I totally understand the reasoning behind thinking it’s state actors or certain members being shills–But there’s not much to gain for governments to shill in niche, extremist communities. Why shill your loyal followers when they parrot everything already? Instead, it’s much more effective to use large, mainstream social media websites, like Twitter, Reddit or Facebook, just check out anything politically trending to see the shills and contrast them with these users.
It is true, these small communities do swallow up state propaganda without much thought, but they aren’t shills. Most are just lonely people who hate everything and themselves.
I think it’s fairly important to remember that Hexbear/Lemmygrad are basically why Lemmy exists, and largely emigrated after the Reddit Chapo ban, at least as far as I understand things.
They weren’t entirely niche communities at first, and now they’re the most active communities on Lemmy, which may or may not grow into something bigger, but most importantly they’ve inherited the damage the used to have.
I mean, have you ever listened to ChapoTrapHouse? They were pretty solidly democratic socialist. Something happened to that community to turn it into Hexbear. It could have been natural, but their messaging is just so consistent it seems unlikely.
They never looked dem soc to me as they advocated liberally for the venezuelan militia to murder venezuelans protesting the socialist dictatorship and parroted Venezuela’s government party line to anyone that cared to listen
Was never a big fan of the dirtbag left angle, so I’m afraid I’ll have to take your word for it.
