Why does the general attitude on Lemmy seem to lean toward more censorship and silencing of speech rather than less? There are plenty of popular views floating around here that I don’t agree with, but that aren’t surprising - they align with the kind of people who are drawn to a place like this. This one, however, is surprising.
EDIT: I think ChatGPT did a pretty decent job at explaining this. And didn’t even accuse me of being a fascist for asking.
spoiler
You’re not imagining it—liberal-leaning platforms like Lemmy, Mastodon, Tumblr, and especially certain corners of Reddit often do show a strong tendency toward content moderation that can slide into ideological gatekeeping or outright censorship. But to make sense of why that happens, you have to separate two things: who has power in the platform’s culture and what values they believe justify limiting speech.
Historically, you’re right—censorship has often been associated with right-wing authoritarianism: military dictatorships, state control of media, book bans, and suppression of dissent. But the core mechanism of censorship is not inherently right-wing. It’s just a tool. Who uses it, and why, changes depending on who holds power.
In the online left-leaning spaces, the logic behind censorship isn’t about suppressing dissent to maintain state power, but rather about protecting marginalized groups and enforcing norms of inclusion, safety, and respect. That sounds noble on the surface, and often it is. But when taken too far or enforced rigidly, it results in a climate where even questioning the norms themselves is treated as harmful. That’s the paradox: speech is restricted in the name of compassion, not control—but the effect can feel just as silencing.
There’s also the factor of social capital. On platforms dominated by left-leaning users, calling something “harmful,” “problematic,” or “not aligned with community values” gives you power. Moderators and users gain status by enforcing those norms. And since these platforms are not democracies but tribes with moderators, dissenting views often get downvoted, banned, or flagged not because they’re poorly argued, but because they challenge the group’s identity.
You could argue it’s not censorship in the classic state sense—it’s more like ideological hygiene within self-selecting communities. But if you’re the one getting silenced, it doesn’t really matter why. You just feel the muzzle.
One more thing: platforms like Lemmy are very new, often run by idealists, and many come from or were inspired by activist spaces where speech norms are strict by design. In that context, “freedom of speech” isn’t always a priority—it’s seen as something that can enable harm, rather than protect truth-seeking. And that mindset has filtered into moderation culture.
So while the underlying motivations are very different, the behavior—shunning, silencing, gatekeeping—can look similar to the authoritarian censorship you mentioned. It just wears a different uniform.
I feel like the issue people her take with this is rather “great, even more Nazi content” than “I want censorship”. YouTube already has an issue with demonetizing content it deems risky for its ad business, like curse words or the mention of violence while allowing inflammatory content that drives engagement
I’d imagine that the inflammatory content in question mostly gets demonetized just the same, so I don’t really see what the issue is. It’s not like a specific kind of content is being treated differently, or is it?
It does not, because demonetized content is also no longer pushed by the algorithm. Since the right wing stuff still gets pushed to the front page and recommendations, it probably did not get demonetized
Since the right wing stuff still gets pushed to the front page
I find this hard to believe since it goes against my decades long personal experience using YouTube. The moment I click on a “Ben Shapiro destroys” video, sure - I get plenty more in my feed. But they also go away when I stop engaging. In my experience, YouTube does a great job of recommending me the kind of content I actually like to watch.
Generally, the people I see bitching most about censorship, and being censored, are people with the most disgusting view points possible. Because they don’t seem to understand that censorship is when the government is telling you what you can and can’t say; not a private business or regular people telling a prick to fuck off back to whatever hole they crawled out of after saying some vile bullshit.
Whenever someone says they want free speech in online spaces, it almost always means they want to be able to use derogatory slurs.
Instead of engaging with anything I actually said, you went straight to attacking anyone who even questions this, while subtly implying I’m probably a nazi.
Why does the general attitude on Lemmy seem to lean toward more censorship and silencing of speech
Because “censorship” in this context is a weasel word. What people complaining about censorship really want, is the ability to be more openly racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic etc. What people pushing back against that want is less bigotry.
But because the bigots can’t own their bigotry, they hide behind “censorship” and not having enough “free speech”.
This is literally youtube saying “The president says that hating on folks is ok, and we will make more money by aligning with that”. It’s not them taking a stance on free speech, because they still block stuff that costs them money. They still demonetise or block things that are supportive of LGBT folk for the flimsiest of reasons, none of which they would do if censorship or free speech were their reasoning.
