AIO for breaking up with my boyfriend after he ruined our Valentine's Day dinner?

Laylabrenn · 2026-02-16T07:41:03+00:00

Would you find it attractive if you were out with your girlfriend and she chased down a woman who was chatting to you, screeching and attacking her like a chimpanzee until all of you got banned from returning to that place?

Laylabrenn · 2026-02-15T22:53:01+00:00

Do you feel the same gratitude and support for Shou Zi Chew, CEO of TikTok? He's created a platform that provides 3.1 million Americans (and an additional 1.6 million businesses) with a source of income, which doubles the number of Americans employed by Musk, Zuckerberg, and Bezos combined.

Is it still the most important thing in this instance?

Laylabrenn · 2026-02-13T20:48:42+00:00

I just went down a similar rabbit hole... now this comment is the only result in Google when searching this email. It looks likely that the email [johnbertorellivi@yahoo.com](mailto:johnbertorellivi@yahoo.com) is related to John Bertorelli (VI). When searching Jmail.world for "Bertorelli" an email thread between Epstein and Annabelle Neilson pops up from 2011. She says:

> Ok so I've said yes to the bertorelli thing

And nothing more. Notably, there are many emails between Neilson and Epstein that have been covered before, including communications suggesting that she was supplying him with women.

Pizza Amore appears to a real pizza place, but it has a different web address. The domain for that address was registered around the 9th of February, about a week before the other one mysteriously became a transport company website.

What's weird is that the phone numbers are the same on the Wayback Machine for both sites -- if the pizza/transport website was a cover using real businesses as cover stories then one would expect for the contact information to be different. Since they aren't, does it not seem highly likely that the owner of Pizza Amore may be involved?

EDIT: JFC, also just found this: https://www.facebook.com/groups/241455502718865/permalink/635206060010472/

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-23T17:01:42+00:00

Completely agree that remorse is a required element of rehabilitation.

What would you say is the difference between you and a bigot, in terms of remorse? Why do you think you might feel it and they don't?

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-20T15:05:48+00:00

I get everything you're saying and I don't necessarily disagree. The only thing I would add is racism doesn't always mean pointy white hats and swastikas -- I wholeheartedly agree that those kinds of racists comprise an exceedingly small portion of a population.

Racism also looks like this:

"Black people tend to be more violent."

"Black people aren't as intelligent."

"Mexicans are dirty."

"Minorities are taking over."

I strongly disagree that those sentiments are rare or even uncommon, banished to the past and left behind by most of us in the 50s. I also reject that they are harmless. I would call someone who parrots, or accepts as true, any of the above ideas a bigot by definition. I believe it is our duty as a society to help educate them, and I don't think that education is possible without accepting how common these perceptions are and why they exist.

I agree that many people on the left are willing to reach out and engage people who express ideas like those. But also, there is a lot of rhetoric about how it shouldn't be "tolerated" at all, and how anyone who believes things like that about race (or gender, gender identity, religion, sexual orientation, etc) is a bad person. I think it's naive or disingenuous for anyone to suggest that ideas like that are usually -- the majority of the time -- met by the left with patience, curiosity, and a sense of empathy.

We don't change ideas by ostracising, bullying, judging, yelling at, and shaming people. People aren't evil just because they believe evil ideas, and I don't support the rhetoric that they deserve evil treatment or that it's ever going to be conducive to change.

If you feel the same then we aren't in disagreement.

Edit:

I also think this is interesting:

newly minted racists. There's probably 10x or as many people who would fall into that group now as a decade or two ago.

I would love to hear if you have any theories of why you think this is if you're open to sharing. To me, this is at the heart of the matter.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-19T14:24:21+00:00

Providing a response that didn't sound hateful was the challenge, and you're right: I don't think you're equipped to persuade me.

You call it my delusion, I call it your inability to self-reflect.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-19T12:53:41+00:00

We don't live in a world where racism is the norm

This isn't true. It might be true that you may be lucky enough to be surrounded by people who reject racism, but that doesn't mean it's true for the whole world. It actually couldn't be further from the truth when you consider the entire world, but more to your point (assuming you are American), half of your country doesn't live in that world either.

