What do you think Lemmy is most biased about? Which opinions do you think differ most from the general internet?
(Excluding US politics, due to community rules)
Commonly mentioned biases:
| Subject | Mentions |
|---|---|
| Pro-Privacy | 2 |
| Left-Wing | 9 |
| Anti-Capitalism | 5 |
| American | 5 |
| Older | 2 |
| Pro-Linux | 3 |
| Tech people | 5 |
| Anti-Ai | 4 |
| Pro-LBTQ+ | 3 |
| Anti religion | 3 |
| Pro-Communism | 3 |
Bonus: Gaming Biases
| Subject | Mentions |
|---|---|
| Nintendo hate | 3 |
| Pro-SteamDeck | 1 |
| Anti-GOG | 1 |
| PC over console | 1 |
I’ll go first.
- I think there is a strong pro-Linux bias. It wouldn’t surprise me if 40+% use it on here.
- People from the US seem over-represented, but less so compared to Reddit
- There is a far stronger anti-capitalist sentiment on here than other social media
- The average age seems to be much higher. I joined when I was 16 and feel quite young unlike on other social media.
I’ll add:
- AI bad
- Piracy ok
- Political posts are more frequent (Bias towards political expression)
- More tech enthusiasts
- Piracy ok
I’m not sure how true that is for the largest instance (lemmy.world) but apart from that it seems quite on point
I agree that the average age is higher. You’re the only other confirmed teenager that I have encountered while on Lemmy. I joined Lemmy when I was 17 during the Reddit emmigration.
Fuck Reddit and Fuck Spez.
Lemmy prefers Star Trek over Star Wars.
I’m a both-sides-kind-of-guy on this issue
As an avid fan of both since I was a kid, I don’t think these two are really at odds with each other.
You’re paraphrasing “Only Sith deals in absolutes” and you’re showing your bias. 😀
Unfortunately it’s just harder to be a Star Wars fan since Disney bought it.
As opposed to the easy time to be a fan, like during the “Meesa propose…” speech.
Or when George Lucas couldn’t keep his grubby mitts off the movies and kept shoving stupid crap into them. Yeah. It’s always been hard.
Unfortunately it’s just harder to be a Star Wars fan since Disney bought it.
Paramount is trying very hard to create the same difficulty to love Star Trek with their Section 31 movie.
I’m more a The Expanse type of person
I’m more a The Expanse type of person
So say we all! Oh wait, that’s a different one too…
I like both, the new series they’re doing in wars have been great
But what about Star Gate?
Touché! I would argue 'Gate has better representation on Lemmy than 'Wars. “Would you not agree, Daniel Jackson?” /Teal’c
Lemmy is not neurotypical and it shows up with various discussions. Discussions here tend to assume autism or AuDHD as typical behavior, when it is only typical for the group of people assembled here.
Also half of all lemmings are transgender. No idea why.
Clearly a severe leftist bias. Not just in the context of US politics.
It’s not a bias if you’re right
World == USA
Incredible US bias here to the point where many discussions completely ignore the existence of the rest of the world.
Lemmy is actually worse than reddit here. The only network that at least tries to be cosmopolitan is Mastodon and that’s why it just feels so much healthier there.
I mentioned how HDDs could be broken down fpr secure data erasure and then trashed (read recycled).
Lemmy user immediately read and assumed “landfill”.
Well…There are countries in the world that don’t have massive landfills (we in Germany replaced those with coal mine pits :p)Yeah. I’ve had several discussions talking about what happens in other countries and someone starts complaining about how it is typical American behavior.
IMHO Lemmy feels similar to how Reddit felt 10-15 years ago. The community seems closer to my age. The population is smaller. The content is less formulaic.
The biases shown here feel like a distillation of the broader internet (similar to what Reddit used to be). We like animals and nature, we hate intrusive powerful forces like large corporations or invasive governments. We share a shit-post-y sense of humor. We tend to lean left politically. We love to feel like we know more than we actually do.
