We had the “AI chatbot” mental illness link the other day, what’s next, people using apps to bet on sports are poorer?
WatDabney@lemmy.dbzer0.com 6 days ago
I’m reasonably certain that it would be much more accurate to say that people who are prone to depression, paranoia, suicidal thoughts, self-injury and digital self-harm are more likely to use the dark web.
Broadly, this isn’t the first time that it’s struck me that pedantic moralizing often relies on reversing cause and effect…
Valmond@lemmy.world 6 days ago
U@piefed.social 4 days ago
You eloquently expressed my thoughts. But I find the second part of your comment particularly insightful. It strikes a deeper chord worth what might motivate that reversal.
WatDabney@lemmy.dbzer0.com 4 days ago
It’s a thing I hadn’t really thought about before, but as I was writing that, I was thinking how many times I’d written similar things in the past - about heavy metal music, comic books, dungeons and dragons, violent video games…
And it struck me that that was too consistent to be coincidental - that there had to be some basic failure at work there.
And thinking sbout it more - it’s at least broadly the same dynamic as the endless loop of class- and race-based bigotry. Systems are established by which members of a particular class or race (or ethnic group or gender or sexual persuasion or…) are disadvantaged - poorer nutrition, less stable housing, poorer education, fewer opportunities, etc. - then point to the ignorance, frustration and antisocial tendencies that triggers as nominal evidence of their inherent inferiority, by which they’re rightly denied equal treatment.
I’m willing to bet that there’s a significant body of work out there on this topic
iloveDigit@piefed.social 6 days ago
I would say it’s more like, yeah of course when a “silent majority” forces a tiny percentage of people to rely on obscure tools to fight constant attacks on their right to free speech, that tiny percentage might be struggling more than the group attacking for fun
Randomgal@lemmy.ca 5 days ago
You mean buy drugs and tickets to Epstein Island? Because that’s what the Dark Web is used for.
iloveDigit@piefed.social 5 days ago
When you’re targeted enough, you use it for regular email and stuff. Not sure if you get that. There are probably people who use piefed through tor
swelter_spark@reddthat.com 4 days ago
I use Lemmy through tor. And everything else
Cracks_InTheWalls@sh.itjust.works 4 days ago
It’s also used for anonymous communication where there’s significant privacy concerns, there’s several news organizations that have a dark web presence for sharing sensitive information.
But yeah, there’s a lot of that other stuff going on as well.