I’ve run across these terms several times, but without enough context to figure out what they mean. Could someone help me out, please?

ETA All of you are amazing! A huge thank you to everyone who responded, and an extra thank you to those who have provided links or explanations to further and/or related information. I am learning so much by reading all of these comments!

  • AvaddonLFC ☄️ 🤘@lemmy.world
    1061·
    1 year ago

    “Sealioning” here refers to a way of trolling by asking ill-intended questions, usually disguising it in innocence. When other members try to explain and help, they’d try to lure them into hours of discussion upon it, usually by knowingly misinterpreting what they heard.

    Or worse, just directly disrespect and reject all the suggestions the commenters provided. The essence is being a waste of time for everyone.

      • TheBananaKing@lemmy.world
        111·
        1 year ago

        But y’know, if someone walks up and makes disparaging racist remarks about how they don’t like your kind, following them round and demanding they explain themselves out loud is about the most appropriate response that exists.

        • givesomefucks@lemmy.world
          91·
          1 year ago

          I mean, yeah, if they’re racist.

          But just because the comic picked a sea lion doesn’t mean it’s about race… It’s just an easy way to identify a group of things.

          It could be “people who kiss their grown children on the mouth” or “people who smoke crack 5 times a day”.

          It’s any group of people.

      • blackbelt352@lemmy.world
        11·
        1 year ago

        Sealioning is a sort of evolution of JAQing off. It’s the JAQ coupled with feigned innocence and indignance when people actually stop putting up with BS.

        Actually after thinking a bit deeper about it, it mirrors Socratic Questioning, but with the opposite intended end goal of muddying the waters instead of gaining clarity.

    • KurtDunniehue@ttrpg.network
      8·
      1 year ago

      I’ve seen Sealioning used quite a bit in a particular Lemmy instance that would self describe themselves as Pro-Russia & Pro-China, as a way of shutting down discourse between people who disagree with them. There are people who disagree with a particular narrative, and they’re discounted immediately for wanting to know how someone would arrive at a pro-Russian & pro-China position.

      Also they’ll just “whatabout!” and change the subject whenever unassailable critiques of these regimes come up. As if its is only possible to hold outrage in a single direction at a time.

      I’ll have you know I’m capable of disliking EVERYONE mentioned in a given conversation.

    • dhork@lemmy.world
      7·
      1 year ago

      Everyone points to the comic in regards to sealioning, but I have always equated it to posters who are incapable of having an actual debate and keep saying “Why? Why? Why? Why?” until they get tired and fall asleep under the pier (but then their friend wakes up and takes over).

    • aaron_griffin@lemmy.world
      5·
      1 year ago

      I usually think of sealioning as also requiring some element of butting in with your pet issue when it’s not apart of the discussion.

      OH YEAH WELL WHAT ABOUT UKRAINE?!

      • meco03211@lemmy.world
        2·
        1 year ago

        Biden’s gas prices are so high. Worst president ever.

        gas prices go down

        mention that Biden should be congratulated for lowering prices if he was the cause for them going up

        Yeah well… he’s still the worst for all these other reasons!

    • Blamemeta@lemmy.world
      52·
      1 year ago

      Worst bit is sealioning is almost indistugishable from legitimate questions a lot of time.

            • AvaddonLFC ☄️ 🤘@lemmy.world
              1·
              1 year ago

              That would depend a lot on the context. What catches a moderator’s attention on an issue like this wouldn’t be seeing the individual post, rather seeing the reports about it. A mod usually acts on the consensus of the community and tries to determine if the members are correct in reporting things. They may be correct or wrong, but most of the time it’ll be correct. And we’d of course step back and apologize if we thought we were wrong.

    • RagingNerdoholic@lemmy.ca
      2·
      1 year ago

      But why, specifically, is the term “Sealioning”? Is it referencing some behavior exhibited by sealions? Is it an aggregate of or wordplay on other slang?