This is a topic for larger collective discussion but my thoughts are:

Culture

• What kind of culture is being cultivated here? Is there a collective project (consciously or unconsciously) to engage with people in a certain way or is it just a free for all?
• I mention "culture" because there are some online communities that try to promote values (empathy, compassion, etc) in a self-moderated way whereas most other communities just don't give a fuck.

Visibility

• Obviously Raddle needs to be visible to attract new members - how should one go about getting the word out (to the right people)?

I'm of the position that an online community that actively fosters a culture of empathy, compassion, love, and solidarity will have an infinitely longer lifespan than a free-for-all melting pot. But that shit's incredibly rare.

anyways i just got off work and am fucking exhausted and need to sleep so i hope i wrote things that make sense

hell yeah

Goddamn, this is making me realize how absolutely shit I am at wget/httptrack/basic IT skills. How does one get wget to recursively scan through each "https://raddle.me/f/memer?next[id]=" URL? Or "https://raddle.me/f/memer/*"... I seem to be able to superficially grab images from the first page of "memer" but I'm struggling with wildcarding the URL to grab every page. Sigh...

current attempt is "wget -nd -nc -r -l3 -e robots=off -A jpg,jpeg,png,gif,bmp --wait 1 -H https://raddle.me/f/memer?next[id]=*"

indeed you can

sincerity posting my amphetamine rants online is risky business, cut me some slack buddy

This can become a complicated topic very quickly and I feel text is an awful medium to discuss this... but I'll try to share some thoughts and personal examples:

Explore the beliefs/principles that you wish to act on. Merely desiring to be nice won't take anyone very far if it isn't rooted in strong personal values and commitments.

• Personally, I want to cultivate community wherever I go and make people I interact with feel loved. Lofty ambitions I suppose, but a few years ago I turned that into a commitment - to make everyone I speak with feel a little bit more heard, cared for, less alone, etc after we're done interacting.

Try to be present when interacting with another person. Though I loathe the neoliberal commodification of "mindfulness", my personal definition of "mindfulness" is broadly something to do with an awareness of oneself and one's environment. In practical terms, that means when I'm interacting with another person I try to:

• Observe... but without being a creep. Pay attention to facial expressions (imo best way to gauge how someone feels about what you're saying, thus giving you immediate non-verbal feedback you can use), eye contact or lack thereof and body language.

• Slow. The. Fuck. Down. Take a deep breath after you finish a sentence. Keep your body still and relaxed. Observe any thoughts passing through your head without judgement or attachment.

• Make eye contact when asking someone a question or saying something kind.

Refine your habits, patterns of speech, and practice.

• I have eliminated certain words from my vocabulary. I never use the word "should" because I believe it is inherently coercive. I do not use the word "need". I try to always speak with gender neutral language. There's a hundred more of these in my brain somewhere.

• If someone offers you a compliment, say "thank you". If someone thanks you, say "you're welcome". Don't dodge these things with humility or insecurity - you're invalidating someone's gift of gratitude when compliments or thanks are not accepted. And that's a shitty thing to do imo

• Every low-stakes interaction (cashier, bus driver, faceless bureaucrat, etc) is as an ideal opportunity to practice being kind to people. Goddammit you're gonna try your best to give that cashier a tiny respite from their hellish job and make them feel cared for, even if only for a brief moment. Be genuine. Ask someone how they are doing and fucking mean it. If someone asks how you're doing, be honest. Don't ever be afraid to come off as awkward or weird because it's going to happen eventually. No one ultimately gives a shit and you'll be forgotten about in minutes.

...that was a weird rant (I maaaybe took twice my prescribed adderall dose today) but I hope you can find something useful or thought-provoking in that wall of text

i find this headline so fucking infuriating. npr and other news outlets (read: liberal) are pathologically incapable of taking a stance or digging below the most superficial surface of anything. they could literally remove the "Is" from this headline or - radical idea - frame the question as "Why is YouTube Not Doing Enough To Stop Harassment of LGBTQ Content Creators?" but that might expose the impotent hypocrisy of fence-sitting "objective journalism" or something whatever im done ranting fuck this shit

Crazy idea but if that doesn't work out again, I think they should try out neoliberalism.

im of the opinion that things have already - most likely - progressed to the point of no return and that we're now locked in to a death-spiral of negative feedback loops. it's too late to effect any meaningful change or mitigate the worst outcomes of climate change. as such, I consciously choose to embrace hope not as a belief that things can be fixed, but as a philosophical stance that regardless of what the future holds (which tbh seems impossibly bleak), i will continue to do my damnedest to: support those who fight to make the world a better place, inject as much love/empathy/compassion I can into my day-to-day interactions w/folk, slow down to appreciate the wonders and beauty of nature, and fucking go down fighting regardless of the inherent futility in doing so.

i spent years as an IV heroin addict playing daily russian roulette with fentanyl/H and have watched countless loved ones die around me so im not too concerned about death itself. the knowledge that I can opt out of this world at any time is a great comfort to me and i have certainly rolled that dice a few times. but because ive won the lottery of having been born into privilege (middle class, "developed" country, white) i believe i absofuckinglutely have a moral imperative - regardless of my personal suffering - to stick around, support/love my comrades, and keep fighting for what i believe to be true and good.

to quote frightened rabbit, "while im alive, I'll make tiny changes to earth"

Sobriety

Aww, don't say that. I love you folks and I think we'd work things out.

