We have a chance to build a new community here. How do we avoid the mistakes of /r/newzealand?

Hi all, as with most of you, I'm an immigrant from Reddit. I never used to go on to the NZ or regional subreddits because frankly, I felt very unwelcome and those places were extremely negative.

How then do we build a new community that is based on being positive and accepting, even of those with different points of view, political leanings, religious beliefs or lifestyles? Everyone deserves a voice, no one deserves to be shouted down or made to feel unwelcome or belittled because they have differing thoughts.

Even festering cunts like Brian Tamaki and his ilk, deserve a seat at the table. We live in a free country and that means everyone should get a voice. Everyone gets to speak their piece, even if you don't like it.

How do we stop this community devolving into yet another online echo chamber?

schzztl,

If this place becomes tolerant of obvious trolls and becomes a right-wing shithole, I'll find another instance to use and I hope others do the same. Have no interest in listening to idiots who parrot the same selfish crap all day long.

That aside, I think r/nz's biggest failure was the overwhelming negativity towards everything. I noticed it became particularly bad during the 2021 lockdown and then never got better. Yes house prices suck and politicians suck and crime sucks yadadada. But sometimes people fail to see the bigger picture. At the end of the day I consider myself lucky to live here and not in some festering third world shithole, and am proud to call myself a kiwi.

Having politics siloed off to one part of the site is probably a good step. It doesn't all need to be political. More importantly, repeating the stuff that upsets you in every fucking thread does no good. Perhaps we need a space like r/casualnz as well, something for specifically lighthearted discussion. Some positivity to balance out the negativity that will inevitably come from discussion here.

beware_the_cagers,

Can we get a header image for the community? Something not very tall, but uniquely NZ

FatalChessInjury,

Good idea! Any suggestions for what it might be?

ycnz,

https://lemmy.nz/pictrs/image/49e92d35-00d6-4536-93b0-f6f059d12017.png

terraborra,
@terraborra@lemmy.nz avatar

I agree with the principle that we don’t want to recreate r/nz but come at it from a very different perspective.

For example, when national came out against bilingual road signs, the conversation devolved into a debate about whether one of our official languages should be neither seen nor heard. That is unacceptable to me as I am intolerant of intolerance and there should be no room for debating the right of any person to exist.

Dalinar,

I feel like those designs were intentionally shit so they could come back with the realistic solution of having English on top and let people feel like they've won.

bruzie,
@bruzie@lemmy.nz avatar

Nope. To paraphrase IamRageSparkle:

If you don't kick the Nazi out of your bar, you end up running a Nazi bar.

For your listening pleasure:

Edit: removed suprious formatting tags

FatalChessInjury,

I disagree. If you kick the Nazi out of your bar, he ends up going to the Nazi bar down the road and becomes even more extreme. If you let the Nazi into your bar, you have a chance that they will see the error of their ways and not be a Nazi any more. By the same token, if the Nazi in the bar starts shit, you can still kick them out of the bar.

Also, great music choices.

BalpeenHammer,

The problem is the stench of nazis permeates your bar for the rest of time whether you succeed or not.

ycnz,

I've upvoted you for the discussion, but I completely disagree. Nobody deserves a seat at the table. Tamaki has more than enough voice as it is. He doesn't need to be handed one in our online communities.

Having tolerance for both bigots and the targets of their hate means very quickly that the people being persecuted leave.

tirohia,

There's even a name for this - Karl Popper's Paradox of Tolerance.

At this stage in human history, a community or forum where all are welcome is impossible. If one leaves a forum open for those who are intolerant, then the forum effectively becomes closed to those that they are intolerant of. It's not a problem with forums or how communities are managed, the problem is humans being humans. Maybe in a thousand years time or so ...

At best communities get to choose what they tolerate. I've found in the past that those who demand tolerance of fairly toxic views, fail to remember that tolerance isn't, nor should it be, unlimited.

  • All
  • Subscribed
  • Moderated
  • Favorites
  • •
  • newzealand@lemmy.nz
  • tacticalgear
  • DreamBathrooms
  • cisconetworking
  • magazineikmin
  • InstantRegret
  • Durango
  • thenastyranch
  • Youngstown
  • rosin
  • slotface
  • mdbf
  • khanakhh
  • kavyap
  • everett
  • JUstTest
  • modclub
  • Leos
  • cubers
  • ngwrru68w68
  • ethstaker
  • osvaldo12
  • GTA5RPClips
  • anitta
  • provamag3
  • normalnudes
  • tester
  • megavids
  • lostlight
  • All magazines
    •