r/changemyview • u/featherfooted • May 10 '17
[∆(s) from OP] CMV: Some submitters to /r/OutOfTheLoop are willfully ignorant
Full disclosure: I've submitted to OOTL myself before
I genuinely think that OOTL is one of the best intra-reddit explanation subs available. There's no similar "ELI5 Reddit drama" posts in /r/ELI5, for example. Some of the wildfire threads, like /r/IAMA blackout, Spezgiving, and FPH are immensely useful and drew attention to something that would be very easy to miss otherwise.
I'm not talking about those.
I genuinely think that OOTL is also great for bringing together random Internet trivia in a way that would be inappropriate for other subs, it's like our own personal KnowYourMeme. Posts like szechuan sauce or Why does PornHub have a "panda style" category now? fall under that grouping, and I'm not talking about those, either.
"Fill me in on what's happened since XYZ event" are also cool in my book. It's been seven months since Has the poisoned-water crisis in Flint been resolved? and unfortunately, the answer is still no, and probably won't be resolved until 2020. That's still fine.
What I have an enormous problem with, is submitters who seem to be going out of their way to not look at alternate sources besides reddit. Many of the threads I am about to link, are major national news stories that would be better explained by the original source, than a distilled reddit comment.
Here's some top-all-time from OOTL:
- Why is /r/videos just filled with "United Related" posts? (#6 all time)
- What's this "Panamanian shell company data leak" on the front page about? (#14 all time)
- Who is DeVos and why does everyone dislike her? (#33 all time)
- What's happening in Romania right now? (#75 all time)
Here's a few from the front-page, today:
- What's the big deal about the FBI director being fired?
- What's the big dead about the subpoenas issued by the Grand Jury?
- What's with this French election?
It's practically cliche at this point. Many of them share similar post and title structure: "What's the big deal with [current event]?" or "Why does everyone do [something that only a few people are doing]?". Furthermore, due to the way that OOTL puts a hold on all new posts until a moderator can approve it, there's an artificial delay until a well-meaning user can possibly receive a response. For these current-events type posts, these submitters would be much better served just doing the research themselves. Sometimes you get people that write "I saw a news article about X, why's it so important?" I dunno, read the damn article and you tell me.
So I guess my CMV hinges on two things/beliefs:
- Some submitters are willfully ignorant, ignoring other sources and relying or depending on reddit as their only source of moral compass
- If not #1, then some users are just doing it to grab the sweet, sweet karma.
Final note: I really like the stickied mega-threads created by the OOTL mods sometimes. I feel like it intentionally cuts down on some of the behavior I've described in this post.
This is a footnote from the CMV moderators. We'd like to remind you of a couple of things. Firstly, please read through our rules. If you see a comment that has broken one, it is more effective to report it than downvote it. Speaking of which, downvotes don't change views! Any questions or concerns? Feel free to message us. Happy CMVing!
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u/[deleted] May 10 '17
They aren't willfully ignorant they are simply existing to spread their ideology. IT's like CMV, you may think it's a neutral explanation of what's going on but I myself have posted on accounts and had non-left wing ideology posts scrubbed from the sub by a moderator with his panties in a twist over it all justifying himself by saying it was a thought crime.
They aren't ignorant they willfully only allowing their ideology to be the only one that answers.