• LoudMuffin [he/him]
    ·
    3 years ago

    I stopped browsing there after a decade in 2019 and it's fucking incredible how much I've changed. Maybe part of it is just growing older but I really genuinely think 4chan specifically and some other websites like that literally give you some form of brain damage

    • mittens [he/him]
      ·
      edit-2
      3 years ago

      Yeah 4chan can only hook you in if you feel identified with the people that post there, while you're one of them, the minute you notice they're not like you it loses its spell instantly.

      It's very damaging because it's a deeply alienating website. Even outside of the fashy stuff, it was a really fringe place in a way people IRL were not. Feeling deeply identified with the online freaks makes it a vicious circle, it deepens your emotional dependence on your online friends. This cuts you off from the world, like you're in some cult. Like instantly receiving a -10 in social skills.

      • LoudMuffin [he/him]
        ·
        3 years ago

        It’s very damaging because it’s a deeply alienating website. Even outside of the fashy stuff, it was a really fringe place a way people IRL we’re not. This cuts you off from the world, like you’re in some cult. Like instantly receiving a -10 in social skills.

        Yeah, I got hit with my first major depressive episode at 15 and it really did not help that I had gotten really into posting there at that time. I think a lot about what my life would be like had I not ever gone there. I'm grateful to it in some ways (it was waaay less toxic pre-Gamergate) because it introduced me to a lot of really cool shit but it's really an echo chamber of insecurity and with fascism having overtaken then entire site now there's really nothing worthwhile there anymore

        • mittens [he/him]
          ·
          3 years ago

          The way I see it, it was like building some sort of inmune system against fascist ideas, I guess. I think it could've been worse. Also some of its fringe interests have turned a bit more mainstream now, you can reinvent yourself as some sort of bon vivant connoisseur of the finer japanese arts.

          • LoudMuffin [he/him]
            ·
            3 years ago

            oh yeah, I ran into a /pol/ moron IRL (I managed to confirm it LMAO) and it's funny fucking with him because he has caught me dicking around on reddit so he thinks I'm some naive redditor but I know the truth :xi-gun:

            • spectre [he/him]
              ·
              3 years ago

              Lol I've had the same thing happen and been aware of when he's spewing obvious /pol shit, but I don't keep up with what they are ahead of time so I can't dunk that hard on it.

    • CommunistBear [he/him]
      ·
      3 years ago

      Yeah, I remember being on 4chan way too young in like 2005-2006 and I can say for certain that it contributed to fucking me up. I won't say it's 100% at fault since I was already being neglected and coming from a broken home, but it was a strong contributor that alienated me from my peers.

      • LoudMuffin [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        3 years ago

        I was already being neglected and coming from a broken home, but it was a strong contributor that alienated me from my peers.

        what fucks me up is thinking I could have had a girlfriend for a little while in highschool but I got too much into posting on /mu/ and became an idiot elitist and basically kinda brushed off this not entirely unattractive girl in marching band who, while not exactly my type probably would have been a healthier use of my time than posting on fucking 4chan lmao

          • LoudMuffin [he/him]
            ·
            edit-2
            3 years ago

            No, but we listened to BADBADNOTGOOD and Interpol while she had her head on my shoulder on a bus ride back from a parade

            she's married with a kid now and I'm some deranged commie scum approaching wizard status so

            • ElGosso [he/him]
              ·
              edit-2
              3 years ago

              lmao I feel that last sentence, I think there's exactly one woman I had a crush on in high school who doesn't have a kid, and plus my on-again off-again girlfriend through college age (I was still highschool-brained) has one too I think, she's definitely married at least.

              Honestly this whole thread has kind of made me realize that posting is the one constant in my entire life, no matter the forum or messageboard or whatever I was posting on and no matter how I felt about the subject matter. I don't feel good about it, but, I mean, I never really felt good about anything. That's why I spent my life posting.

              • LoudMuffin [he/him]
                ·
                3 years ago

                Yeah, I've accepted it now. Some people were born to post. I've seen it even on relatively "normie" websites (like old hobby web 1.0 forums), there are a few posters there were you get the feeling where it was their calling.

                I'm just going to keep posting. Maybe I'll find a wife who likes to post, too. It's not really likely, but at the end of the day, does it really matter? It makes me wonder to what exact extent I am an aberration versus just being a product of this particular historical moment along with other hordes of weird, lonely men posting incessantly as if their collective posts will one day converge into one James Joyce esque masterwork of surrealist poetry perfectly capturing the zeitgeist of the fully atomized internet age.

                • Mardoniush [she/her]
                  ·
                  3 years ago

                  All of the old 1917 comrades were uber-posters. Lenin seriously needed to touch grass at times. Trotsky spent his whole life floating several inches above any vegetation, dictating who to own in the next Pravda edition.

                • ratmfan [she/her]
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                  edit-2
                  3 years ago

                  this might be the saddest thing I have ever read