Yeah, the trick then becomes, “At what percentage, with how many anecdotes, do I consider a community/instance Bad Faith Central?”

Like I said, getting 20+ downvotes and 0 upvotes followed by a ban for my “Huh, I never realized the potential racism connection between Winnie The Pooh -> yellow -> Asian before this conversation, but I still disagree that anyone who criticizes Xi Jinping or the CCP is racist” comments was a large red (heh) flag in my face that made me instantly block the community, but the other one (+6/-6 comment removed for “Electoralism” for saying attacking Kamala Harris for supporting the DSA is silly party purity cannibalism) is a tougher call.

There’s also the issue of insulating myself from differing viewpoints essentially creating my own echo chamber. As you indicated, for me Lemmy isn’t just Fun, it’s also a way for me to interact with and learn from different people around the world. I hadn’t met someone IRL who had anything positive to say about the CCP until I was well into being a grown man, for example. I do value hearing from those people because there is bound to be some truth to what they say, and it helps me grow as a person and think about my own government more critically.

But you’re right in that critical thinking is not necessarily Fun, and can be exhausting or even a waste of time in scenarios like I mentioned where by the 5th reply it was no longer about realizing that some people might be using Xinnie the Pooh to further racism but suddenly a tankie circle-jerk where I’m being dogpiled and accused of being a racist because I didn’t realize that previously, with a bit of Uighur Genocide denial as a cherry on top. I’d link the thread for the curious who want to read what was actually said, but given your own comments are deleted on Lemmy when a moderator deletes them, I can’t find it any more.