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this post was submitted on 22 Feb 2025
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Technology
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I’ve felt this. YouTube tried to radicalise me to the left ( Yes, I do realise the irony of saying this on this particular server, but it’s my story, and merits telling regardless), and I felt myself spiralling. I realised it, and cut off all of the algorithms. Now I use Freetube on the desktop, so that I only have the content I choose, and the fediverse as other social media.
Serious question: radicalize in what way?
I generally skip ALL propaganda videos longer than 10 seconds, no matter the orientation or product advertised. It's my BS detector from years of watching TV as a kid. (Only exception is when I want to see the latest trends in ad techniques, and analyze them).
I honestly wonder how does a radicalization process look like. 🤔
So, context: I’m still fairly young (right now in college), from Europe and fairly into politics (US and otherwise), this all happened when I was still in high school. On YouTube I watch primarily tech/educational content. And then the algorithm starts pushing TLDR news on me. That’s fine, those guys are generally ok and their sources are reliable. Besides, I already have plenty of European news sources and want to catch up to the US. Then slowly new channels were introduced. At first confirming my beliefs, how healthcare is terrible et. all(in the US). Then it started planting small lies, like how there are “only two federal holidays”(it took me a while, even after quitting to dismiss this as a lie and actually checking my sources), and it started escalating, trying to push me left and towards more radical solutions. I’m not yet sure exactly when or how, but at some point I smelled bull crap and realised I was being messed up with. At which point I quit and started curing my own feed.
Interesting. Sounds like it saw you watch "TLDR" content, and binned you with the "I want simple answers, here and now" cohort, a prime target for manipulation videos. Probably could have pushed you in any direction you seemed inclined to follow.