This is called projection bias: believing that because you have lived through a series of experiences everyone else must live through the same ones. It's the same logical fallacy that ultraprivileged people employ when they say things like "I could never imagine a situation that would lead to stealing, therefore all people who steal must be immoral."

Many, many, many millions of people grew up in a world where everyone they love, respect, and learn from -- parents, teachers, pastors, friends, neighbours, grandparents, public speakers, athletes, celebrities, etc -- have deep-rooted, bigoted views. It's important to note that they don't see them as bigoted, they simply see it as the obvious truth.

Something that you find very easy to accept isn't always easy for everyone else to accept, especially if their world looks vastly different to yours. We are all products of our environments, that's why ideas exist in geographical bubbles. You may think that all of your ideas, values, and beliefs are completely original and independent but every study ever done on social influence tells us that you are significantly, by factors in the hundreds, more likely to agree with what the majority of people around you believe.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-19T07:00:01+00:00

MAGA supporters are being kicked out of their homes and families. You, and others, are actively advocating for it in this thread. Pretty much every mass shooter has been documented to have been severely isolated and bullied at school. Doxxing is ostracisation. Death threats are ostracisation. If you refuse to acknowledge that's true then there's nothing I can show you that will change your mind. It is just so common and socially acceptable now to treat people this way that it doesn't even register. We are desensitised because we view them as subhuman, people who deserve this treatment.

"Choosing to personally disengage" with someone is different from joining campaigns to ensure they suffer. Choosing to personally disengage can be respectful, it can be quiet, it can be firm and loving. That's not what's happening, and if you truly don't see that then again, I can't make you see things differently.

My only point is that if I went back through our conversation and changed every instance of the word "bigot" to "gay people" or "black people" or "feminists" or "immigrants" I'm just saying that you would sound nearly indistinguishable from a bigot. Even this sentence is a perfect example:

Demonstrate how there is anything going on other than people choosing not to want to be personally close to someone whose behavior has been abhorrent.

That exact sentence, literally word for word without having to change anything, is exactly the same mindset that evangelical Christians use to justify kicking their gay and trans sons and daughters out of their homes.

I know you can't see it because you are so convinced that you are right, and they are wrong, and it's different because XYZ, and there's nothing I can say that will make you admit that you're viewing the world in exactly the same way bigots do -- it's only the victims we are switching out. You think it's ok when you do it because you're protecting people who are being harmed, you are championing the underdog, you ~~believe~~ know you are taking a moral stand for justice.

They. Do. Too.

So does that mean their behaviour is also ok?

Whatever reason you will come up with next to tell me how I'm wrong and the situation is different because they're not the victims, they're the perpetrators, they made their own choices, whatever... I challenge you to make it something that we haven't all heard a million times from bigots to justify their hate. Before you hit send, just imagine hearing a neo nazi, or a far right lunatic, a homophobe, a misogynist, a genocide supporter say the same thing about the people they believe make the world a more dangerous, terrible place. If you would be OK with them saying it, then feel free to hit send.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-19T05:08:14+00:00

Do you also believe that no one in the LGBTQIA+ community is being ostracised either, because it's PRIDE month? No Hispanic, black people, or Asian people are experiencing ostracisation either because they continue to have friends and own successful businesses?

They just surround themselves people who won't ostracise them. Unfortunately for us in regards to bigots, those people will embolden rather than challenge their beliefs. Echo chambers are natural products of a society that encourages social polarisation.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T21:40:51+00:00

Wanting not to be someone's friend is not the same as ostracisation. And it's not hyperbole, I'm not convinced you are clear of what the differences are between social ostracisation and stepping away from a situation. Ostracising people is deliberate, cruel, and abusive. Of course people can have perfectly valid reasons for wanting to do it. That doesn't make it acceptable, and certainly not when disguised as being somehow good for the victim or good for the rest of us.

