remember not to automatically assume someone with negative reputation is a troll. Given kbin currently doesn't calculate reputation correctly (it counts boosts not upvotes).
I'm putting this as a top level comment, but I mean to be talking here to the people suggesting to report or block, or moderators looking at this and thinking of taking action against trolls.
I’m not sure why anyone cares about karma or points or whatever they are called over here. I don’t ever look at that for other profiles, and only noticed that it even existed when I finally logged into my account on a computer rather than a mobile.
I think to tag on to what you said…I think it’s fair to say that a troll can only be labeled as a troll based on the content and responses they create.
Doesn't matter. For one person like you there are 20 other who will just spam/downvote.
Sure it matters.
Honestly, I don't think we should bother checking their reputation score even if it was working correctly. They're either engaging in shitty behaviour or they're not. All of us engage in shitty behaviour sometimes - we all get hangry, we all have bad days, and we're all suffering in some way or another - and the fact that someone has a record of saying popular things doesn't mean their shitty behaviour needs to be accepted or engaged with.
Call it out, ignore it, or report them. If there's a pattern of shitty behaviour, the mods or admins can have a chat with them about it.
Of course, I agree with that. But there are people who do that, so I figured it's important to mention still.
I’ve already seen one troll who’s going hog wild. What’s annoying is, i blocked them, but still got a notification about them when they replied to one of my posts (I couldn’t see the reply on the post itself, but could see it in my notifications). So just be aware that blocking someone doesn’t mean they’re gone.
There's a few tickets floating around regarding the user flow for how blocking users actually works. This is probably one of those untested cases where you've blocked someone but you can see see them when they do X.
The blocking workflow is definitely something that needs some improvements, but I think right now everyone is focused on stability (especially with the influx of new people everyone's expecting)
I figure it’s something that will get fixed as things get more stable. It was just a very unpleasant discovery right before I read this post.
I get no reply notifications, so there's that.
It's clear that kbin still has a lot of bugs. Guy running it is a bit overwhelmed right now. Hopefully they're able to fix issues like this sooner rather than later.
Did you turn them off (or maybe you never turned them on, I don't recall what was default state)? They're working for me from what I can tell.
Settings -> Notifications
I'm not the person you asked, but no. It's a bug. I experience the same. I only get reply notifications if somebody uses @.
Weird! I get notifications on mobile (the web app) and on the full browser (attached).
Sorry that you guys have problems ... maybe try turning the notifications off and back on? I know I had initially changed them a few times, so maybe that was needed and I just never noticed any issues while KBin was less busy.
Hope the moderation gets more aggressive soon, or this place is fuuuucked. There's already like three the_donald magazines.
Opposing political opinions are not trolls. Let's not be like Reddit where "opposite opinion" = bad.
No, but fascists are troll (and worse. Much worse). And yes, trump and his cult are fascists
as much as i hate trump we should hate the sin and not the sinner
lots of trump supporters could easily be leftists
Not if they support anything he or his political party or cult have done in the past few years!
...what the fuck? The guy who's got a record of felonies he's in court for, and has been absolutely the most fascist piece of shit to happen to America could easily have leftists supporters? The guy who lost "bigly" in the popular vote and created the most partisan and polarized political voters possible? This is Q Anon level of reality.
If there is a leftist in the "lots of trump supporters", they are by definition, not a leftist.
No, but someone rocking up to a news magazine just to post “Trump won and everyone knows it” with no news article is trolling. Some of these folks are trolls trying to piss people off.
If that's what the people in that magazine want to see they're not being trolled at all. Now if that shit leaks out, then yeah I'm 100% with you.
It’s not what people in that magazine “want to see.” Every post save the troll post linked to a news article, with little to no commentary. Thus the “News” name.
If they want to see that, they can start their own instance. No one is obligated to host them.
"Can I come over to your house and shit in your hair?" said the pigeon.
"No thank you. I'd rather you do that somewhere else." said the man.
"Censorship! Triggered! Snowflake!" Said the pigeon. Then he shitted in the man's hair anyway.
Sure, and if the instance operators decide that I respect it. Just saying it's not up to me, or you, or the person I replied to.
Even among people who like trump, there are plenty of people who know that he lost the election.
Even if Biden cheated (and I'm not saying he did), people who cheat to win elections are called the winner of the election. Laws tend to fine campaigns for cheating rather than changing the outcome of the election.
