Could just be a consequence of a less ideologically diverse user base to start with.

I’m so upset about (privacy, reddit, corporatism, etc, etc) that I’m prepared to leave my large online social networks for a smaller space on principle is probably a bit of an outlier position to take.

Not that it’s wrong, but it’s probably something we all agree on. Something out there is so fucked up we refuse to be a part of it on principle, even if we don’t fully agree on what that is.

So...I'm guessing you haven't installed Linux yet?

If so, try Linux. We're not a cult or anything.

Looking at your post history, I'm just seeing that the down votes look average to me.

If that's what you're talking about, I wouldn't take down votes personally.

Often what people are down voting is bad news, not necessarily fake news or something they disagree with.

If that's not what you're talking about, then never mind.

I'm not sure. What does everybody else think?

Mute lemmygrad, hexbear, .ml and maybe blahaj and see if you still feel the same afterwards.

Lemmings have always been well-known for running in herds.

Depends on your instance. 

Where there's a herd, there's a say.

So.... everyone here is upvoting cat pics?

That's what I herd as well.

I'll tell you exactly why. As soon as I see what everyone else said.

If it's downvotes you're concerned about, I think the fact is that bad scoring aren't hidden by default like reddit which is why unpopular downvoted takes are more visible. People feel strongly here about their opinions but I wouldn't worry too much about the amount of downvotes in general so long as it's not because you're an asshole or troll.

Social media bubbles are present everywhere, the way the Fediverse is set up I think leads to stronger but smaller echo chambers, which I don't think is necessarily a bad thing because you choose what kind of group you want to be with and which other "bubbles" you will interact with based on how aligned your values are with other bubbles. You get the choice of what things you want to debate and discuss and what you don't.

Don’t understand the downvotes you get. I don’t think it’s Lemmy exclusive though. It’s just what the reddit like voting system promotes. Just hiding the score would make it a lot better i think.

Because it's an echo chamber. You have communities that are modded by a small group of people who can control narratives through censorship, the community is very hostile to any differing views from their own, and the existing communities are so devoid of internal criticism that they start to purity test each other, which leads to more extreme views and develops a herd mentality.

I don't have an answer for you, OP. I will say that Lemmy is the angriest social media platform I have ever been on. I have never seen so many angry people who will actually stalk people (across mulitple posts) they disagree with, as I have seen on Lemmy. I've seen people here advocate for murder and torture of people and/or politicians they don't agree with. It’s crazy!

No, you fight like a cow.

I think it's moderation. If you have a differing opinion from the mainstream (as in what the moderation team thinks), you'll get banned from the current community and any other community that mod is moderating. It's absolutely insane.

That quite obviously leads to a chilling effect where people aren't willing to discuss anything controversial freely, like their political stance, unless of course it's the one mods have.

I like piefed and Lemmy, but this is by far the worst place for any political discussion