You two definitely make valid and interesting points. You should really debate this one out.

Yes, and this site has done that more and more over the last few years.

I'm not sure, I think some, radical, members already have a strongly formed opinion and come to vgchartz to argue their case, in an often poor way. The clickbait forum thread headlines on the main page will attract some.

That's certainly not what I was going for, and I hope I didn't give the wrong impression. I'd like to think the OP presents a continuum of sorts between two extreme points.

The last thing I want, as a moderator and a member, is to create a dichotomy between two different factions. This isn't about good versus bad or us versus the "other." It's about self-reflection. It's about thinking seriously about why we think the way we do, and why we treat others the way we do.

sorry i didn't mean that you are doing it but i do believe it is being used on a wider basis to cause divisions between groups of people

from there both sides can be manipulated until a desired outcome is achieved

my apologies for the confusion

for example, lets say hypothetically you fund a conflict between the west and the middle east, polarising both sides more and more ( bomb those filthy arabs! / death to america! ) and it progresses on and on and on until you reach some kind of synthesis with you at the top

or you fuel the flames of animosity between races 

or you fuel the flames of animosity between the sexes

or you fuel the flames of animosity between progressives and theists etc etc etc

you crack society up along several different topics and increase the separation until the pain of that separation forces the people to come together under tighter controls to ensure that the pain of separation does not happen again

Free access to information also means free access to disinformation. Whether forums such as these are radicalizing for any given individual depends on his or her abilities to valuate facts and opinions, not on the amount of trolls or genuinely radical posters. If anything, trolls aid those of higher intellect by exposing those who would rather jump to conclusions before considering the intent behind each post that they read and thereby use to shape their lesser opinion.

This of course also means that in the event that forums also radicalize the gaming population as a whole, then the forums themselves are not to blame. Doing so would be akin to blaming guns for warfare and mass shootings, when the truth is that both are just tools used by different people to express themselves.


As for the OP's second question: No, I am not one of those whose opinion has been radicalized from forum exposure.

I think if you take gaming seriously enough to join a forum, you are already a radical of some sort. And I think mixing with radicals of other platforms just makes things worse. This is why the best troll free forum to go to are platform exclusive forums.

Stop video game forum terrorism.