dealing with rage bait in the indie web
You probably remember rage bait from social media. Things posted just to upset others in a means of 'trolling' them and gain attention, engagement, notoriety, numbers. It's not even usually what the person really thinks, it's more a lie or turned up to true edgelord levels to get the desired effect.
A lot more content than that has been loosely labeled rage bait for a different, understandable reason: Even if the person tries to hide their true nature under some sort of disclaimers and professional way of writing, it still gets you upset. You are drawn in like it is bait to share it around for others to see that stupid thing, to rant in your group chats about it, or to even enter a public back-and-forth. You bite, and it is rage bait to you, even if it wasn't intended that way.
Now on social media, you'd likely report, block, whatever to get rid of it and get it out of your sight. You'll probably even see it when people share it around in rage already, or engage with it in the comments. It's a bit easier then to say "Well, it's taken care of. I've reported it and others do the job of arguing, I can disengage." and really do that. But on the smaller web, indie web, and whatever more niche circles that might not be the case. On their own blog, or website, there's no "Community Notes", no comments. It just stands there, unchallenged. When it's on a feed like Bearblog, you cannot block or hide it. That makes it harder to disengage.
Related: When I was still on another blogging platform that I later deleted, I actually made a really detailed post on how the small web can be used as a right wing recruiting ground. The post was split into two parts, and I cannot find the first part on any archive service. EDIT: Thanks to Liz Sugar messaging me her backup of my first part, I was able to restore the first part.
Here (Internet Archive Link) is the second part though. I still recommend reading it fully and think all of that holds true, even more so now that people continue to migrate from big social media sites elsewhere, and even those sites reduce their moderation, normalizing certain behaviors for the future.
Snippets from the post for easier reading:
- Bans and general dissatisfaction with big social media sites causes some people with hateful opinions to wander the web searching for a new place – and arriving here.
- Due to the small web having a smaller audience and being led by volunteers with their own busy lives, offensive content can remain up for a very long time or completely slip through. Report options might not always be available or accessible, or the person will not get banned. Their content can remain without a dialogue, without being refuted and engaged with, on their website, without consequence. This is an upgrade to them in comparison to being booted off from other sites and communities.
- Admins and mods of forums, blog spaces, status sites, and webrings might find it difficult to judge when to exclude or ban a person for views expressed outside of their spaces and within a personal website. There might be reluctance to do so for a fear of creating “echo chambers”, being unfair, or not “listening to both sides”, feeling like they need to let people who are racist, homophobic, transphobic or sexist stay for a supposed centrist and fair space.
- Web revival spaces, as seen in Neocities manifestos, are interested in things such as old web nostalgia, personal freedom, reclamation of the internet, and criticisms of big social media sites and companies. All of these things can easily be misappropriated to fit extremist worldviews.
- Nostalgia can be used as a vehicle to romanticize and idealize traditional and conservative views that feature thinly veiled or outright racism, sexism, homophobia and transphobia.
- Personal freedom and freedom of designing your own website without constraints can mean to them that these spaces should be a safe haven to host their offensive views and propaganda, since it is personal and their choice and freedom to do so.
- Reclamation of the internet to them can mean reclaiming it from “snowflakes” or “censorship” of big social media, of reclaiming it from “wokeness”; which is often code for people of color, LGBT people, and others they are uncomfortable with or bigoted about.
- They see themselves agreeing with the criticism about the established social media sites and big companies, but then continue on to connect it to “elites”, a “deep state”, or employ antisemitic conspiracy theories about Jewish people either in conversation or on their site.
- These views are often more hidden within their personal website, because they have learned it can get them banned, or people stop associating with them. They also don’t mention them when signing up for places that ask you to write a bit about yourself or what you plan to use it for. You might have to click through several menus and some warnings to access that part, or visit their external, but linked, social media (if they still have some).
And I think this is still something niche websites and forums or blogging services in the personal, smaller web are not well equipped to handle; the users even less so, because the usual blocking and reporting from the big social medias might not be an option.
So you have to deal with either outright rage bait or unsavoury content in the indie or small web. What do you do?
My personal plan nowadays looks like this, your mileage may vary:
- If it's already a title that says exactly what it's going to be and you know it's going to be enraging, don't click. It just ruins your day with no resolve. You can practice this right now on the Discover section for free.
- If you recognize a username and their stuff always pisses you off, don't click.
- Even if you want to reply, don't, at least not in the heat of the moment. My thought is usually: I don't want to litter that shit over my blog or give it more exposure, or I at least want to do it in a way that fits what I'm comfortable with on my blog, not getting me to rage publicly. I want it to be from a distance, calm, more knowledge-based, more-me focused than just planting a rant. The issue is that text that gets under your skin can quickly make you respond in a way that reveals way too much about you just to shoot back, and in the end it just harms you, not them; they're not changing their mind anyway. It also takes a lot more time to write and source claims to disprove something than it is to blurt bullshit out, so consider this cost and ask yourself if it’s worth it anyway.
- If you think it's genuinely vile, report. All the creator or hoster of the platform can say is No, so you don't lose anything. Well, I guess it can hurt when they don't remove things that are genuinely awful and may target parts of your identity or you, but then at least you know and can act accordingly.
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Published 11 Jan, 2025
I use indie web, small web, personalized web etc. usually interchangeably, even if people insist there is a difference; I just don't see it and it overlaps too much for me to really discern. Just think: These kind of spaces off of big social media, whether it is Bearblog, Microblog, Smolpub, Melonland Forum, 32Bit Cafe, Neocities, Nekoweb, your selfhosted site, etc. etc.