This has nothing to do with “censorship” and everything to do with a deliberate attempt not to increase free speech, but to shift “allowed” speech to the right
Why does the general attitude on Lemmy seem to lean toward more censorship and silencing of speech rather than less? There are plenty of popular views floating around here that I don’t agree with, but that aren’t surprising - they align with the kind of people who are drawn to a place like this. This one, however, is surprising.
EDIT: I think ChatGPT did a pretty decent job at explaining this. And didn’t even accuse me of being a fascist for asking.
spoiler
You’re not imagining it—liberal-leaning platforms like Lemmy, Mastodon, Tumblr, and especially certain corners of Reddit often do show a strong tendency toward content moderation that can slide into ideological gatekeeping or outright censorship. But to make sense of why that happens, you have to separate two things: who has power in the platform’s culture and what values they believe justify limiting speech.
Historically, you’re right—censorship has often been associated with right-wing authoritarianism: military dictatorships, state control of media, book bans, and suppression of dissent. But the core mechanism of censorship is not inherently right-wing. It’s just a tool. Who uses it, and why, changes depending on who holds power.
In the online left-leaning spaces, the logic behind censorship isn’t about suppressing dissent to maintain state power, but rather about protecting marginalized groups and enforcing norms of inclusion, safety, and respect. That sounds noble on the surface, and often it is. But when taken too far or enforced rigidly, it results in a climate where even questioning the norms themselves is treated as harmful. That’s the paradox: speech is restricted in the name of compassion, not control—but the effect can feel just as silencing.
There’s also the factor of social capital. On platforms dominated by left-leaning users, calling something “harmful,” “problematic,” or “not aligned with community values” gives you power. Moderators and users gain status by enforcing those norms. And since these platforms are not democracies but tribes with moderators, dissenting views often get downvoted, banned, or flagged not because they’re poorly argued, but because they challenge the group’s identity.
You could argue it’s not censorship in the classic state sense—it’s more like ideological hygiene within self-selecting communities. But if you’re the one getting silenced, it doesn’t really matter why. You just feel the muzzle.
One more thing: platforms like Lemmy are very new, often run by idealists, and many come from or were inspired by activist spaces where speech norms are strict by design. In that context, “freedom of speech” isn’t always a priority—it’s seen as something that can enable harm, rather than protect truth-seeking. And that mindset has filtered into moderation culture.
So while the underlying motivations are very different, the behavior—shunning, silencing, gatekeeping—can look similar to the authoritarian censorship you mentioned. It just wears a different uniform.
I feel like the issue people her take with this is rather “great, even more Nazi content” than “I want censorship”. YouTube already has an issue with demonetizing content it deems risky for its ad business, like curse words or the mention of violence while allowing inflammatory content that drives engagement
I’d imagine that the inflammatory content in question mostly gets demonetized just the same, so I don’t really see what the issue is. It’s not like a specific kind of content is being treated differently, or is it?
It does not, because demonetized content is also no longer pushed by the algorithm. Since the right wing stuff still gets pushed to the front page and recommendations, it probably did not get demonetized
I find this hard to believe since it goes against my decades long personal experience using YouTube. The moment I click on a “Ben Shapiro destroys” video, sure - I get plenty more in my feed. But they also go away when I stop engaging. In my experience, YouTube does a great job of recommending me the kind of content I actually like to watch.
deleted by creator
i am inclined to agree with everything your robot servant said
Generally, the people I see bitching most about censorship, and being censored, are people with the most disgusting view points possible. Because they don’t seem to understand that censorship is when the government is telling you what you can and can’t say; not a private business or regular people telling a prick to fuck off back to whatever hole they crawled out of after saying some vile bullshit.
Whenever someone says they want free speech in online spaces, it almost always means they want to be able to use derogatory slurs.
Instead of engaging with anything I actually said, you went straight to attacking anyone who even questions this, while subtly implying I’m probably a nazi.
Because “censorship” in this context is a weasel word. What people complaining about censorship really want, is the ability to be more openly racist, sexist, homophobic, transphobic etc. What people pushing back against that want is less bigotry.
But because the bigots can’t own their bigotry, they hide behind “censorship” and not having enough “free speech”.
This is literally youtube saying “The president says that hating on folks is ok, and we will make more money by aligning with that”. It’s not them taking a stance on free speech, because they still block stuff that costs them money. They still demonetise or block things that are supportive of LGBT folk for the flimsiest of reasons, none of which they would do if censorship or free speech were their reasoning.
This has nothing to do with “censorship” and everything to do with a deliberate attempt not to increase free speech, but to shift “allowed” speech to the right