this post was submitted on 15 Sep 2025
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[–] invo_rt@hexbear.net 95 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Clearly, there was a lot of gaming going on, friends that have confirmed that there was kind of that deep, dark internet, Reddit culture and these other dark places of the internet where this person was going deep.

Legacy media (and most independent media as well) is so ill-equipped to address this topic. Watching talking heads read the bullet casings over the past few days, the best they can do is slowly read it out like it's a different language and ruffle their noses with zero analysis or context.

IMO, it looks like it's a terminally online, irony poisoned, nihilistic shooter. Everything is a joke, everything is bleak. Sincerity is cringe. Etc. It's impossible for normies to understand that whatever is written is dripping with sarcasm and irony, not sincerity. He could've wrote the navy seal copypasta and they'd be reaching out to the military for comment on whether or not he had a service record.

[–] D61@hexbear.net 42 points 1 month ago

... wrote the navy seal copypasta and they'd be reaching out to the military for comment on whether or not he had a service record.

brace-dark-cowboy If you did decide to...

liz-society Which you shouldn't...

brace-watching ... but if you did...

liz-punk ... we disavow...

[–] Nakoichi@hexbear.net 23 points 1 month ago (1 children)

If he had written anything about being trapped in a maoist cult I'd be real worried.

[–] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 25 points 1 month ago

"Sheriff deputy discovers 144mm artillery shell with the shooter's manifesto carved into it, the name "chairman gonzalo" comes up multiple times in it. Who is this mysterious chairman?" libs-owned

[–] zipper@hexbear.net 54 points 1 month ago (2 children)

"...friends that have confirmed that there was kind of that deep, dark internet, Reddit culture..."

not-listening "these damn kids and their dark interwebs!!!"

[–] XxFemboy_Stalin_420_69xX@hexbear.net 37 points 1 month ago (1 children)

this but unironically. reddit is a deeply anti-human website

[–] zipper@hexbear.net 38 points 1 month ago (2 children)

reddit is a shit website but i wouldn't call it dark. it just has a lot of smartasses who can't help but pull an "uhh akshually" even when it's not needed.

[–] picklemeister@hexbear.net 32 points 1 month ago (1 children)

usually the case but you also have the “fitness” subs which are places where people proudly display their eating disorders and suggest that fat people are untermenschen, the “childfree/petfree” subs which are wallowing pits of sociopathic despair, and worst of all, town/city subs in which hordes of demons pile over one another to declare i-am-adolf-hitler first in response to the sighting of a homeless person existing

[–] zipper@hexbear.net 16 points 1 month ago (1 children)

man what city subs are yall part of? my home town's subreddit is half people complaining about the weather and half cool pics of the skyline. but yeah the fitness subs are hitlerite breeding grounds and any sub with "_free" at the end is bound to host some... interesting characters cringe

[–] XxFemboy_Stalin_420_69xX@hexbear.net 21 points 1 month ago (2 children)

i've never encountered a city or region focused subreddit that wasn't 99% landlords and wannabe landlords complaining about undesirables lowering property values in the given city or region. they're some of the worst places on reddit

[–] zipper@hexbear.net 9 points 1 month ago

man, guess i'm lucky then

[–] Chana@hexbear.net 4 points 1 month ago

It's also a bunch of Gen X suburbanites. People who don't live in the city but have endless reactionary opinions about it. Trends PMC.

[–] RedWizard@hexbear.net 25 points 1 month ago (1 children)

but i wouldn't call it dark

I think the usage of "dark" means "isn't touched by the light of the sun," as in, it's so deep down only Angler Fish live there. Reddit might be accessible from the "surfice web," but there are so many people using the site and so many subreddits that it houses its own "dark web." Small, niche communities, cryptic communities; all lurking at the very bottom of Reddit. Almost all social media, of note, houses dark corners where creeps and weirdos congregate. These systems are so vast that they require the crowd to suss out unwanted content, and if nothing gets reported, almost nothing gets removed. Fliters and automation only go so far, and when people adapt to those systems, they become useless.

That being said, CNN is also calling it "dark" because they couldn't be bothered to even do a surface glance at places like Reddit to even understand what goes on there.

[–] zipper@hexbear.net 24 points 1 month ago (1 children)

CNN, at some point, claimed that the dude got radicalized by Discord. i'm convinced that they know next to nothing about social media beyond insta and twitter.

[–] RedWizard@hexbear.net 16 points 1 month ago

I fully believe that. It's also a kind of "black box" service, where you can't just "browse it" like you would Instagram, Twitter, or Facebook. If you are not a member of a Discord server, Discord does basically nothing.

[–] DragonBallZinn@hexbear.net 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

And they fucking never have anything bad to say about 4chan, the actual dark web, or ifunny.

You know, the literal digital gang controlling the entirety of the internet?

[–] zipper@hexbear.net 7 points 1 month ago (2 children)

"the entirety of the internet" is a stretch. they get a bit over 20 million users monthly (compared to reddit's 107 million daily active users), but they can definitely be a pain in the ass when they put their mind to it. then again, that applies to every social media. 4chan is just more lax with gore and slurs.

[–] DragonBallZinn@hexbear.net 6 points 1 month ago

Oh, don’t get me wrong, I’m moreso talking about 4chan the idea. Yes, the site is small but it’s reach is vast. The fact that “redpill” “beta” “npc” “wojak” “onions” “soy” “zoomer” “mogged” “chad” “normie” are words many folk here will understand is a testament to that.

[–] Philosoraptor@hexbear.net 4 points 1 month ago

The number of users is (relatively) small, but they punch way above their weight-class in terms of cultural influence. It's the generator for at least a comfortable plurality of contemporary meme culture, if not an outright majority.