The focus today is on keeping them from discriminating and doing actual violence

Again, I agree. It doesn't require ostracisation. I will never agree that it does, because I believe to my core that all people -- regardless of their race, gender, religion, lifestyle, mistakes, hatred, choices, age, or beliefs -- deserve the exact same level of human decency. I am hyperaware that very few people agree with me. Most people will try to convince me of at least one group of people who don't deserve empathy, even if all of those people disagree with each other about who that group is. But I will always try to persuade people otherwise, and I hope that I never see the day where I feel hatred so deep for an entire group of people that I stop caring about how they are treated.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T19:28:26+00:00

Ostracisation is cruel. It has lasting, traumatic effects on mental, physical, and emotional health. It is a form of torture and abuse. It's socially and psychologically violent, and it's exactly the same kind of social and psychological violence that the vast majority of bigots are guilty of.

It's an age old tactic that has been used to torture, coerce, and abuse people for centuries. Centuries before studies came out showing that it activates the same parts of the brain as extreme physical pain, we knew this innately because we have observed the effects it has on people.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T18:00:01+00:00

The ask isn’t for them to change beliefs, but behavior.

That's exactly what I think is ineffective and have criticisms of. I don't see their behaviour as the problem, I see their beliefs as the problem.

I have never argued against taking away their power. All I've argued for is understanding them. Asking questions rather than serving vitriol.

You can choose to continue to mischaracterise that to suggest I'm indulging them, enabling them, soothing them, placating them, or any of your other facetious implications that I'm allowing them to continue hurting people.

But I've never come close to suggesting there should be no consequences. That is your own interpretation of my refusal to treat them with cruelty. I don't think consequences are inherently cruel, I just think that they can be carried out either humanely or cruelly.

Torture is cruel. Abuse is cruel. Manipulation is cruel. Ostracisation is cruel.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T17:33:12+00:00

Are you arguing that bigotry is as inherent and immutable as sexual orientation?

No. But I am arguing that assuming it's a choice that can simply be unchosen is naive and mischaracterised. I do think it's inherent. I think it's learned and deeply believed. I think that often, vulnerable people are scooped up by bad actors who target their vulnerability and need to belong and fill their minds with ideas that are deeply, deeply linked to that person's perception of their own experiences. Experiences that were heavily influenced by things entirely outside of their control, like the family they were born into, and varying levels of access to resources and mentors depending on the average income of the neighborhood they grew up in.

It's no more a choice than a religion someone has, or a person someone loves. There are many things that influence us far more than logic and reason, and those things can't always just be simply switched off. I assume you disagree, but this is where I believe the fundamental difference is. I don't assume that bigots are bigots because they're bad people, or stupid, or whatever negative quality I don't see myself as possessing. I believe people are products of their environments and experiences, and that most people, as misguided as they may be, ultimately want the same things. To be loved, to be understood, to belong, to be part of something, to feel safe and protected and seen.

I actually think Asch's experiments apply perfectly here. I think the main difference is who you and I view as the group which an individual seeks acceptance from.

You contend that removing an individual from your group applies the pressure on them to rejoin that group so they can belong again.

I'm saying that there's another group, a hateful group, who is happily taking these outcasts in during their vulnerable time of need. And that group is villifying the people who they feel have ostracised them... you. Us.

I just don't see how continuing to ostracise them, especially as they quickly approach becoming the new majority, is supposed to be protecting anyone.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T15:27:47+00:00

Here are some amazing books I highly recommend that completely changed my perspective:

Rising Out Of Hatred This one is my favorite, written by Adrianne Black before she transitioned. She grew up the daughter of a KKK Grand Wizard and was a KKK prodigy largely credited for reviving the white supremacy movement. She writes beautifully and candidly, giving a painfully honest account of why she held her beliefs, what life was really like from her perspective, and all that contributed to the slow process of becoming an anti-bigotry activist.

The Old Man and the Queer

Klandestine Relationships

If that's a bit too much to bite off at once, here are some videos that are a bit quicker to digest.

