So much fucking yes.

No, it doesn't. This place becomes barely tolerable once you spend a completely unreasonable amount of time and effort curating toxicity out of your feed. I just don't think there's fixing it when it's a foundational problem. It's tribalism, grandstanding, virtue signaling, groupthink, and outrage. It's not "let's explore an idea" but rather "look at everything that's wrong with the world and how these people are the problem."

It's a self-selected group of people loosely tied together by the mutual hatred of an outgroup. That's the only common thread.

Contrasting the two discussion-based platforms I spend my time on and how one just works and the other is Lemmy, I've come to the conclusion that the only way to build a platform like this that the users don't regret having gone to is by having it paywalled behind a monthly subscription and making indecency a ban-worthy offense - and actually enforcing it. When it's a free-for-all like this, there's no incentive to not shit where you eat.

I have Ukraine. Gaza, Trump and Musk blocked, not because I don't care about them but because I can't affect them in any way whatsoever aside from feeling shitty at being more personally aware of the atrocities of the world.

What are you going to do with the important stuff?

When you realise your view of the world is already narrow because of the window you choose to view it, a few quality of life filters are not going to make that window any smaller, just less covered in shit.