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This was such a sad story - everything I read at the time said Dr Meza was a charitable, successful member of the community in LA (running coach, founded progra

This was such a sad story - everything I read at the time said Dr Meza was a charitable, successful member of the community in LA (running coach, founded programs towards Latino students, etc.). The LetsRun forum is such a wild place - it's a really strange mix of great running news discussion, 4-chan / bodybuilding.com conspiracy theories, and (IMO) a lot of teenage / college male runners who have a lot of angst, and something to prove because they are in an unpopular sport. Moderators/owners (rojo / pojo? or something) don't do anything / actively encourage this.

AdamJMarsh 5y ago
Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. I look back at my teenage years and realised how hazardous they are to mental health. My curiousity & engagement on those communities was limited to infrequent lurking. I now understand why alt-right/q anon movement popped up so quickly. A big issue with these boards is that the ownership can't overmod because these communities are a big drawcard, even if they're financial negatives.
- Ansil849 5y ago
  > Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. Yes, but so are Facebook and Twitter.
  - AdamJMarsh 5y ago
    Communities there can and have been super toxic yes. There is a difference though as those platforms have larger moderation resources though.
    - iamacyborg 5y ago
      I dunno, I just had a weird incident happen last week where a family member of mine received a ton of cyber bullying on Twitter because she’s an actress and has an unusual surname. When I reported stuff Twitter said it wasn’t against their policies.
  - Zerverus 5y ago
    Not communities.
  - ciphol 5y ago
    FB/Twitter are not one community, they are a million different communities that mostly don't see each other.
    - Ansil849 5y ago
      > FB/Twitter are not one community, they are a million different communities You can apply the same arbitrary granularity to bodybuilding.com (different subforums) and 4chan (different boards) too, and say 'such and such subforum isn't as toxic as these other ones...'. The point is that all four platforms spread and foster toxicity. And given that Twitter and Facebook are magnitudes bigger, they also do so much more than 4chan or bodybuiding.com.
      - ciphol 5y ago
        One person can click to see different subforums on those sites, and often does. One FB/Twitter, you can only see stuff posted by your friends, friends of friends, specific people whose names/usernames you know and have searched for, groups you have chosen to join, and ads they show you. The other 99.99% of content is invisible to you.
    - ungamed 5y ago
      Oh but when they do!
- coolso 5y ago
  > Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. There’s that word. The world is super “toxic”. The aforementioned sites allow people to speak freely, which can result in negativity, but they’re also bastions of freedom and creativity and everyone’s thoughts being equally visible. One can easily argue that that’s far less toxic than Reddit’s style of everyone being the church mom that silences and admonishes everyone that says something “problematic” or what the congregation considers unacceptable. Where’s the fun in that? There’s definitely a certain group of people who hate not being able to silence others, since if they can’t silence and censor their opponents, their arguments don’t really hold up.
  - hef19898 5y ago
    You freedom ends where my nose begins, or something like that. The freedom to voice your opinions, even unpopular ones, is good. It stops being good once it turns to online harassment, IMHO even before that. And by the way, just because there is no active moderation doesn't mean that every voice is equally heard. Or did any one on running.com listen what Dr. Meza had to say?
