Michael

I do like that you signal-boosted Mullvad Browser. I think it’s a great option. And I hope somebody sees this post and gives the team a hand.

Projects like LibreWolf and Mullvad Browser are important because user settings being roughly the same across a userbase helps you to blend in. Even extensions you install can be used to fingerprint you.

There’s also no credit-score check in the US for job applications, so no, it doesn’t “lock people out of finding work.”

Employers may use credit report information to verify an applicant’s identity and to look for signs of excessive debt or past financial mismanagement. Source: https://www.experian.com/blogs/ask-experian/why-employers-check-your-credit-report-and-what-they-see/

Employers discriminate very openly against applicants for a variety of reasons. Nepotism is one such way, AI filtering is an emergent way - there are plenty of other practices.

Good luck getting a job if you were ever convicted of a crime, no matter how innocuous, or even had a police report filed against you (for certain jobs with clearances) - with no convictions, evidence, or arrest. Even being arrested with charges dropped can disqualify you effectively.

And you better believe if you actually got arrested, every local newspaper has doxxed you - with full name, mug shot, even potentially your employment history and rough home address. All it takes is a name to get somebody’s address because people search websites exist to compile all of the wonderful publicly available information.

and they are struggling to keep it up to date with the latest Arkenfox updates, despite putting out new releases.

Keyword is Arkenfox user.js. Which is not Firefox updates.

If the LibreWolf maintainers are overwhelmed at the frequency of commits of a project that tweaks Firefox preferences (which amounts to “sesame street numbers” according to Arkenfox developers) because they are short on time and resources, so what?

I did see those examples and of course I commend you for those and empathize with you. I feel it’s best to just not engage with very polarizing topics, and from my experience, changing people’s minds is very difficult if they are firm in their position and feel very strongly about a topic - even if your arguments are sound. If you think or feel differently than the consensus and feel strongly enough to talk about such subjects, just calmly eat the downvotes in such topics as you did. I promise you’ll be stronger for it.

Listen, I was just trying to explain why some of the downvotes might be happening generally and I’m certainly not attacking you or against you. You’re free to see things however you’d like and hold whatever views you like. Again, if it were my choice votes wouldn’t appear at all.

I just know people are very sensitive to tone, and I understand that it’s difficult to always be on your best behavior when people don’t give you the respect you deserve, but I assure you there’s a balancing act where you can not be a doormat and also assert yourself.

I’ll keep an eye out. I have been using this website moderately for nearly a year. I’m sorry your experience has been different - not discounting you.

I see that you frequently employ laughing in discussion, that you are pretty confused about different ideologies (such as seeing communism as being inherently authoritarian), and that you are frequently sarcastic and dismissive to others. You consider anybody suggesting change outside of capitalist philosophy as radical and you mock others for blaming capitalism for their problems. I apologize if I’m mischaracterizing you, I quickly skimmed a few pages.

Be respectful, debate in good faith, perhaps stop typing your laughs and other perceivably rude remarks if you don’t want backlash. Or just do you - you are allowed to have gripes with various systems and ideologies and express them and discuss them with others.

Pay less attention to the downvotes. The downvotes don’t hide your comment as on Reddit. There is also no collapsing of comments done by mods. Myself, I’m personally not a fan of the upvote/downvote systems and if I continue using this service I’m likely going to zap the upvotes/downvotes and all vote counters with uBlock Origin (as I don’t participate in voting anyway).

There are plenty of people on the fediverse that are clearly free and independent thinkers - as in not operating from inside a bubble where they get fed opinions and views from others and them regurgitating those views ad nauseam. On Lemmy, I see a lot of curiosity and a lot of people who were probably censored or effectively buried by downvotes on other platforms, despite their good faith and interesting (and sometimes radical) perspectives.

Discussion flows well, there’s less focus on upvotes/downvotes and there is no karma. There doesn’t seem to be a tradition of dog-piling people who wrong-think according to the group consensus (or whatever neoliberal narrative is prevailing) as there is on Reddit. Moderation is much less heavy-handed and there are no shadowbans/comments that don’t show up for others (but only for yourself). There are significantly less bots and almost zero astroturfed content, as well.

Worry less about the labels, I say. If you want mainstream or conservative opinions, it’s very easy to seek them out - the internet is full of those perspectives. If you’re curious, you could play devil’s advocate and discuss current events or other hot topics from a mainstream perspective and ask others why they think differently to better understand the userbase on the fediverse and how things generally go down here. I’m sure plenty of people would be happy to weigh the pros and cons of different viewpoints and perspectives and entertain a discussion about certain issues in good faith.

Not everybody is filtering everything out from a polarized lens and is focused on being an absolutist or purist with their preferred ideology.

Not going to get into a huge debate, but I disagree that it’s a good thing or even remotely ideal. I don’t there should be such huge separations in society to the point where you can point somebody out as “rich” and “poor” - especially pegging an entire neighborhood as poor or mostly poor.

We can do better to provide quality housing and the ingredients of dignity to everyone.

We need to redefine society if we want to truly unify, and it starts with an universal human bill of rights. Ensuring individual and community-based sovereignty with guiding concepts like direct democracy are important first steps. Dependence on externalities and reliance on impersonal entities like corporations (which largely capture governance, science, and everything else they can) needs to stop if we want to realize a world that is worth living in for ourselves and future generations.

Society is our doom if we continue to allow pollution, waste, and destruction of our environments on levels we have never seen before, while experts and other people in the know stand silently and cover the situation up, or are largely ignored if they are actually crying out. Environmentally-caused disease and chronic illness are rising to levels that we can no longer ignore or cover up.

Hopefully we don’t have to always be dependent on so many other people and services to have basic dignity and sanitation.

People who live off-grid, van/rv/etc., homestead, etc. lifestyles are pioneering a future where we don’t need services that aren’t likely that great for the environment - such as public sewage, our reliance on fossil fuels to power and heat our homes and electronics, or unsustainable agriculture that isn’t in balance with the environment or even nutritionally-dense.

I am grateful to the people who enable our standard of living to survive with some semblance of dignity, and especially those focused on solutions, so we can get to the point of self-sufficiency, sustainability, and balance in our environment as a species and planet.