Nextdoor.com

Don't know how many of you are active representing Libertarian views on Nextdoor, but I am VERY active. Probably too active. Anyways, just learned something interesting.

There are often a handful of people who ALWAYS take the government position in a way that is aggressive, unwavering, unapologetic and uncurious of other views even if well represented by me or anyone else. It seems they often take the time to do internet searches about me and dig up dirt. But when I do searches on them NOTHING. As I'm aware ND's founding documents sold the idea as an arm of government, it should come as no surprise.

So recently, I made it my policy to only respond to people who come forward and prove who they are and what they do for a living. A LinkedIn profile, Facebook or anything. And while I've asked for that information now from about 6 different people while discussing the subject of Masks, not one has replied. And they immediately withdraw from the conversation when confronted about this. One woman recently asked why I wanted to know. Here was my response.

"Internal documents for NextDoor make it very clear their intent from the very beginning was to collaborate with government. And there are many people on here defending government positions in an oddly passionate and uncurious way. Often, they reveal themselves subtly that they work for agencies like the Health Department. I won't name names. But it just doesn't seem all people here on NextDoor are just ordinary citizens trying to find the truth. But are instead actors with an agenda they are paid to represent. In fact, not a single one of them I've asked has answered confirming my view. So no sense in wasting time with them. They are paid shills whose views are corrupted. I have often suspected they don't even use their real names on here because they don't show up in any searches like I do, for better or worse. But I'm a real person. It seems smart to have people defending the government position, especially one that is ruining our community, prove they don't work for the government before their positions are taken seriously. Does that make sense?"

FYI

Mike

Michael F Denny
Mike@Dennz.com<mailto:Mike@Dennz.com>
(415) 608-0269

Nextdoor sends me emails asking if somebody lives in the neighborhood. I assumed that was a way to exclude fake names. (Of course, it would not stop someone from impersonating a neighbor.)
Harland HarrisonSan Mateo

Thanks for your activism, Mike. I've resisted establishing a profile on NextDoor for a couple reasons:

1) Their systematically collecting data on not just who people are but where they live, to which Harland alludes

2) My observation that people coming together on the basis of geography (as opposed to, say, around a shared interest in jazz, or free markets, or gardening, or whatever), it seems to naturally bring out more authoritarian impulses

  If NextDoor's documents show an intent to collaborate with government, that's obviously another reason for concern. Do you have a link to any of these documents?

  I think it is still useful for some libertarians to populate all these fora (forums), and am glad you are representing pro-freedom views there. I don't think all the statist-leaning commentators in such groups work for government, but I'm sure some do, and that this affects their perspectives. Pointing out this conflict of interest can be a good approach – and I sometimes explicitly use the term "conflict of interest". Many people are familiar with and understand this term, and (per the Davi Barker op-ed piece published in the recent LPSF newsletter), it can help undermine the legitimacy of statist power by exposing the selfish motives often involved.

Love & Liberty,

((( starchild )))

Sorry Starchild….don’t have links. But I know some of the very first developers to work with Nextdoor and they told me about the plans.

To be honest, the more I get involved with it, the more it appear a rigged game. But there are stragglers who drop in who are happy to see alternative opinion presented. We meet for coffee and get acquainted.

But I also find certain posts just seem to disappear. The site seems heavily monitored. And it doesn’t take much to just have posts silently removed.

Mike