I kissed comment culture goodbye

I actually made plenty of friends commenting, in the early days of the Internet, but it wasn't just commenting. It was that a comment on a message board would lead to following them on LiveJournal, which would lead to AIM chats, which would lead to volunteer positions and real-life meetups and being invited to their weddings and a job referral to Google in the late-00s.

I've got plenty of friends now. Most are not the ones I met online; that was a phase of our life that has largely passed us by, though I keep up with a couple. I still comment on things, but it leads to more shallow relationships if any, but perhaps that's because I'm not really looking for friends anymore.

But I think that the bigger reason I'm reconsidering commenting online is: I can never be sure if the other person is real anymore. And even if they are, it often doesn't feel like they're debating in good faith. A lot of recent Reddit comment threads have really felt like I'm arguing with an AI or Russian troll farm. Social media now feels like a propaganda cesspool rather than something where people come together to share disparate views.

Wow, I enjoyed your comment deeply and it reminded me of 15+ years ago on the internet, where your experience really matched mine. I still am friends to this day with the people I met 15+ years ago. I haven't made an internet friend in over 10 years though.

I personally believe that part of this is due to the upvote/downvote culture of Reddit. We're all incentivized to say something that will attract upvotes. There's a positive side to this -- thanks to this I regularly read really funny, entertaining comments. Genuine genius in the comments section.

On the other hand, its just to entertain. There's nothing really human or of substance there. Or, what's especially dangerous, to say something that bucks the trend, the status quo, admit an unpopular vulnerability outloud and suddenly you're hit with waves upon waves of downvotes. Not only that but I genuinely believe that the downvotes empowers angry debaters to come in and pick apart whatever it is that you said, just to enjoy the upvotes. I perceive it as a kind of bullying.

At any rate, I don't think these spaces are designed for intimacy. They're designed for memes and funny jokes, not genuine conversations.