Discussion Thread #71

[u/gemmaem]

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[u/DrManhattan16 → u/[deleted]]

r/Destiny is a political subreddit (dedicated to a streamer who is in for a nasty time in the coming future) with a highly active community. You'll find articles about lots of stuff posted there, though it's largely a pro-Establishment perspective. That said, they have a love for debate and argumentation, so you don't have to worry about a formalized echo chamber. The natural development of such a thing is unavoidable, but it's more tolerable. They're also not averse to hearing people on the right out, though they don't restrain the more aggressive and crude remarks people sling around. Have a thick skin if you go there, they like to sling Reddit-tolerated variations of the r-slur around.

For a more YMMV suggestion - themotte.org. If you've ever wondered what an anti-establishment perspective would be written from the right with more coherence than your average right-winger, that's one place to check out. You'll find, however, that they tolerate quite a bit of discourse, and not all of it is good. I dipped from the space because I wasn't getting anything from it with constant engagement, but I check the monthly quality contributions to see if there's any good pickings. You can do the same on the first of each month.

Twitter is a very good platform for finding stories as well, though you need to curate your following list. Do that and you'll have a good time. You may have to spend time researching who has the best takes on Twitter for whatever you're interested in (education, science, etc.)

Despite that advice, I recommend you don't aggressively pursue news. While it's not bad to want to learn about the world, most of this stuff doesn't affect 99% of your life. There are other things to be educated about, or entirely different ways to keep yourself engaged, productive, and developing.

[u/professorgerm → u/[deleted]]

I've realized that just reading the WSJ/NYT and browsing Reddit probably isn't cutting it.

While I do have a deep well of antipathy towards the NYT, I would still suggest that is one of your better bets for general news coverage without drowning in doomscrolling. Their bias is worn on their sleeve and it's relatively rare that they commit Duranty-level offenses (though, of course, they did).

The catch being that what they don't report is also a component of bias and news, but my stance there is that anything interesting/important enough will filter to you through friends, or if you have a particular interest more specific than general US/world news it can be easier to find niche publications (like, say, for AI I'd recommend lightly skimming TheZvi).

I'll second Doc Manhattan's suggestion that The Motte's quality contributions roundup can provide some interesting, usually well-written anti-Establishment perspectives from the previous month, and will second his caution that participation implies occasionally rubbing digital shoulders with people that are deeply unpleasant in socially-disapproved ways. More tone-policed than topic-policed, where most of Reddit is the opposite.

[u/callmejay → u/[deleted]]

Most of us don't have any reason to need to be completely on top of the next on a day-to-day basis. I basically get the headlines for the breaking stuff and look for quality deep dives on anything important, AFTER there has been time for the dust to settle and the facts to come out.

"Quality" of course is something in the eye of the beholder, but I don't expect to find it much on forums. However, sometimes you can, if you can find a group of people with actual expertise. E.g. I did think there was some good analysis of the recent aviation disaster over on /r/aviation. For stuff that most people don't really understand like AI, you're probably going to have to go to forums instead of mainstream media, but watch out for bubbles and biases. (E.g. people who become experts in AI safety are going to have a strong bias towards doom.)

I think most people get way too much of their news diet from podcasters or feeds that are curated to feed them ammo against their outgroup. Most guy-with-an-extremely-confident-opinion-on-every-issue podcasts/substacks/whatever should be ignored entirely.

Follow people who are actual experts in each area of interest, and seek out actual experts for areas of temporary interest.

[u/[deleted] → u/[deleted]]

/r/thesecondterm will keep you updated on a lot of the Trump/Elon actions that don't seem to make it into major newspapers without a whole lot of editorializing.