>I've noticed a huge uptick in the toxicity online in the last 5-7 years.
You're crazy my dude(tte). I've been on the interbutts since 1991 and Usenet days, and it's exactly as it always was. The big difference is we have reporter ding dongs on Twitter thinking Twitter, aka the comments section they removed from their web presence, is the real world. Also old people on Facebook who never learned the lessons of being on Usenet in the early 1990s, aka arguing on the internet is a lame and addictive hobby.
There are minor accelerants for this; youtube really did have some kind of pathological radicalization rabbit hole in its recommendation engine for a while (now it's just boring and useless and shows you "more of the same" on "blue checked" accounts). And of course, the other media encourages polarization and demonization of the other for dumb short term. That's a purely American phenomenon, and nothing's going to change it until the people pushing this swill on MSNBC, Fox and CNN decide to change it.
You're crazy my dude(tte). I've been on the interbutts since 1991 and Usenet days, and it's exactly as it always was. The big difference is we have reporter ding dongs on Twitter thinking Twitter, aka the comments section they removed from their web presence, is the real world. Also old people on Facebook who never learned the lessons of being on Usenet in the early 1990s, aka arguing on the internet is a lame and addictive hobby.
There are minor accelerants for this; youtube really did have some kind of pathological radicalization rabbit hole in its recommendation engine for a while (now it's just boring and useless and shows you "more of the same" on "blue checked" accounts). And of course, the other media encourages polarization and demonization of the other for dumb short term. That's a purely American phenomenon, and nothing's going to change it until the people pushing this swill on MSNBC, Fox and CNN decide to change it.