A lot of the outrage on both sides is actually russian bots.UWSaint wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2026 9:03 amDefinitely is a game played by all. Definitely is (or can be) mutually beneficial outrage if it creates a positive feedback loop of attention (description of the nature of the feedback loop, not a normative value on it).donlever wrote: ↑Thu Oct 15, 2026 8:39 am So, in a microcosm, everyone is pushing everyone else's buttons for "clicks" and attention therefore "bucks" or power...
Like the red guys and the blue guys do as well.
The wheels on the bus....
(....my hope is that 85% of the general population have had enough and literally don't give a fuck ... the downside to that being vocal ambivalence, be that at the voting booth or standing up for friends and neighbours...)
...go round and round.
Your hope (and the possible tradeoff risk) is spot on. Silent majorities may exist but it doesn't take majorities to change culture or even governments when healthy not giving a fuck manifests as sleeping in on test day.
They don't really care about the cause, they just want to sow division within western society.
So a lot of the most divisive posts on both sides of a contested topic often originate in Putin's troll factories.
It was noted that when the Ukrainians took out three major data centers in russia, the discourse on line over the next few days got a lot more civil, both in Europe and the USA.