Thanks for the replies. Although my post reflects how I was feeling at the time when I saw this Reddit stuff, in retrospect I don't appreciate my shitty tone. You are clearly making an effort to engage with me in a thoughtful, mature way and I appreciate that.

But Ziq... you can always help yourself when you're being attacked like this. Don't let anyone - especially not some anonymous internet goons - have the kind of power over you that makes you feel as if you can't protect yourself from abuse. When you frame the issue in language like "I always take their bait" or "I can't help myself", you're mentally setting yourself up for defeat. You will always have the strength and autonomy within you to combat these kinds of provocations - that can never be taken away from you.

Wow, these people are clearly fucked up. I didn't make the promotional thread by the way, just observed it unfolding. Why not just post these screenshots (or don't reply to the trolls) every time they start trying to slander you? It seems they're just trying to get you to take the bait and play their sick games on their turf. It's always going to be a losing battle if you do that imo.

some shitty unorganized thoughts before i run off to work; excuse the sloppiness and try not to be an asshole if you're gonna reply to me

What does Raddle offer that other platforms do not? I like a lot of the way this site is run and am sick of supporting corporations that tolerate hate speech and endlessly try to monetize content/data, but unfortunately I don't think that being in opposition to something is much of an appeal to people. As well, original content can only take a community so far - there are plenty of incredible blogs, websites, etc that have fantastic writing but little audience.

Perhaps we should encourage local anarchist groups to use this platform to communicate with one another? Or LGBTQIA groups? Maybe that would fracture things too much if that push was successful, but then how does the site deal with the incessant trolling that would inevitably arise?

alternately we could (semi)regularly name-drop this site on certain subreddits. i know plenty of these communities have some incredibly toxic elements but... just some ideas:

• /r/chapotraphouse
• /r/anarchism
• /r/COMPLETEANARCHY
• /r/traaaaaaannnnnnnnnns
• /r/latestagecapitalism
• /r/breadtube
• /r/collapse

That might open the floodgates for trolling though

If any of us here is popular on social media we could shout out Raddle on like Twitter or some shit but I haven't played the "get e-cred" game in a long time. I yield no social influence.

Maybe we should be having more active discussions like this on a daily basis and encouraging every one here to come together on riot.im? What is the ratio between discussion posts and links to other websites?

I do know that the whole alt-accounts incident from several months back really soured things in the eyes of the dozen or so people I know who I've mentioned the site to.

Perhaps applying a more traditional-corporate "project management" lens to this shit would be beneficial.

I don't know just some random thoughts and fuck now im incrediblty late for work again

I use the following:

https://idope.cc

https://thepiratebay.org/ (of course)

https://rutracker.org/forum/index.php (very good for more obscure things like VSTs for DAWs)

I'd be willing to give up my life.

Thanks for looking into this.

And that blog... have you read the writing? It's impressively shitty.

Also, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x-rRtMgsYnc

Why do you only post submissions that link to this (fairly shitty) blog?

Dude, you will never win with someone like redisnowgreen. They're going to (try and) antagonize until they're called out on their shit, strawman their way into a corner, and then flee with some self-righteous statement about how you're not worth replying to, that the "truth" is self-evident, etc. And they'll do this while trying to insult you/call you names which as far as. I'm concerned, is enough evidence that they have no interest in good-faith discussion. It's generic troll behaviour and the formula is painfully obvious with this particular user. I don't see any solutions outside of waiting until they get bored and leave, banning them (I'm a fan of this approach), or ignoring them.

I don't mean to undermine your replies here or anything. But I wonder if interacting with these goons is the best use of our time.

lol dude you think anyone's interested in fuckin' Ben Garrison?

so you believe sandy hook was a conspiracy theory? what's your shtick bro don't be a tease just get to the point

That's a great quote + article. I hate that this is the kind of headline that many will see, have an overly dramatic reaction to, and form an opinion on without giving any thought to the content of the article or experiences/opinions of those who are actually LGBTQIA. Hell, I'll acknowledge that the reactionary idiot in me started bubbling to the surface for a split-second just reading the title.