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Comment by intopieces | Hacker News Reader

Unfortunately, stepping out of my bubble on Twitter would involved reading racist, sexist, homophobic, Islamophobic, xenophobic invectives. I know we're entering the "post-PC" / "PC-backlash" era but that doesn't mean I ought to spend my precious attention on people whose opinions are not worth considering.

But, then again, I've never really been on the Twitter train anyway.

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Either you want out of the bubble or you don't.

There are people with contrarian views that aren't necessarily completely batshit insane, like those that chug Alex Jones.

For example, I've found David Brin to be fairly balanced, far from left-leaning, but not the sort of Libertarian people like Theil aspire to be: https://twitter.com/DavidBrin

I'm sure other people can post recommendations here.

> Either you want out of the bubble or you don't.

I don't think that's a fair assertion. It's possible to both want to understand opposing points of view but also not have the bandwidth to filter out clearly not-worthwhile text.

I'm never unblocking comments on YouTube. I'm never going back to Reddit.

It's like being home for Thanksgiving: When the conversation starts with "Well Obama's a Muslim so..." you know it's time to take your turkey plate to the living room and watch the parade.

I'm curious how you think one can understand without spending bandwidth.

As painful as it is you have to engage with people like that. If your own family is chugging Trump, it's a chance to try and nudge them, incrementally, away from their extremist positions.

Like maybe admit that Hillary might not be literally the devil. Baby steps.

I can't tell with this particular topic - are you making a bad joke or do you legitimately feel this sort of smug behavior would be helpful?

I'm saying if you've got a family so far gone they're doing lines of Alex Jones on their Facebook page every day then there's ways of getting them rehabilitated.

This isn't smug. This is fact. Facebook is filled with toxic garbage. Simply nudging people away from that and to something more rational would be a huge step towards civil discourse.

You can't. But not everyone deserves my bandwidth. Empathy and intellectual curiosity are my only prerequisites. If a person can't meet those, I don't have the headspace for anything they have to say.

The less energy I spend being my own gatekeeper, the more I have for things that truly enrich my life.

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