    - bluecalm 5y ago
      Man, Dr. Meza was an obvious chatear who refused to stop. He could have silenced it all by running with a GPS way before it snowballed to what you call harassment. He deserved to have his reputation ruined. You're just blaming victims (the ones cheated) for doing something about it. You can't have a world where the cheater keeps his profits from cheating and his victims are not hurt by it. It's not a positive sum game, something gotta give. Don't blame the victims.
      - hef19898 5y ago
        You know what's an easy way? Just don't let him compete anymore. Like what grown ups do. Amateur sports turned into cesspool.
        daniel-cussen 5y ago
- Lascaille 5y ago
  >Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. They're places that provide access to actual human beings though. So many other online communities - especially ones with wide readership - are astroturfed into oblivion. My take on it is that having to deal mentally with lunatics howling at the moon and screaming about the upcoming Great Replacement is the price you pay for access to actual opinions. That screaming horde is what keeps the astroturfers and consent manufacturers out.
  - newaccount74 5y ago
    > the price you pay for access to actual opinions But you only see opinions of people who are willing to tolerate the torrent of abusive posts. You won't see the opinions of the silent majority who see the stupid flamewars and decide they'll spend their time elsewhere.
    - bluecalm 5y ago
      Some 4chan forums are completely hopeless (/pol for example) but on others you can find a lot of interesting stuff. As a general rule: as long as it's not politics the discussion is often interesting but then again, it's the case about everywhere.
      - Lascaille 5y ago
        >on others you can find a lot of interesting stuff There's value to be gleaned from /pol/ if you can stand the lunatics. The skychan threads sometimes yield some interesting conjecture. 4chan is currently the best place for realtime ukraine war footage and analysis, in my opinion.
        s5300 5y ago
        > There's value to be gleaned from /pol/ if you can stand the lunatics. While I don’t particularly deny this > 4chan is currently the best place for realtime ukraine war footage and analysis Is most definitely a no. Oddly enough, Reddit seems to be the best for footage, with Telegram likely coming second. As for analysis, Twitter without a doubt. Is there a load of absolute horse shit? Of course. If you don’t know how to detour that, you shouldn’t care much in the first place. The only good thing that has come out of 4chan regarding this war is the cope cage. That is indeed hilarious.
- eternityforest 5y ago
  It's always fun to see someone use the word "chit" for shit, and think "Oh hey that copypasta leaked out of bodybuilding". These forums seem to collect the most problematic people from every political group and subculture, put them all together, and then teach them their own unique manosphere philosophy that is currently one of my least favorite things about all of mankind. It's some kind of primitivist thought combined with a screenshot of a Nietzsche quote about strength and power, some pretentious militant atheism, a bit of eugenics, a lot of intelligence-worshipping, and a heavy dose of still believing in cringe culture. Way bigger than just alt right, there seems to be a variant for every affiliation. It's almost mainstream.
quattrofan 5y ago
mgv11 5y ago
Yeah Letsrun forum is really infamous in the running communities. The main reason for it that anonymous comments are allowed.

