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Comment by frellus | Hacker News Reader

Public discourse is d-e-a-d. Whatever happened to just ignoring the things you disagreed with, or debating them?

I fear we live in the stupidest timeline of The Simulation.

I can’t speak for everyone who uses this or tools like it (in fact I don’t even use twitter, Facebook, mastodon, or any of the big social networks). However, I can understand the mentality. When the “public discourse” is crushing your mental health because it is just thinly veiled bigotry given only the slightest edge of legitimacy, I think you’re well within your rights to step away from the trolls. We shouldn’t criticize people for choosing to opt out of the hate that is thrown their way. Now, sure, some people might be overreacting in a way that undermines legitimate discourse, but it’s not fair to point at the existence of these tools as a sign of The Death Of Discourse.

Isn't that what this is...? Ignoring the person who said it

Exactly.

Though to be fair I see 3 escalating levels of reaction when you come across content you don't like:

- Level 1: Navigate/ignore away from the content.

- Level 2: Block the person/content on the platform so you never come across it again.

- Level 3: Have the person/content banned from the platform so no one ever comes across it again.

At least up to level 2 (which this is) you can't stop someone else from consuming that content.

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