On any given subject, if you ask “What would the internet think about this?” you will probably find that same opinion reflected strongly here.
The community seems closer to my age.
I feel like the community is split between 25~40s and pre-teens, lol
Though to be fair, it feels like a 70:30 split.
There are a lot of Reddit refugees here. Many came over because Reddit sucks. Others came during the API debacle. Some seem to have come here because they were banned from Reddit due to not really knowing how to follow the social rules of the internet.
The AskLemmy Community, for example, will have posts like this next to each other (if you sort by New):
What’s the biggest issue you’ve seen when someone tried to shift to Linux?
Why do older people say im mature for my age but my friends still say things like hey buddy/pal??
It just struck me from the comments on this thread, but I think there’s a correlation between the feeling of reddit 10-15 years ago and the average age here.
If we go by the estimates that most people are 25-45 around here, that’s all of us that were probably hanging out on early reddit 10-15 years ago. Like, I joined reddit when I was about 17, I’m 33 now and moved here a year ago and definitely feel those early reddit vibes. It feels similar because that was us. Am I talking crazy?
Nah, you are speaking sense. I think Lemmy was really pitched as a Reddit alternative (or at least that was my experience)and it makes sense that the first flood of people who got excited about that are people who miss how Reddit used to feel.
This probably sounds like a dodge of an answer, but…
It depends on the Lemmy instance. Some are anarchistic, some are very left wing anti-establishment, some are hardcore tankies, and I’ve heard somewhere there’s a right-wing instance? Some hate certain technologies, some love those technologies, etc.
I don’t think it’s realistic to lump all Lemmy instances (and users) together under a single ideological umbrella. That’s like lumping everyone from America or any other county together for their opinions.
.world is the right wing instance
I’m on .world, and I’d happily throw all the billionaires into an industrial shredder.
Samesies!
Let the record note that Scott_of_the_Artic is an outlier and a comrade yet remains statistically a minority
You and me Scott! We’ll take on the .world!
This brings up another facet: when it comes to ideological biases it’s all subjective.
I consider lemmy.world slightly left of center overall, but again with important caveats that some communities within it are pretty left wing and some are pretty right wing. But maybe to someone pretty far on the left of the political spectrum the instance seems very right wing, while to someone pretty far to the right it seems like almost everyone are ‘rabid pinko commies’.
Basically, things are more complicated than they may look.
I just joined Lemmy and then I discoverd what .ml is. Now I don’t care about instances anymore
Wrong, because of what words mean and the context implied by the .world domain itself
What implication is that?
That it shouldn’t be US or any other nation defaultism, putting the left/right argument squarely in the realm of the relatively objective socialist/capitalist economic scale.
I think youre reading way too much into what tried to be an inclusive name.
Or I’ve read the instance info and framing references beyond my personal status don’t scare me.
Not particularly surprised that Americans are defensive about .world not being their personal property that must conform to their worldview though.
We certainly do have our fair share of Zionist scumbags.
I’ve been on .world for over a year now and haven’t really seen anything I’d call blatantly right-wing. But if this is right wing and the rest of lemmy is even more leftist, I’ll gladly join the rest of yas elsewhere.
All capitalism is bad, and any attempt to rein it in is failure before any attempts.
I’ve seen people advocate for communism here and asked them to name an example of a communist government of a major country that hasn’t devolved quickly into a dictatorship, and let me tell you, the hysteria and rage could power a small city. I’m fairly progressive, I like to think, but it seems like a lot of lemmings have gone so far down the anti-capitalist rabbit hole they’ve literally come out the other side in China and are wearing Mao stickers.
an example of a communist government of a major country that hasn’t devolved quickly into a dictatorship
I’m not feeling rage or hysteria, but I find a number of issues with this “test” that could easily cause frustration with anyone who has major criticisms of capitalism. My response is long not because of some irrational anger, but because things are complex and nuanced.