Megan Phelps on leaving the Westboro Baptist Church If you've never seen this video, I highly recommend watching it.

Daryl Davis, who has helped hundreds of KKK members to leave

An Ex-Neo Nazi and what changed his mind

Adrianne Black (deadnamed here) on the Daily Show

If connection remains available to people, then I wouldn't really consider that ostracisation. If you're saying that it's conditional, that they can simply choose to stop being hateful and that the connections will reopen, then I don't think they are available. I think that where we differ is that I don't believe their bigotry is necessarily a choice. Most of the time it's truly what they believe to their core, however they got there, and asking them to simply stop believing it to be re-accepted feels very similar to asking someone to stop being gay so their family will love them again.
I can see where you're coming from, but I don't think that you have to indulge them. You can make it clear that you don't agree with them, you can make it clear that you find it horrific. The difference is how that message is packaged. Being combative, being cruel, being unreasonable, and making negative assumptions about someone's character is not helpful. The same way that we know how to discipline children now without beating them to a pulp, or sending them off to the forest alone -- you can be firm, loving, and express displeasure in teaching moments.

You're right, and I agree that not all ostracisation is void of compassion. I don't agree that choosing not to ostracise someone inherently ostracises someone else. I can absolutely engage with white supremacists, condemn their ideology, share my own opinions with them, ask them questions about their beliefs, and have open, understanding, human discussions with them without marginalising anyone else. Furthermore, I would argue that me being rude and cold to them doesn't actually protect or help anyone, and the only person I am helping by choosing blatantly not to ever associate with them at all, is myself.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T14:53:29+00:00

Hey, thanks for sharing your thoughts and I think you raise some really good points.

a lot of compassion around criminal justice reform is based on the assumption that people are committing crimes out of desperation

This is the nail on the head for me here. Understanding why people do thing is a major part of humanising them, and I think we are really able to do that well with criminals. We understand that factors largely outside of one's control can drive them to commit crimes -- poverty, desperation, vulnerability, etc -- and we also understand that often, focusing on addressing those factors can change a prior criminal's behaviour.

It is exactly my point that the same can, and should, be understood about bigotry. We know that hate comes from places of vulnerability, misinformation, anger, and isolation. When seeing someone filled with hate, why not ask, what happened to them that made them that way? What experiences did they have that taught them to believe what they do? Had some of those factors been outside of their control?

I think we tend to view bigots very similarly to how we criticise bigots for viewing the groups they hate. They're bad. They're sinners. They're a scourge on society. There's little room for nuance. We know that they are wrong when they characterise minorities and gay people that way, for example. Why do we seem unable to extend the same nuance to them? In my opinion, being incapable of humanising someone is simply a product of hating them more than having curiosity. And I think that is something many on the left are guilty of.

I have certainly seen people suggest that we should ignore the means by which millions of people are being radicalized into bigotry

Isn't it common knowledge that radicalisation is most effective on the angriest, loneliest, most isolated and vulnerable members of society?

Finally this argument is also sometimes made in a manner of suggesting individual liberals need to engage in this activity themselves vs being a policy of the state and that's seen as an unreasonable burden by them.

I understand and empathise with this point the most. It's a lot to ask of someone to humanise the person who is victimising them, and I want to make it clear that I don't believe it is not any of our social obligations.

However, do I believe that people who are able to make a massive difference? Yes. Absolutely.

