[UrukParthian]

Dangerously minimizing? What's dangerous is a culture addicted to simulating political action by managing online comments. Instead if putting resources to making your local garden great, to mangle Nietzsche of Ecco Homo, people get worked up by actions they have no control over instead of working locally to change conditions where they could have an impact.

And you lack imagination and historical hindsight if you think the concept of "toxicity" can only be wielded by whatever you consider to be the forces of light. So to speak.

[s73v3r_]

"Dangerously minimizing?"

Yes. Pretending that the problem of toxicity is just people who can't handle differing opinions is to be willfully ignorant of the problem. As such, a reasonable conversation can not be had.

"And you lack imagination and historical hindsight if you think the concept of "toxicity" can only be wielded by whatever you consider to be the forces of light. So to speak."

Nowhere did I say that in the least.

[UrukParthian]

You're spoiled beyond belief if you view "toxic" comments online as a serious problem. If it is truly "a problem", then the larger problem is tying your emotions to what anonymous people say. You live vicariously through an image of how offended someone else might be. Instead of tending to the garden you can actually protect and uphold.

Do you think the poor bastards in Skid Row feel better because some (literal) white typed in defense against toxicity?

Do you think someone...Let's say Tim Wise! Do you think Mr.Wise has actually interacted with black communities while he lives in a 98% white neighborhood? Do you think Mr.Wise would help some homeless junkie who's trying to figure out how to work his phone so he can message an estranged daughter on Facebook? That's part of what I did in Skid Row. There are issues of knowledge, skills, and plain diet that would offer much better benefits than speaking out against some notion of "toxicity", created by people who have no skin in bleating their stupid moralism.

[s73v3r_]

Sorry, but this idea of "Sticks and Stones" hasn't been true for a long, long time. You may be able to shug off terrible, racist, bigoted slurs hurled at you, but people who have that slung at them day after day after day might not be, and I'm not going to blame them for not wanting to take it anymore.

[lopmotr]

Then why are they on the racist slur subreddit? Same with Twitter, you don't have to follow people who insult you, or the people who retweet the insults to you.

[s73v3r_]

Why are you assuming that stuff stays in it's little corner? It doesn't. Especially with Twitter, it's very easy for anyone to message that kind of thing to you.

[iamcasen]

You could argue that toxic comments on the internet are the only reason the current president got elected in the US. Should said president lead us to a nuclear holocaust, or any number of other real possibilities due to his proven negligence, toxic internet comments would have a very real impact on the material conditions of citizens in this country.

[lopmotr]

Huh? What if Clinton had won and started a nuclear holocaust? Who's to blame then? You must be opposed to all political advertising for the party you don't like because somehow you're able to see that it's bad and the other half of the population isn't. That's being hopelessly blinded by partisanship.

[iamcasen]

I'm opposed to all political advertising period, and would have also considered a Clinton presidency non-optimal, though likely more stable than what we have now.

I'm fine with the down votes, but it should be pretty obvious that it would have been Marco Rubio, or some other sanitary GOP member who got elected if it wasn't for the Russian troll brigade on the internet whipping up a frenzy for Trump.

That's my only point

[nkurz]

it should be pretty obvious that it would have been Marco Rubio, or some other sanitary GOP member who got elected if it wasn't for the Russian troll brigade on the internet whipping up a frenzy for Trump

You raise a wonderful point. Personally, I don't think a "Russian troll brigade" was singularly more effective than all the other attempts to affect the election, but if there was an influence, it certainly may have been greater in the GOP primary than in the general election.

But despite having read an awful lot of election analysis, I don't think I've ever heard anyone else make this point. I've only ever seen the issue framed as Trump vs Clinton, with almost all the proponents of the "Russian hacking" narrative being on the pro-Clinton side.

Besides yourself, does there exist a group of pro-Rubio (or perhaps more interestingly pro-Cruz) supporters who believe that Russia successfully influenced the election in support of Trump? Is there somewhere online I could read more about this worldview?