Just blocked lemmy.ml from my Lemmy account, and I swear to god it’s one of the best things I’ve ever done on this platform. My homepage feels actually clean now.
For the past few months I’d been seeing a lot of tankie posting and pretty much far-left propaganda on my feed. It got tiring enough that I finally checked my blocked-user list, and realized pretty much everyone I’d blocked was from lemmy.ml. So I just blocked the whole instance instead.
Saying this as someone who considers themselves a leftist: I used to think Lemmy itself was an echo chamber. Turns out lemmy.ml was the problem the entire time. Probably the reason I tolerated it for so long is that I agreed with a lot of what they posted, but like an oversaturated meme, I’d had enough. Browsing the platform was starting to feel way too tiring instead of fun, which defeats the point of being here in the first place.
The breaking point was seeing some dude post a “meme” implying North Korea and China are basically communist utopias and that the West sucks. I mean, the West does suck, but come on - you’re saying North Korea is the ideal the West should strive for? What the hell…
To anyone who wants to do a test - easily reversed in mere seconds - try blocking the Lemmy.ml instance, then visiting this exact OP and see if the comment section looks any different as a result. Heck, open it up in a second browser window (no need to log in even) showing the before and after, and as a challenge, try to count the number of differences.
I will give them a hint: it is zero. Users thus “blocked” in that manner can still post, reply, vote (brigade), and even send you DMs, which trigger notifications, which btw can last for WEEKS and WEEKS without ever stopping. Their own admins refuse to do anything about it, thus the situation will continue, unless counteracted by an equal opposing force.
Blocking an entire instance at once is literally impossible using standard Lemmy software (without getting into higher level complexities such as custom uBlock Origin filter settings), despite how it seems to be the #1 thing that people on Lemmy.ml tell others to do, it is impossible to actually enact.
PieFed can do it though. Which only helps so much since many people on lemmy.ml have alts on other instances, which I’ve seen many people proudly announce that it was done specifically to get around such blocks and recommending that others do likewise.