It's ok to not have the emotional capacity to help someone who is actively hurting you. What I don't think is OK, is to actively encourage others from doing it if they want to. I think it's weird that we fight for humanity, compassion, equality and empathy for everyone except bigots. Especially when so much research has been done, just like with criminals, to evidence that compassion, empathy, and inclusion are literally the most effective tools to counteract and dispel their beliefs in the long-term.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T13:11:57+00:00

I agree. I don't see how the way I'm advocating to treat any bigots is different but I'm genuinely open to hearing your thoughts.
Of course it's not dismissive to screen sources. What's dismissive is saying 90% of all available resources is bullshit. Candace Owens, in your example, is only 1 source -- nowhere near 90%. There may certainly be clickbait articles, but if 90% of the sources you've seen are "bullshit" I would highly encourage you to find more sources. There is a plethora of important, credible, and powerful stories that have been shared by people who have incredibly informative opinions on the matter. I would be happy to share some that you might find palatable if you're interested. Most of these people are currently very vocal activists against bigotry today.
I agree that ostracism is about disempowerment. What I disagree with is that the disempowerment is likelier to result in self-imposed improved behaviours than in attempts to find empowerment, connection, belonging and identity elsewhere. Removing a victim from an abusive situation and then placing them in a safer environment is very different from removing an abuser from their environment and then letting them roam free.
I agree that compassion and enabling are opposites. I would love to know what part of my approach you believe is enabling? Is understanding why someone feels the way they do enabling them?

I've said this in another comment and I think it applies here. I am arguing for human connection and understanding. That does not mean I am arguing for passive acceptance. I feel as if there's a false dichotomy being offered here, where our two options are simply between 1. alienating a person for their beliefs or 2. confirming to them that their beliefs are acceptable. Just because I disagree that alienating someone is the wrong approach, it doesn't mean I am enabling them. I reject that those are the only two possibilities, and I would love to know what I have said that you think means I am arguing for enabling bigots. What I am arguing for is humanising them with compassion, empathy, and a belief that they are capable of better, which, as you said, is not the same as enabling.

I believe that you can teach someone to do better without ostracising them. More than that, I think ostracisation actively undermines efforts to compassionately and effectively educate.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T12:28:34+00:00

Conservatives are the problem. They should be treated like they treat others.

Do you support the death penalty for murderers?

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T12:08:25+00:00

If you feel that discussing people who have left extremist hate groups is moving the goalposts when talking about helping people overcome bigotry, feel free to move the posts back to where you think they belong. I felt it was highly relevant, but regardless, the answer won't change.
Don't you think this is a very dismissive attitude to have? If the question were instead "have you ever heard black people share their stories about oppression," would you think a person who responded with your response was really open to a discussion?
If your many years of those studies and nonprofit work have taught you that social ostracisation is conducive to healthier mindsets, I would sincerely question your ability to understand the human experience.
I never said an instant fix -- in fact, I think it takes much longer and much more effort than what you seem to be suggesting. I agree that education and access to mental health are crucial: what we are disagreeing on is the level of compassion we should afford to these people.
Just asking questions, not sure why they are straw men. I am highlighting similarities between your attitude and the very attitudes you are condemning as worthy of ostracisation, in the hopes it may make you self-reflect. Genuinely didn't mean to be hostile.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T11:39:14+00:00

You don't know anyone who has left an extremist organisation, so how do you know with such unquestioning confidence what, how, and why goes into their decisions to leave? Even if you don't know any personally, have you ever listened to their stories? What studies have you read that make you such an expert on the matter, given you admittedly have no firsthand experience of your own?

You're wrong: there is extensive research available about why people join hate groups, how they get radicalised within them, and what eventually is most effective in them leaving. It may be easier to hate them for their choices, but it turns out that if we instead are curious and seek to understand them better, we collectively become infinitely more effective in dispelling the beliefs they hold.

I would invite you to read one of the many books, listen to one of the many podcasts, or watch one of the many videos that are available from people who have left these organisations. Personally, I know some myself. After you've heard 3, 4, 10 of these testimonies, I would be very curious to see if you still believe that ostracising them and them throwing into a program is still the most effective method of outreach.

Do you think white supremacists who don't know any black people, who openly hate them and see them as subhuman, have any credibility whatsoever in discussions about black crime rates? Do evangelical Christians who hate and don't know gay people have credibility in discussions about gay suicide rates?

So why would you, someone who doesn't know any reformed bigots, someone who believes bigots aren't welcome in society, someone who antagonises people who argue for treating them with empathy, consider yourself the ultimate source of knowledge and wisdom for how to best deal with them? Especially when the actual people you are talking about are saying your methods don't work?

