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Comment by golergka | Hacker News Reader

That's exactly what was written on 4chan's /b/ for years. Despite having a ridiculous reputation, this place was always excellent at helping it's users develop the right attitude toward internet in general: don't trust anyone, don't let your emotions take control, and don't be so damn serious.

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I've found this is usually more the paper-thin justification /b/ users employ to avoid noticing that a culture based entirely around judging others for being too hysterical quickly drives them hysterical.

The last descriptor I would use for 4chan is "cold calm rational".

You clearly haven't spent enough time on it - that's exactly the qualities that it trains within you, although the method it uses is kinda harsh.

It is a place where people go to with their uncontrolled emotional outbursts. Which is their thing when those outbursts don't have impact on rest of the world and really not fine when it leaks outside.

Yes, swear words lost all their meaning for many on 4chan. That does not make people using them any more rational.

It's not about sharpening your wits thorough osmosis, it's about seeing nonsense laid bare at your feet. Leveraging that to see through the pretense of "smarter" conversation to understand it's the exact same stuff: shit-flinging, misleading but plausible half-lies, active propaganda, underinformed dummies thinking they're having a deep conversation, etc...

The zen that parent poster describes comes when you recognize that your favorite political commentator, or the thing your best friend just said over coffee are not inherently smarter or dumber than 4chan.

edit: w/r/t "leaking outside.": The problem isn't that Trump was meme-ed into the whitehouse. The problem is that paternalistic control of messaging will never equip the populace to evaluate something as nonsense when the parents aren't around to stop the message from propagating.

By leaking outside I meant a.) coordinated harassment b.) people being shocked that the rest of world does not share 4chan habits and culture - including channers being honestly shocked that people react negatively to unrelated Hitler meme used as argument and not taking author as some king of genius for that. Because channer using hitler and nazi symbolism did not even realized what those things means or were (except general understanding that it was something edgy).

I don't really think Trump got to white house bc 4chan, I believe his voters voted him because he represents them as he is.

Love your summary of the 4chan spirit. On point! It taught us that we shouldn't judge a message based on its communicator but only on the message itself.

Not even the message. Even the message is likely manipulative, or an outright falsehood, or, most likely, both.

This is the right way to view any single-source information you are reading on the internet.

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