If you see people expressing an opinion that’s useful for the rich and powerful, it’s appealing to imagine that the people expressing that opinion are shills. But I think saying such out loud lowers the quality of discourse. If we go around accusing one people we disagree with of being shills, we aren’t learning or participating in an exchange of ideas, which is the point of a discussion forum like this.
There’s a perfectly sound explanation for those posts that seem “shillish”: sincerely held beliefs that are different from yours. I think fanboyism and ideology motivate a lot more people to argue on the internet than money. If you want proof of this, look at all the teeming masses arguing for all sorts of causes that the rich and powerful don’t care about.
There’s a perfectly sound explanation for those posts that seem “shillish”: sincerely held beliefs that are different from yours. I think fanboyism and ideology motivate a lot more people to argue on the internet than money. If you want proof of this, look at all the teeming masses arguing for all sorts of causes that the rich and powerful don’t care about.