The internet is neutral.
Corporate social media is definitely toxic.
Can be, but is not inherently.
The algorithms are toxic. Negativity gets more engagement so the algorithms push that content more.
This is too simple, groups of people radicalizing themselves is a very well known phenomenom, it has existed since humans started forming groups.
A good example are the terrorist groups during the cold war, Baader-Meinhof, Japanese Red Army and similar.
The groups may start as a group to work towards a new political system through peaceful means, then someone starts an informal competition about who is the “best” and more “pure” member, starting to subtly put other member’s down for not doing as much as they are.
Then it becomes a feedback loop, and soon you have a group that condems their own initial goals as counter revolutionary, and constantly moving the goalposts.
The algorithm itself doesn’t introduce this behaviour, but turbo chargers it by making people self radicalize mich faster by showing them an endless stream of people telling them how to be even “better” and even more “pure”.
I don’t. They’re just tools.
Toxic people are toxic, and they’ll still be toxic in different settings where they are interacting with other people.
Yes, but social media promotes things toxic people say because it generates revenue. They are part of the problem.
Lemmy and Mastodon are social media as well, and they are not profit driven. Non-social media like newspapers and cable TV also spread toxic content.
In the end, you got the causality reversed. Media (both social and non-social) gravitates towards what drives the most engagement. Negative/toxic content drives the most engagement because that content elicits a strong emotional response in the consumer.
Media amplifies the problem, but ultimately the problem is people. Toxic content is going to stick around until people stop giving it attention, and unfortunately in all of the history of humanity we have yet to figure out how.
The internet is fine, it’s social media and the people using it that are toxic (aided by algorithms pushing people to give their own worst for all sorts of reasons)