Nah bruv. There’s a world of difference.

4. Upvote and Downvote Responsibly

Upvote: Content you find useful, interesting, or entertaining.
Downvote: Content that is off-topic, unhelpful, or violates community guidelines—not just because you disagree with it.
Why it matters: Misusing the voting system can lead to valuable posts being buried.

What’s the fucking point of comments at all if anyone who raises a contrasting opinion is downvoted into invisibility?

Which just means you’re not an older Albertan or a rural Albertan. WE keep voting conservative because we ARE conservative. And outside of the the two main cities, this province is radically conservative. Thats not gonna change.

Legit question: Why do you stay in AB if you hate it so much?

Just an FYI, you pray to God and Conservatives prey on school children.

Yeah the UCP is questionably concerned about where my kids go to the bathroom. What is it with cons and bathrooms, anyways?

Well, you’re not alone my friend. I have voted NDP at one point but Im definitely a small c conservative and generally vote Conservative. But good god, try presenting ANY kind of conservative viewpoint on social media and prepare to not only be called various insulting or downright evil names, but to be downvoted to oblivion. The hard fact is that social media leans left and sometimes FAR left. Im done with reddit, its turned into a cesspool and those who aren’t leaning left are just hundreds of bots and shills. Im not spending time debating with a bot. At least the fediverse isn’t popular enough or monetized to attract the platform destroying companies that have made reddit useless.

The point is that the usefulness of a tool is determined by how people use it, not what it was created for. Downvotes will always be used as “i dont like this” unless their mechanics change

anyone who raises a contrasting opinion is downvoted into invisibility

Also this a great exaggeration. We’re defending contrasting opinions right now and that’s not happening.

At the risk of looking like a simpleton, isn’t Alberta separatism basically just a US psyop to colonize oil rich land by gaslighting Albertans into voting to leave Canada and ultimately join the US?

Sort of, it’s not about joining the US but about becoming a separate Union and having control over their resources and rights. They do have the backing of the US with this movement just because of the oil.

Sort of, it’s not about joining the US but about becoming a separate Union and having control over their resources and rights. They do have the backing of the US with this movement just because of the oil.

I want to say this loud and clear in a post here for everyone to see, but there is an issue here with people having this giant hate boner for Albertans. Not the government, not UCP voters, but Albertans.

It doesn’t matter if you’re politically on the same side as people elsewhere in the country, it doesn’t matter if you present facts to people who are provably wrong on the most basic of things they say, it doesn’t matter if you treat them with dignity and respect by mentioning things with good intentions and not insulting people. You will still get labelled as the bad guy for the very fact you’re Albertan.

I made a response to a comment on this post in the community. My comment was responding to someone who called Albertans “HUGE pussies” for “giving up our rights”.

In my response to said comment, I basically said that the notion that we’re “simply giving up” is completely false, using the following facts:

1. Students have been staging walkouts:

• CBC: Calgary students among thousands across Alberta taking part in provincewide walkout
• Global News: Alberta students walk out of class in support of teachers forced back to work
• OkotoksOnline: High River students walkout in support of teachers

2. The AFL (Alberta Federation of Labour) has stated that they will retaliate against the back to work order with a “general strike if necessary”

• Global News: ‘General strike if necessary’: Alberta unions declare intent to bring down UCP government
• CPAC: Alberta Union Leaders Respond to Smith Government’s Back-to-Work Legislation
• CityNews Calgary: No general strike yet as Alberta labour unions mobilize against Smith government

3. The UCP has faced a dip in the polls resulting from the back-to-work order

• CTV News: Majority of Alberta Gov’t Report Card respondents feel province headed in wrong direction
• Angus Reid: Teachers’ Strike: Most Albertans side with teachers as they criticize UCP’s handling of education
• Calgary Herald: ‘Reputational challenges’: New poll shows public support for Smith, UCP has dipped amid teachers’ strike (Yes I know it’s PostMedia, it’s still relevant and correct in this case)

I went ahead and said that statements like this that blanket Albertans as lazy, dumb, and inept do not help relations between the province and the rest of the country, especially when the actions being taken showcase the exact opposite.

For this, I was labelled as a conservative myself when I’m registered with the NDP provincially and federally, had myself and those around me insulted, and was told I was uneducated by someone who spewed blatantly incorrect information as they did so, and I was the one looked down upon in the entire interaction simply for where I’m from.

I suggested that in order for the NDP or Liberals, or anybody to win over Albertans, they need to address issues here. I gave the example of canola farmers suffering, and how the feds can tariff imported cooking oils to encourage consumers to choose a domestic alternative and/or have marketing campaigns to support canola farmers by increasing their domestic sales.

For this, someone insinuated that I am dumber than them simply based on what they assumed to be the school system I attended. The very same person who said this confidently made another comment where they claimed that the NDP was in charge for a “long time” before Peter Lougheed, and that Lougheed ran on diversifying the economy, and ditched the effort afterwards.

This is provably false. The NDP formed government for the first time in 2015, it was the Social Credit Party who came before Lougheed’s Progressive Conservatives. Lougheed also established the Heritage Fund , which was made specifically to save money for investments in other sectors of Alberta’s economy, the disaster of the fund came with the following leaders.

However, calling someone out for getting their facts wrong, and showcasing a current example of tariffs working to protect domestic goods gets you downvoted if you’re Albertan, with the very people insulting your intelligence getting upvoted as they spew their nonsense.

Apparently explaining working-class issues and what left-wing parties can do to better reach those who normally vote Conservative is treating Alberta as “special” and forcing “everyone else to adapt” to us. Clearly the “majority” of people in Alberta are “hateful morons” and “insular xenophobes” .

Why do people continue to blanket me with the thoughts of a few bad apples they met? Are they more prominent here, sure, whatever, I can agree to that. I can agree that people here can be some of the worst you’ve met, I would know, I live here.

But me and the good, well-meaning people I know, especially those here who are marginalised or among the over 750,000 people who voted for the NDP the last election, do not appreciate having blanket statements made against us simply because we live here. I am pro-abortion, I am pro-immigration, I am pro-expanding healthcare, pro-creating public alternatives, pro-trans rights, anti-privatisation, anti-separatist, and yet sure, I’m a Conservative tip-toeing a line because my thoughts slightly deviate from the norm.

Hate the government, hate the jerks, do not hate me simply for where I’m born and the fact that I live here. I do not do this to you, I do not insult people for where they live or were born, and don’t make blanket assumptions about the entire population of an area based on who’s in power where they live. Why then is it seen as acceptable for this to happen to me?

I am an Albertan who doesn’t want special treatment, but for fuck sake, it is reasonable to want to be treated with respect.

Edit: I don’t know why the numbered lists are showing all as 1’s, I have them properly numbered in the text of this post.

Sorry, I thought the context of that quote was clear:

I was referring to raising a contrasting political opinion in defense of Albertans, as that’s the context for this entire discussion.

This guy Ontarioiates