As an example where a campaign was fined for malfeasance during a campaign, the Clinton campaign was fine for misbehavior in the 2016 election related to the steele dossier https://www.politico.com/news/2022/03/30/dnc-clinton-campaign-fine-dossier-spending-disclosure-00021910
However, although that example was of a losing campaign, up in my home country of Soviet canuckistan, several election cycles ago the conservative Stephen Harper government was fined for election fraud, and that's all that happened. They were officially in charge and they stayed that way until the election of Justin Trudeau in 2015.
Typically, lawmakers want election issues to be dealt with by the electorate, they're extremely extremely wary about stepping in and changing elections on their own.
While we're on the topic though, I would like to remind everybody that it is extremely typical for the losing side of an election to claim that the other side cheated. In 2000, there were plenty of people pointing out fuckiness in the supreme Court decision that ended George W. Bush the election, and in 2004 election machines were singled out as a potential method of cheating by the Democrats when John Kerry lost the presidential election, and in 2016 there were lots of cries saying that there was election interference that led to the election of Donald Trump.
hey children, yes this is a Prime example of a troll.
The_Donald was not about political opinions. It was a hate farm that made neofascists out of people who came for the lulz. By all means let's have actual conservatives discuss politics as a counterpoint to more liberal views, but smack the fascists down - because it's the only way to truly have a tolerant society and civil discourse: Intolerance as politics must not be tolerated. If that basic rule is ignored, everything else fails.
See the paradox of intolerance.
I really like this interpretation of the Paradox of Intolerance:
Link to source.
That does seem like a more reasonable way to think about it.
That "paradox" is bunk and is only good for justifying censorship.
No, it's good for getting rid of antisocial shit heads who feel like they're entitled to an audience for their toxic or abusive ideas and beliefs.
Because that's exactly what it speaks to.
Now, if you want to argue with Karl, might I recommend getting a PhD in philosophy and starting from there, rather than whining on the internet?
Are you saying that disagreement with this person is not legitimate unless you have the same level of education?
Ah yes, because all opinions are equal and NAMBLA and Nazis need to be given equal weight for their "opposite opinions".
That's not what they said at all.
What they said is that just because you don't agree with the opposite opinion doesn't make the person saying that opinion a troll. They may be a hateful motherfucker, but a hateful motherfucker who is trying to talk in good faith.
They aren't arguing some enlightened centrist "everyones opinions are equal" bullshit. They're just arguing that opposite opinion does not equal automatic troll.
You can block people and communities… I’m a trans woman; naziism and really just social conservatism works against me. I still think they should have a space to spout off, just as I should have a space to spout off about how irresponsible, bigoted and cruel their statements are. I also think there is nothing wrong with safe spaces; I mean look at raddle.me and on the opposite end Facebook and Twitter. Taking someone’s tounge doesn’t prove them wrong, only that you are afraid of what they have to say. The words of a fascist should be said and maybe repeated so they can be struck down by those who prefer love to hate.
Thank you for this. The only way to combat ignorance isn't too silence, but to educate. When you silence someone, you isolate them to places where their opinions are only reaffirmed and never challenged, thus exacerbating the ignorance.
I wish I could upvote you twice.
You can start by boosting instead of using the arrow, which is actually currently only counting as favoriting and does nothing to counter any reduces on a post. It's an oversight that's being worked on and will eventually change, as I've understood it.
I did both!
Don't platform fascists. Don't play apologetics for platforming fascists. Don't tolerate people who platform fascists.
Stop treating fascism as a mere difference of opinion.
" Hey you want the humane and equal treatment of all peoples, and I have an opposite opinion that some people should be subservient or eliminated. Woah woah why are you banning me."
It's a painfully American sentiment that was prominent in the civil war. "Hey we just disagree on slavery..."
I would argue that there is a line where speech becomes hate speech, in fact that line is already defined as criminal libel/defamation and assault.
Argue all you want. But if you're going to argue that the line between what is acceptable and what isn't is what is legal, first off, uh, no (fascist rhetoric is legal in most places), and second, whose laws do you want to apply?
@drumdonuttea Is it possible to block individual users?
Users can absolutely be blocked, and at least on kbin you can also block instances and magazines as a whole as well
You can block them on kbin, but just be aware that if they reply to you or your post, you’ll still get a notification of it. You won’t be able to see their comment on the page it was posted to you, but it will be sitting in your notifications until you clear all them, since you can’t get rid of individual ones.