AdamJMarsh 5y ago

Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. I look back at my teenage years and realised how hazardous they are to mental health. My curiousity & engagement on those communities was limited to infrequent lurking. I now understand why alt-right/q anon movement popped up so quickly. A big issue with these boards is that the ownership can't overmod because these communities are a big drawcard, even if they're financial negatives.

Ansil849 5y ago
> Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. Yes, but so are Facebook and Twitter.
- AdamJMarsh 5y ago
  Communities there can and have been super toxic yes. There is a difference though as those platforms have larger moderation resources though.
  - iamacyborg 5y ago
    I dunno, I just had a weird incident happen last week where a family member of mine received a ton of cyber bullying on Twitter because she’s an actress and has an unusual surname. When I reported stuff Twitter said it wasn’t against their policies.
- Zerverus 5y ago
  Not communities.
- ciphol 5y ago
  FB/Twitter are not one community, they are a million different communities that mostly don't see each other.
  - Ansil849 5y ago
    > FB/Twitter are not one community, they are a million different communities You can apply the same arbitrary granularity to bodybuilding.com (different subforums) and 4chan (different boards) too, and say 'such and such subforum isn't as toxic as these other ones...'. The point is that all four platforms spread and foster toxicity. And given that Twitter and Facebook are magnitudes bigger, they also do so much more than 4chan or bodybuiding.com.
    - ciphol 5y ago
      One person can click to see different subforums on those sites, and often does. One FB/Twitter, you can only see stuff posted by your friends, friends of friends, specific people whose names/usernames you know and have searched for, groups you have chosen to join, and ads they show you. The other 99.99% of content is invisible to you.
  - ungamed 5y ago
    Oh but when they do!
coolso 5y ago
> Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. There’s that word. The world is super “toxic”. The aforementioned sites allow people to speak freely, which can result in negativity, but they’re also bastions of freedom and creativity and everyone’s thoughts being equally visible. One can easily argue that that’s far less toxic than Reddit’s style of everyone being the church mom that silences and admonishes everyone that says something “problematic” or what the congregation considers unacceptable. Where’s the fun in that? There’s definitely a certain group of people who hate not being able to silence others, since if they can’t silence and censor their opponents, their arguments don’t really hold up.
- hef19898 5y ago
  You freedom ends where my nose begins, or something like that. The freedom to voice your opinions, even unpopular ones, is good. It stops being good once it turns to online harassment, IMHO even before that. And by the way, just because there is no active moderation doesn't mean that every voice is equally heard. Or did any one on running.com listen what Dr. Meza had to say?
  - bluecalm 5y ago
    Man, Dr. Meza was an obvious chatear who refused to stop. He could have silenced it all by running with a GPS way before it snowballed to what you call harassment. He deserved to have his reputation ruined. You're just blaming victims (the ones cheated) for doing something about it. You can't have a world where the cheater keeps his profits from cheating and his victims are not hurt by it. It's not a positive sum game, something gotta give. Don't blame the victims.
    - hef19898 5y ago
      You know what's an easy way? Just don't let him compete anymore. Like what grown ups do. Amateur sports turned into cesspool.
      - daniel-cussen 5y ago
Lascaille 5y ago
>Bodybuilding.com misc & 4chan are super toxic communities. They're places that provide access to actual human beings though. So many other online communities - especially ones with wide readership - are astroturfed into oblivion. My take on it is that having to deal mentally with lunatics howling at the moon and screaming about the upcoming Great Replacement is the price you pay for access to actual opinions. That screaming horde is what keeps the astroturfers and consent manufacturers out.
- newaccount74 5y ago
  > the price you pay for access to actual opinions But you only see opinions of people who are willing to tolerate the torrent of abusive posts. You won't see the opinions of the silent majority who see the stupid flamewars and decide they'll spend their time elsewhere.
  - bluecalm 5y ago
    Some 4chan forums are completely hopeless (/pol for example) but on others you can find a lot of interesting stuff. As a general rule: as long as it's not politics the discussion is often interesting but then again, it's the case about everywhere.
    - Lascaille 5y ago
      >on others you can find a lot of interesting stuff There's value to be gleaned from /pol/ if you can stand the lunatics. The skychan threads sometimes yield some interesting conjecture. 4chan is currently the best place for realtime ukraine war footage and analysis, in my opinion.
      - s5300 5y ago
        > There's value to be gleaned from /pol/ if you can stand the lunatics. While I don’t particularly deny this > 4chan is currently the best place for realtime ukraine war footage and analysis Is most definitely a no. Oddly enough, Reddit seems to be the best for footage, with Telegram likely coming second. As for analysis, Twitter without a doubt. Is there a load of absolute horse shit? Of course. If you don’t know how to detour that, you shouldn’t care much in the first place. The only good thing that has come out of 4chan regarding this war is the cope cage. That is indeed hilarious.
eternityforest 5y ago
It's always fun to see someone use the word "chit" for shit, and think "Oh hey that copypasta leaked out of bodybuilding". These forums seem to collect the most problematic people from every political group and subculture, put them all together, and then teach them their own unique manosphere philosophy that is currently one of my least favorite things about all of mankind. It's some kind of primitivist thought combined with a screenshot of a Nietzsche quote about strength and power, some pretentious militant atheism, a bit of eugenics, a lot of intelligence-worshipping, and a heavy dose of still believing in cringe culture. Way bigger than just alt right, there seems to be a variant for every affiliation. It's almost mainstream.

quattrofan 5y ago

mgv11 5y ago

Yeah Letsrun forum is really infamous in the running communities. The main reason for it that anonymous comments are allowed.