Will Republicans leaving Facebook for Parler make things worse in America?
Asked by
JLeslie (
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November 8th, 2020
from iPhone
I see a lot of my Republican and Libertarian Facebook friends posting on Facebook to check out the Parler app. Parler is another social networking platform, but it isn’t deleting right wing and Alt-right lies. I became curious who owns it and so here is the Wikipedia for it https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parler. It’s privately held and founded by John Matze and Jared Thomson. I don’t know anything about them. I encourage you to read the Wikipedia. Near the top Wikipedia says, Parler has a significant user base of Trump supporters, conservatives, and Saudi nationalists. Posts on the website often contain far-right content,[10] antisemitism,[13][discuss] and conspiracy theories.[14]
Just before seeing all the posts telling Republicans to move to Parler, there was a wave of posts by Republicans saying Facebook should be broken up and the monopoly is bad. I told my friends Elizabeth Warren has that as part of her platform, of course they had no idea. Now, I see how clever it is to talk about breaking up Facebook and then bring Parler in afterwards seemingly unrelated, but I think it’s carefully planned.
Will Republicans defecting to Parler in place of Facebook mean the country gets even more divided? Truly no checks on what Republicans are being fed and less conversation between Republicans and Democrats in general to try to understand each other’s point of view.
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26 Answers
I think it will go the way of “Conservapedia”, which styled itself as a conservative value alternative to Wikipedia. Sidelined into a niche, populated by kooks, and beset by trolls.
Well I think overall, people moving away from Facebook to a variety of other sites is largely a good thing, as Facebook does have too much attention, and is overall pretty evil even if it does remove some nasty conversations.
I don’t see the notion of xenophobes moving to xenophobe-tolerant sites to be really a separate event that it makes sense to consider in terms of the OQ “is THIS making things worse in America?”, as I think it’s really about the xenophobes.
Clearly many of them are going there, others of them will go other places, and wherever they go, they’ll tend to stick to themselves and create warped xenophobic conversations. Those also will continue on Facebook. They may be annoyed by FB’s measures, but it doesn’t really stop them from having extremely xenophobic conversations there. I guess if many of them go to sites that let you share extremely awful stuff, there may be more of them sharing extremely awful stuff… eh yeah, I suppose you have a point: it probably will mean more of them will be soaking in more terrible messages, which yeah probably isn’t good.
(BTW FWIW Sodahead used to be a den of mostly hostile right-wing Americans. I used it for a while around 2008–2010, but got tired of being regularly told Obama was the antichrist and I was an evil commie if I didn’t agree with them. I just checked and learned it died in 2015.)
If Facebook is social media, is Parler anti-social media?
^^^^^^^^ I see what you did @filmfann ! ! ^^^^^^^^
I gave this a GQ as I was having the same thoughts after learning about Parler last night. I went to visit some friends who are Trump fans and they told me about Parler. I had never heard of it and so I came home and googled it. Then on FB, someone I follow for cleaning and organization tips wrote that she can now be found on Parler. There were many discussions on her page about politics, and a bunch of people were upset that she is supposed to be talking about cleaning and organization tips and instead she’s pushing politics.
After my friend told me about it last night, and explained what it is and how she likes it because they don’t censor your posts and fact-check, I was thinking how this is not good, because it’s going to be a whole bunch of misinformation shared.
This reminds me of how some Jellies ask questions on here and get upset when nobody agrees with them, and then they argue with all of the answers. In Parler, they can post whatever lies they believe, and everyone will encourage it. They’ll all believe it. They will become more enraged.
I wouldn’t be surprised if Trump opens up his own website for lies and joins Parler too. Anyplace he can get his messages out will suit him and his followers.
They already pretty much talk only to themselves. If moving off to Parler makes the echo chamber happier, go for it.
My guess is that within weeks it will be infiltrated by saboteurs, and someone will be doing the same sort of editorial management that takes place on Facebook.
If Facebook is social media, is Parler anti-social media?
And if antifa is anti-fascist…
Hey look, the very fine people at Parler made the news.
’“Marshall [Arkansas] Police Chief Lang Holland resigned Saturday afternoon, a day after urging violence against “traitors” who had attempted to prevent the reelection of President Donald Trump…
”...In one post, Holland declared: “Do not forget what these Marxist Democrat b* have tried to do. When you see one in public get in their face do not give them peace. Throw water on them at restaurants. Push them off sidewalks. Never let them forget they are traitors and have no right to live in this Republic after what they have done.””
“Another stated: “Death to all Marxist Democrats. Take no prisoners leave no survivors!!..”
”“I pray [Obama, Pelosi, Hillary Clinton] hang on the gallows and are drawn and quartered!!!!” he wrote. “Anything less is not acceptable.”
“Holland made the comments on Parler, a conservative alternative to Twitter that encourages its users to “speak freely and express yourself openly, without fear of being ‘deplatformed’ for your views.”
@Call_Me_Jay
Should I be surprised by that? Because I am not.
@ragingloli I was reluctant to post, because you summed it up in first comment.
@JLeslie ?? Yes. He is a user on Parler. Normal people do not tolerate unfiltered conservatives.
@Call_Me_Jay I was just wondering if he was one of the founders maybe, or had a significant role on the site besides just being a horrible person using the platform.
I just saw three more friends in the past hour post that they joined parler. I think it’s up to like 15 of my friends now. When I say friends, many of them are people I know in real life, but not in my close circle of friends. One is a very good friend in real life though. Let’s see what they think after using it for a while.
I was thinking if a bunch of Democrats joined the site I wonder if the conservatives would defect.
Its weird, my LEO friends and everyone is just posting it. ‘Find me at @parler.’ I’m out, nothing interesting about echo chambers.
@KNOWITALL Are your friends talking about leaving Fox News also? I just starting seeing that a few hours ago.
nothing interesting about echo chambers.
They didn’t use the words “echo” or “chamber”. Parler must be the home of independent centrist free speech!!
The lack of awareness would be funny if they could not vote.
@JLeslie Yes saw that one, too.
I have yet to post one item thats flagged or fact-checked, so it seems ridiculous to me. Quit sharing without researching, problem solved.
I’m in craft groups on FB where people are complaining about censorship and talking about going to Parler. It’s like they don’t comprehend that you have freedom of speech when you’re on a street corner or talking with your friends, or want to get up on a soapbox in front of a group, you can say whatever you want. “Biden sucks” or “Trump sucks” or whatever you want. However, when you’re on a website, you are subject to the rules of the website. If they want to take down your posts for whatever reason, they can and if you don’t like it, you can always leave. They can leave to Parler if they want to. I hope they enjoy it there, really I do.
@KNOWITALL I did notice some of my photos or links don’t post immediately the last few weeks, they go into review I guess, and then quickly are allowed. Not even necessarily political. I’ve never had a link or photo deleted that I know of. I was thinking that maybe this is happening a lot and Republicans are thinking EVRYTHING they post now is getting censored. Not sure though.
Republican or conservative nut jobs leaving any place for anywhere else should only be seen as a good thing.
Seems to me like Parler will just become another YouTube comment section, if it isn’t already. Most people won’t want to hang out there. When anything goes, trolls are indistinguishable from regular users. And then everyone ends up getting trolled.
Supposedly all the new users bogged down their server, so it wasn’t working properly earlier in the week. All the Rep reviews I’ve heard say it’s like Twitter for Reps. Some decided to go to MeWe or elsewhere, there’s several being thrown around social media.
All the Rep reviews I’ve heard say it’s like Twitter for Reps
Twitter deletes racist hate speech and death threats. I guess if that is normal conversation for your circles you might think it’s like Twitter.
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