You have an emerging (or fully emergent) toxic culture happening here.
1) spam posts are rampant which is frustrating everyone.
2) If you dont conform IMMEDIATELY to the popular belief you are labelled a shill instead of trying to change opinion with reason.
3) You have actual shills coming out your anuses
How does one try and remain positive and not get sucked into this culture? I cant tell if the people harassing me truly believe me to be a shill or are just shills themselves. I dont even expect a response to this. Im just writing this here because I hope that you can find a way to get it under control. I likely will not be here to enjoy it if you do. Good day to you all.
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Vindicator ago
Hey johnlupus, thanks for your post. Here's what I do:
1. First, I try to assume the best intent of whomever I'm dealing with.
Yes, there are shills and trolls. Yes, people are paranoid. But the reality is that most people are here for good reasons. Many, many either have experienced sexual abuse themselves as a child or know someone who has. All are appalled that the government they fund is allowing this heinous shit to go on and are unwilling to stand aside and give elite power-mongers a pass.
2. Second, I don't take what you're calling "toxic" personally.
We've all got a sympathetic nervous system that automatically kicks into the fight-or-flight response when we perceive a threat, and just about everyone on this sub feels kids are being threatened. Many feel our justice and electoral systems are in grave danger. A few fear our nation's place in the world is at stake. And some fear the wrath of God due to the depravity of our leaders. Add to that the occasional presence of trolls, shills actually paid to generate anxiety, and spooks who are trained in psychological warfare to trigger people.
That is a metric fuck-ton of threat to process! Most of the folks on here are FIGHTERS, so you get people who are on autopilot in an angry, suspicious, belligerent state. Couple that with frustration at not being able to DO much to fix the situation and folks are not going to be at their best. I don't take it personally.
In fact, I don't even see it as toxic. It is the normal human response to danger. It shows just how seriously people take this, and that is awesome! It gives me great hope and keeps me coming back here day after day to do what I can to smooth ruffled feathers, nail the shills, encourage research and commentary, advance critical thinking, read people's latest discoveries and spread them on Twitter. That's what works for me. :-)
Honestly, probably neither! But when you are worried about it you can generally tell a shill by going to their comments and just reading through to see what they say. Shilling general forms patterns that are recognizable.
Most of all, recognize these feelings of frustration, angst, hopelessness and burnout are EXACTLY what the real shills are attempting to create. Find your way to magnanimity and you take away their power and defeat their machinations. Use that magnanimity to improve the conversation here and BOOM: we've won! ;-)