And they can also still see your comments after you blocked them, at least in my experience. Blocking people is not too useful right now because of that IMO.
This is why I've generally been trying my best not to engage with the obvious trolls and bigots at all (not even downvote) but instead just block and move on. They don't become aware of me, and I no longer see them. Not perfect yet (the block going both ways would go a big way towards that), but it works ok for now.
I mean I would still report them depending on severity but yeah that's of course also a way to do it. I'd absolutely love to see block becoming 2-ways instead of peekaboo.
Oh yeah, I'll still try to remember to report if I see they're on one of the big instances I already recognise, but otherwise I might not in case the report just goes right back to them (like it did with the exploding people) in which case I'm not exactly sure what to do other than post a warning, but I'm rarely the first to notice this kind of behaviour, nor do I really want that kind of spotlight, so I might not be comfortable doing a public announcement about it.
Edit: though I'll admit, I do often block people for things others might not consider as problematic, and feel like if I reported in those situations I'd just get ignored (and if the report goes to the wrong kind of person, potentially targeted for being "too sensitive" or whatever) which is why I'll often keep it to myself.
That's what I mean by severity if you're blocking people for mundane reasons there's of course not always a need to report.
By the way, as far as I personally know (because I asked this myself), if you report someone from exploding heads for example from this instance the report should go to ernest.
In case I explained it badly read this comment from user Kichae
Ok, just had a read through, that makes a lot of sense about where the reports go, though I'll admit I still get a little anxious about reporting "out of kbin" users just because I'm still getting my head around how it all works and all the information moving around the fed. But I'll get there (and things will be tweaked and adjusted, I'm sure).
Thanks, I'll give that a read!
E: oh, and it's not the mundane blocks I mean, it's stuff like casual sexism or ableism that some might not consider "serious", but that's a whole other conversation for another time haha
Oh now I understand what you meant, no I consider both to be bad. Both don't belong here, as well as any other -ism with bad intent. I believe that at the moment reporting the really serious stuff is the important thing to do and as the site grows, and we get more moderators so we don't overload 1-2 people with reports, I wouldn't see any reason not to report the less "serious" stuff.
That's a really good point. I don't want to be on their radar.
It doesn't seem too important what someone you have blocked can see, if blocking is working and you don't see them.
Depending on the circumstances, yes, but if you were arguing with someone and blocked them after you thought the argument was over but they still replied for example, you cannot see their reply, which could lead to misunderstandings.
I just realized I get no notifications at all. Not on mobile, I see no visual indication etc. How do notifications work here?
It seems like it’s something in the process of getting fixed, since I stopped seeing notifications for a few hours today. On mobile, I usually see notifications in the menu bar at the top next to my user name when new ones come in.
You might want to check your settings to see if you have notifications turned on.
Hover over/go to profile, and click the 🚫.
I wonder if people are going to abuse downvotes and reports. The downvote is not a disagreement button, and reporting just because you find a comment distasteful is not what it should be for.
That'd require you to not be a hypocrite though. If not for disagreeing, then for what reason did you downvote my comment?
Because I think you're advocating for a very destructive approach to social media.
As an aside, I didn't know you could see who's voted on a comment. How do you view that?
Its under more, then activity
Boosts = boosts, reduces = downvotes, favourites = upvotes
The down vote button is whatever we want it to be.
I have zero tolerance for trolls, just block 'em and move on. Life's too short!
I just want to point out that not everyone with an unpopular opinion is a troll. I think this is important as many people get victimized by a group for posting something unpopular, getting ganged up on. Be careful where you post!
trolls are people too. but the owner of reddit isn't
They do seem to be super salty over in the subreddits that were discussing all this, like Save3rdpartyapps. A lot of the people posting now are just the anti trolls because the vast majority of the posters (including me) followed through and deleted everything and left.
Well... people wanted lemmy to take over reddit users. Nobody talks about the cesspool reddit is.
I've already been seeing toxic incel shit. They're not trolls, of course--they sincerely believe that garbage.
As long as no one starts making /m/AngryUpvote a thing, and as long as ShittyMorph stays off the fediverse, we'll be off to a good start.
Less of a problem on Lemmy where karma is not publically displayed.