You consider yourself to be “fairly progressive”? I’m going to give you an analogy. It’s not great, but it hits on a few major issues relevant to your “test”. Imagine a MAGA fan asked you in 2026 to “name a thriving woke government agency” or “a government agency that still advocates for DEI” to make a point about your ideals. How does that sound to you?
First, you’d like argue that the term “woke” and “DEI” means different things to different people. That the term has been transformed into some deranged negatively charged approximation used as almost a slur colloquially. The same is true for “communist/ism” and “socialist/ism”. The current US “powers that be” have taken ownership of terms originally used by progressives. Woke was an “eyes open” state of awareness of the systemic racism baked into society. Now it is often considered “naively believing that forced equality makes things better”. DEI was an attempt to correct these systemic issues by encouraging or even enforcing diversity in groups of people who make decisions and influence decisions. Now it, and I’d argue “Affirmative Action” as well, is starting to mean a movement to “give power/opportunity to people because they are minorities whether or not they are sufficiently qualified”. Understand, I’m not in agreement with the transformation of these terms or the sentiment of the new “meanings” but I see them being used in the US in this manner more often. This makes every conversation confusing if you want to have a legitimate discussion of the ideas. It doesn’t help that the terms socialism and communism were never concrete terms to begin with.
Second, you’d be aware that there is literally a powerful force actively attempting to purge the original concepts of “woke” and “DEI” from government agencies. The current administration is working very hard to sabotage any agencies that recognize inequality or try to diversify. The administration has likely broken the law in its efforts to oust any agency leadership who promote these concepts. The administration wants to make the lives of any workers who agree with those concepts very difficult. Any agencies that are based on those core concepts are being spun down or turned into shells that somehow still have a name that implies they haven’t changed but in reality their leadership is working to ensure that the agency now serves the opposite function.
That’s what it is like being openly socialist or communist in today’s world. Everything bad is “socialist” or “communist” - it has been since the revolution in Russia. People have a knee jerk reaction on hearing those words. It’s strongly associated with North Korea, Stalin, and the CCP. Endless stories of violent authoritarianism, surveillance states, and the suppression of free speech. Tons of media - Animal Farm, 1984. As an aside, consider the violent suppression of climate or pro Palestine protesters, or the use of surveillance technology to spy on citizens… in capitalist nations.
Back to my point - if you are advocating for socialism, the West will work diligently to prop up existing capitalist leadership to prevent your success, possibly even help them rig elections. Propaganda will be spread among your population. If you manage to get elected, expect to be labeled extremist or even terrorist. Expect embargos, sanctions, and other economic warfare. Expect actual terrorists funded by the West to attempt to sabotage your nation. Expect or attempt to perform coups. Lobbyists would be throwing money you desperately need at your nation if it would just capitulate. Yes, even citizens might work against you because they are quite wealthy and powerful and your going to upset that. Or maybe honest citizens who’ve heard capitalism is great and socialism is bad and they don’t want to live in a bad nation. What’s the most effect method to survive a situation like that? You are under siege, paranoid, distrustful, woefully outmatched. Use your authority to defend your ideals and your hold on the government, sell out and become corrupt, or get squeezed out by a political opponent (or ally, trust noone) that is working for and funded by the West looking to restore their influence over your nation. Now you have a dictatorship.
You made a lot of assumptions about me in your comment. I’m not going to bother with them, because that’s honestly your job to handle.
I don’t equate communism with (democratic) socialism. I consider myself a democratic socialist, and that’s part of the reason I consider myself progressive. The main difference is that democratic socialism makes room for multiple political parties, while communism accommodates only one. This is the essence of tyranny. No progressive should advocate for communism, because communism is another form of authoritarianism: subjugation to state rule.