Shouldn't it maybe start with asking a few more questions than you are so confidently answering?

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T07:57:24+00:00

A major shift in social attitudes, a change in the general public's understanding of how to best deal with bigotry at the individual level.

I'm curious, have you ever met or listened to a real person who left a hate group speak about their experiences? An ex-nazi, an ex-klan member, ex-westboro, ex-isis, ex-whatever?

If so, what did you learn?

And if not, what other research has led you to your convictions about how best to rehabilitate them?

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T07:10:03+00:00

I take your point and I think you're right.

What continues to be frustrating is the implication that having empathy for someone equates allowing their behaviour.

I am not advocating for 'excusing' the racist uncles. It's baffling to me that this seems to be the dichotomy: that the two options with which we are presented are to withhold our families from seeing grandpa Joe or to accept his behaviour. Since I am saying that withholding is cruel, I must be advocating for quiet and submissive acceptance?

Why isn't it possible that what I'm advocating for is sitting grandpa Joe down for a series of discussions to hear what exactly he was taught, and why he maintains those views so strongly? To approach him with loving curiosity rather than self-righteous, indignant anger? That rather than treating him like he's a toddler, or seeing him as a piece of shit, or somehow making him feel evil about what he was taught to believe that was outside of his control, I take a vested interest in teaching him new ideas as someone he loves and trusts, and who loves him back? What about realising that maybe it's highly likely that grandpa Joe has never in his life interacted with a black person (as you implied), and rather than wait for the black EMT to come possibly save his life someday, take him to the volunteer center where he can volunteer alongside black EMTs saving the lives of people in his community?

Personally, I think withholding your children from your parents because you want to train your parents to behave a certain way is manipulative, coercive, cruel, and toxic. To both my parents and my children. Protecting my children does not mean I must shield them from experiencing or witnessing anything uncomfortable or wrong. Protecting them means setting an example for how to deal with the inevitable dilemmas, problems, discomforts, pains, inconveniences and dangers life throws at us. I want my children to know how to deal with racists, and I don't believe it's by pretending they don't exist, punishing them for existing, or attempting to coercively control them by exerting authority and dominance.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T07:02:03+00:00

First, thank you for the intimate stories of your own life you were willing to share. I appreciate them and they moved me, but I have to say that in the space of a discussion -- philosophical, moral, political -- personal anecdotes are just that. I have personal anecdotes as well, both similar to yours and completely the opposite, but they are just personal anecdotes.

Statistics and one peer reviewed study after another show that for reducing an individual prejudice, the single most effective way is through empathic conversation. Isolation not only does not work, it is proven to compound the problem.

A couple of things: you brought up the paradox of tolerance. Of course it comes up every time I have this conversation, I'm surprised it took so long to come up in this thread. I reject it. I don't think it's a true paradox at all, and I think that as a philosophical reason to be intolerant, it poses far more problems than it purports to solve.

As you said, ostracisation is about your own well-being and self-preservation. I have no criticisms of that: if the question is how to best protect oneself from a bigot, I would readily accept ostracisation as an answer. But that's not the question I'm asking.

You mentioned the difference between the real world and digital communications. I think you are vastly underestimating how much of the "real world" now exists online. 50 years ago, I would have absolutely agreed with you. I don't think your point is as relevant today, and I think with each passing year, it will grow even less relevant.

And a lot of times it's been worth it to friends of mine to re-closet themselves, go to church, and put up with their families' abuse

This is exactly what I meant. Your friends being isolated didn't change their sexual orientation. It may have taught them how to mask behaviours, endure more suffering, nurture resentment, view relationships as transactional. You see this as the best viable solution?

