Ask Lemmy

Propaganda is not a term I'd personally use. Makes it sound more systematic than I believe it is. I'm sure that on every social media platform there are also the state-level actors wanting to put their thumb on the scale but how I see it is that there's simply this Overton window of acceptable speech and views on each platform and it's mostly set up by the loud minority of "activists" on that platform. People grow accustomed to encountering their views there and it becomes normalized and creates the illusion that this is a commonly held view among the userbase there independent of whether it really is. People quickly learn that expressing certain sentiment reliably gets them praise and approval whereas others result in them being attacked and ostracized. This then leads to an echo chamber where that small minority with the most extreme views basically holds the rest of the platform as hostage. If one tries to bring in nuance it tends to get viewed as opposition and that person gets labeled as the other. This leads them to then just self-censoring, remaining silent or simply parroting the same cliches even if they don't agree on the details. It is in a way exploitation of loneliness because group membership is what it ultimately boils down to: if you want to be accepted to the group then here's the stack of views you're to agree with - please sign below or get the fuck out.