I have my problems with “woke” culture, just as I do with conservative culture. But most of my problems with woke culture have to do with their rhetoric and means of achieving their goals, rather than the goals themselves. A racially mixed workplace is something I highly value; achieving it by means of affirmative action is not something I support, because I think 50+ years of it have shown that it doesn’t really work. Yes, it has been shown to improve interracial relations in the workplace, but it has also been shown to cause workers to question the competency of coworkers that benefit from it, and make those who don’t feel discriminated against. This is not what it was intended for. It was supposed to counter inherent racist biases in corporate hiring systems. Instead, it’s become a system that is the very least viewed as a loophole for non-white employees. Obviously, not every case is an example of a non-white employee gaining an unfair advantage over a white employee, probably only a small fraction qualify as such, but as a system it has created the perception that Whites are being discriminated against. And its proponents have done virtually nothing to address that. That needs to change. I’m not saying the spirit of affirmative action needs to end, but its implementation need to change.
If and when you respond, I would encourage you to not make assumptions about my stance. I don’t fit into the political boxes neatly.
Don’t pay attention to the trolls from .ml and hexbear.
Thinking we’re better than everyone who’s still on Reddit
It’s not bias if you’re right
Reddit is full of Russian fuck bots arguing over which chump to pull one over. I don’t think it’s a high bar.
I haven’t seen much Zionist propaganda here (unlike major subreddits, for example) and, when it is posted, it’s e-boo’d with downvotes. 👍
Already mentioned was the pro Linux and everything else sucks. Also, the Nintendo hate.
What I haven’t seen is the high acceptance/love of furry content. I didn’t know people could draw animals that hot. Not that it awakened anything in me.
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I see a lot of disestablishmentarism
Not a whole lot of antidisestablishmentarianism though.
Holy shit, what aren’t? It would be a shorter list.
From what I’ve seen Lemmy is pro-EU, pro-privacy, pro-Linux, very left-leaning, anti-capitalism, and strongly anti-AI.
Most folks here seem to lean to a moderate left also, Conservatives are apparently grouped in with Republicans an MAGA.
While it’s nice to see the community grow there really isn’t any diversity, for lack of a better word, in the political discussions made here.
Good
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Apparently grouped…no, they are one in the same. what notmal group drives massive trucks and ships in rednecks to take over a city and harass them…
what group only spouts shit about how much Canada sucks and uses nonstop slogans to ‘win votes’…
Conservatives. your precious little pp that couldn’t even win his own riding and had to move to miji Texas where the other Maga sporting weirdos live.
there’s many MANY reasons why they are all one in the same but your head is so far up the ass of propaganda that you can’t even think straight. you’re a useless moderator who I bet bans people when you disagree who have never even once posted in your little gun club. you’re useless
Apparently grouped…no, they are one in the same. what notmal group drives massive trucks and ships in rednecks to take over a city and harass them…
Hate to break it to you, nothing about politics is ”normal”.
The same argument can be made against the liberal government, they’re controlling people’s speech and when people don’t agree they get nothing but hate spouted at them.
what group only spouts shit about how much Canada sucks
If you can site sources that would be great, not once have I heard any of Canada’s political parties say they hate Canada.
and uses nonstop slogans to ‘win votes’…
You’re kidding right? Every politician does this, it doesn’t matter if it’s left or right they all do it.
there’s many MANY reasons why they are all one in the same but your head is so far up the ass of propaganda that you can’t even think straight. you’re a useless moderator who I bet bans people when you disagree who have never even once posted in your little gun club. you’re useless
Not once have I insulted you, nor disrespected you so I don’t understand why all the anger. My hobby is directly affected by the current government’s political standings and I’m doing my part to educate folks who not once seen, heard or held a firearm in this country.
If you want to talk about brainwashing take a close look at PolySeSouvient claiming law abiding firearms owners are the reason for the uptick in firearm related crime, not criminals, people who apply to the RCMP and get approved for firearms licenses are apparently the problem.
If you haven’t noticed by now, Trudeau has banned a lot of firearms but yet firearm related crime is still rising, coincidence?