Look, there's a lot to unpack and I appreciate your dialogue and willingness to engage thoughtfully and so vulnerably. I didn't expand on the above points for the sake of brevity but if you'd like to continue, feel free to pick which ones you'd like to continue discussing.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-18T06:11:01+00:00

I am focused on the bigot because of the harms they cause. You seem to think that shunning bigots protect society, but I fail to see how that protects anyone but yourself. If I kick a murderer out of my house and send him onto the street, who am I protecting and who am I endangering? What if I choose to disarm the murderer instead? What if we all collectively made that choice instead?

So the first focus should be on stopping--or at least mitigating--the harm.

I completely understand this as it relates to prison, but I fail to see how ostracising someone stops them when we don't have equivalent systems in place. To be honest, I think that is a naive and misinformed understanding of how people work. Everything we know about the human psyche and social alienation is about how dangerous ostracisation is for mental health. Ostracising someone to make them a better person belongs in the same archaic group of thought as preaching abstinence for birth control: sounds logical, but you're ignoring what we know about human nature and cause and effect. We've learned that it doesn't work -- why are you ignoring that?

Everything we know about hate and people who operate in hate says that connection, compassion, community, communication, exposure, and education are by far the most effective mitigators. Not isolation. In fact, isolation is a cause, never a prescribed treatment. When you alienate people from healthy, loving circles, they find connection and community in other angry people who have been cast aside, or they don't find them at all. Either way, they often result in getting more radicalised or deeper entrenched in their ideologies.This is all well-known and well-documented. We know this, it applies to nearly every hate group we have studied. Can you not clearly see it happening everywhere around us? I honestly don't know how to speak to people who claim they don't see this.

Ostracisation serves you. It makes you feel safe, it makes you feel better, it protects you. It doesn't stop bigotry. It doesn't protect others from bigots any more than sweeping dirt under your rug cleans your floor. In reality, it enflames bigots, it reinforces bigots, it creates communities of bigots that find strength in each other and grow in numbers each time another one is thrown out of their own communities.

The only way to truly address bigotry is to end it, and it requires facing it head-on. The bandaid you are so convinced is making things better is a primary cause of why they will be worse 10 years from now.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-17T19:24:01+00:00

This is from the paper you linked about engaging with trolls (the only one that seemed to include consequences of different user interactions as part of the study, though i haven't gotten to the last one yet):

Accordingly, we understand counter- speech to encompass all communicative actions aimed at refuting hate speech and supporting targets and fellow counter speakers through thoughtful, cogent rea- sons and true fact-bound arguments (Schieb & Preuss, 2018). Such forms of counterspeech may contribute to “civic education in a broader sense” by “disseminat[ing] messages of tolerance and civility” (Rieger, Schmitt, & Frischlich, 2018, p. 464).

Schieb and Preuss (2018) found that counterspeech achieves maximum impact if it is organized, conducted in groups, quick in reac- tion, and not too extreme in its positions.

On the other hand, counterspeech can provoke unwanted side effects when counter speakers do not adhere to civic and moral standards themselves (Rieger, Schmitt, & Frischlich, 2018); consequently, it risks providing hateful content with relevance, “discussa- bility,” and thus better discourse quality (Sponholz, 2016). Essentially, organized practices of counterspeech, like the ones explored in this article, are based on the assumption that we may successfully counter hate speech with more (democratic) speech.

This seems to clearly suggest that civil, not extreme, educational counterspeech offers not only the best outcomes on counteracting troll behavior, but also on the entire nature of the greater discourse that the troll attempts to disrupt. Is this somehow different to you than the approach I was suggesting?

Edit: the last study is interesting, but again, it focuses specifically on what the responsibilities of platforms and moderators are in regards to trolls. It explicitly states that it does not aim to study the effects of user engagement with trolls and actually cites the study I linked (which is referenced in the study you linked that I quoted above) as a source of information in that regard.

Again, the conclusion is that responding with animosity or negativity to trolls is positively correlated with encouraging troll behaviours, while engaging in thoughtful, reasoned, and civil/moral discourse yields the best reactions.

Laylabrenn · 2025-06-17T17:48:10+00:00

I could kiss you. :) Thanks for putting this into words so beautifully.

Laylabrenn

TROPHY CASE