The mute feature. Does it fix anything?

Some of you may not even know there is a mute feature on steemit. It doesn't really do much other than make it so you stop seeing posts, comments, replies, etc from a specific user. It is like putting a filter in your eyes that to YOU makes that person cease to exist as far as you are concerned.

If you were choosing to mute them due to bad behavior of theirs it will make you stop seeing what you are considering bad behavior. It will also make it so you never see if they have a realization and change their ways.

In fact it won't do anything to really change anything other than what you personally see.

I've used mute on a very few occasions. In all of those occasions it was apparent the person had an attraction for belittling, ad hominem attacks, name calling, trolling, etc. I'd try to reason with them on that first. If that failed I muted them. I realized I didn't actually change anything other than the temptation seeing their writing would inspire in me to be tempted to respond to them. That is one of the only activities I consider a waste of my time. Responding to people that have no interest in what I say and only want to call people names, troll them, or get belligerent with anyone who disagrees with them.

Now having stated that I want you to consider that some people use the mute for anyone they disagree with. I've actually been muted by someone on steemit that I like simply because I disagreed with something he was commenting on my post. I didn't disagree really, it is just what he was commenting actually didn't actually change what I wrote about. It was a side track. It also assumed I said things that I did not. I pointed this out. I do think I got harsh, but not insulting at one point, and instead this person muted me. I was following this person as I enjoyed a lot of his posts. I stopped following the person, I stopped up voting their posts which I had been doing pretty regularly, etc. I figure why follow someone who I can never engage with?

So this is a word of caution for how you use the mute. It doesn't necessarily fix things. It can instead just turn the environment into a fantasy land where reality is filtered and you only see what you want to hear. In other words, it gradually morphs your reality into what is sometimes called an echo chamber, a circle jerk, or a "yes man" convention.

I knew the person that muted me liked to use the mute. He is very open about it. I still see his "I mute you" or similar comments to other people. I see him proposing muting as solutions to other people.

It should be noted muting doesn't improve steemit. It doesn't actually make a change to the community. It just makes it so you are oblivious to the things that are going on. It is much like a little kid sticking their fingers in their ears and saying "Nah, nah, nah I can't hear you".

It is there and in some cases it is beneficial. If you know you'll be tempted to feed an obvious troll then it is useful for that, but it is more about keeping yourself in check then than intentionally blinding yourself to reality.

Instead of mute I am going to simply stop following people I see that are putting self interest ahead of the good of the platform and the community. I will encourage my followers to do the same if I notice it. This at least leaves the room that if the person CHANGES later that I can reengage with them when they've learned from mistakes. Mute removes that possibility.

I've said this before and I'd like to close out this post with this. Disagreement is a good thing. If you can have a discussion with someone that disagrees with you that is a tremendous opportunity for both of you to learn new things. In fact, the odds of that happening are much higher due to different information than if you simply speak with people who know the same things and agree with you all the time. It is thus important to remember that being frustrated because you cannot get someone to agree does not mean that person is trolling you. It is also very rare for agreement to occur instantly. This is especially true for complex topics. It generally takes a person going off and thinking for some time. I often describe these things as planting seeds in the minds of others and they in turn planting seeds in my mind. We should not assume because the person did not agree with us that the dialog was a waste of time, a loss, or a failure. Most major mind changes take time, introspection, and time for those seeds to find purchase and grow.

I've had debates with someone in person that was emotional and angry and very much disagreeing with my point I was trying to make. A year or so later I walked into a room to see that person having a similar debate with someone else. This time the person who previously disagreed with me was using my words. He eventually understood what I was trying to explain, and he likely did not even remember the conversation with me. Mental change is typically slow unless it is backed by some traumatic event.