I must have missed it, but at some point Slashdot became the Democratic Underground. The absolute hate, bile, and the conspiracy theories found on this discussion thread really make me sad. Some of these people have some real issues, and I hope they are able to come to grips with them. I hope those on the Left see this as an opportunity instead of continuing their descent into idiocy and lunacy. It appears that some already are. I just hope the rest of the Left joins them.
I used to be a big reader of Slashdot, and even posted messages a few times. I came for the technology news, but inevitably, politics would get injected into almost every discussion. The readers of Slashdot appear to be overwhelmingly liberal, which I partially attribute to the large foreign audience. Put that together with the site’s discussion moderation system, and leftist messages seem to quickly float to the top and get more points. At some point, I just stopped getting any enjoyment from reading through the comments at Slashdot. It wasn’t, and still isn’t, worth the effort to try and sift through all of that garbage in the hope of finding a few truly insightful opinion. I hadn’t really thought about it until just now when I visited Slashdot and found this comment thread, but I’ve been visiting that site a lot less often the last few months. And you know what? I don’t miss it. Not one bit.
I’m all for open discussion of issues – I think that’s healthy and necessary. Unfortunately, while I believe this is the aim of Slashdot, it is far from reality. Go into a dicussion and say that you’re a supporter of President Bush, an Evangelical Christian, or that you don’t believe in global warming. Or, if you dare, say you like Microsoft or Walmart. You will quickly get a taste of the overwhelmingly one-sided slant to all of these topics. A good environment for rants, yes. A good environment for rational dicussion, no.
Good-bye Slashdot. I just can’t take the noise anymore.