[–] NuraShiny@hexbear.net 51 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

The only thing kids can do these days for fun is gaming you fucking boomers. You took everything else away from them and now you act like that's some dark unknown space because, obviously, kids don't want you fucks there to share the one place they have for themselves!

Calling reddit a dark internet underbelly is so funny to me. These motherfuckers only know how to eat hot chip and lie, cuz there's no games on they flip phones.

[–] ClimateStalin@hexbear.net 46 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Calling reddit a dark internet underbelly

In 2025 reddit is literally the most normie website there is. It’s the only place you can semi-reliably expect to see shit posted by other people. My normie coworkers complain about how they have to add “reddit” onto the end of their google searches to get anything usable.

Facebook is more of a dark internet underbelly at this point, just an endless chasm of AI slop where finding a human is a rare surprise. Reddit is just the last semi-functional website.

[–] BynarsAreOk@hexbear.net 23 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I think reddit is just as filled with bots though, the main issue is all the repost karma farming accounts. Its just as easy to have an endless amount of accounts posting useless comments too, like I'm going to any front page post and its a god fucking miracle if the first 5 or so top comments are not completely useless jokes about the OP. As a result imo a majority of subs are completely unsusable and impossible to actualy see any discussion about anything.

Any front page post is always 10 top level comments with 50 replies all on the same variation of the same joke against the OP or the topic. Is that "real" user behaviour? Perhaps but certainly doesn't seem like it from my experience years ago before "AI", but maybe I'm biased.

[–] LeninsBeard@hexbear.net 10 points 1 month ago (1 children)

I think it's more so niche hobby/resource subs that aren't really targeted by bots. Stuff like the sysadmin sub or the various subs for individual applications are super helpful to me as someone who works in that field. What you're saying definitely rings true for default subs or very large subs though.

[–] Tabitha@hexbear.net 1 points 1 month ago

Smaller subs get hit all the time lol.

[–] CyborgMarx@hexbear.net 49 points 1 month ago

The media is so full of shit, they know what his politics are but they refuse to elaborate

The media across the broad is actively trying to court anti-left violence, dems are in on it too

[–] ClathrateG@hexbear.net 41 points 1 month ago (4 children)

“Clearly, there was a lot of gaming going on, friends that have confirmed that there was kind of that deep, dark internet, Reddit culture and these other dark places of the internet where this person was going deep. You saw that on the casings … the meme-ification that is happening in our society today,”

lol

[–] FloridaBoi@hexbear.net 33 points 1 month ago (1 children)

They’re gonna try to ban gaming and reddit-logo in Utah

[–] pinkapple@lemmy.ml 31 points 1 month ago

I don't trust Cox but there's basically nothing radical leftist corresponding to that description, just 500 varieties of incel, blackpill, alt right edgelords. He already knows but the only viable lie is chalking it up to some vague edgy gaming subculture that wouldn't have any motive to do it or care about Kirk at all.

[–] ComRed2@hexbear.net 27 points 1 month ago

gaming and dark places of the internet where this person was going deep

So a basic gamer chud who was into 4chan culture.

[–] TheModerateTankie@hexbear.net 13 points 1 month ago

"Only leftists do gay stuff"

[–] Alaskaball@hexbear.net 38 points 1 month ago (2 children)

So did they get their story straight over whether or not the alleged shooter was living at home with his parents or that he actually was renting a place with a flatmate who may or may not have been a romantic partner yet?

[–] LeninWalksTheEarth@hexbear.net 25 points 1 month ago

it's already been said so now a million Nazis will just run with that story regardless if it's corrected.

[–] Feinsteins_Ghost@hexbear.net 37 points 1 month ago (2 children)

Here's what we know?

We know Kirk is dead. We know someone is accused of it.

Other than that I don't give a shit. Rot, Charlie rot.

[–] nfreak@lemmy.ml 25 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (1 children)

Wild how many people seem to genuinely give a shit about a dead nazi but I guess they have to look out for their own

oh wait even his closest nazi buddies are grifting off his death lmfao

[–] GrouchyGrouse@hexbear.net 26 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago) (3 children)

His wife too, more or less. I’m going to be a bad guy and just assume she’s in it for the payday because I’m judging her for the company she kept in the form of her now dead husband.

shrug-outta-hecks

[–] ClimateStalin@hexbear.net 20 points 1 month ago

I think about it this way, there are two options. Either she was a completely willing participant in the evil he spread, or she was trapped in an abusive relationship and is better off now. Either way it’s good he died.

Definitely looks like it was the first option since she’s continuing his grift

[–] mendiCAN@hexbear.net 9 points 1 month ago

if she becomes successful do we we get to have a "she did it" conspiracy a 'la Courtney love?

[–] Feinsteins_Ghost@hexbear.net 3 points 1 month ago

Absolutely. Goose and gander.

[–] kleeon@hexbear.net 16 points 1 month ago

We know Kirk is dead

source?

[–] GoebbelsDeezNuts@hexbear.net 27 points 1 month ago

We live in a post truth reality pick your favorite explanation and go with it. Extra credit for anyone who agrees with whatever the cops say.

[–] dragongloss@hexbear.net 25 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

yawn niko-yawn let me know when they are done changing the story for the 15th time.

[–] FloridaBoi@hexbear.net 21 points 1 month ago (1 children)

Is the investigation going in the direction of the shooter killing Kirk because he was anti-trans?

[–] oscardejarjayes@hexbear.net 20 points 1 month ago

The roommates social media was found by journalists, and they were quite active on r/4tran, and neighbors are quoted as seeing them kissing, so that does seem to be the angle their going for.

[–] Acute_Engles@hexbear.net 17 points 1 month ago

Did they determine if he was cherry, strawberry, or raspberry flavoured gushers?