• IzzyScissor@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    I remember reading that when national parks tried to make a ‘bear-proof’ trashcan, they found that there was a larger overlap between the smartest bear and the stupidest human to make a viable product.

    I feel like it’s a similar situation here. The smartest kid and the stupidest adult are far more similar than we’d like to admit.

    • AmosBurton_ThatGuy@lemmy.ca
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      6 months ago

      Tbh I find it much more surprising that there’s an overlap of bears and stupid people than I do smart kids and dumb adults.

      I’ve met an unfortunate amount of people that would struggle to dump water out of their boots with the instructions written on the bottom of the sole.

  • Snowclone@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    Very confidently wrong, poor reading comprehension, poor grammar, limited vocabulary, emoji gore, catch phrase/pop culture quotes/talking points repeated with no comprehension of what they’re saying, clearly not aware of how many things in life work, religious regurgitation while being surprised everyone doesn’t agree with them. Very easily impressed with basic factual statements, clearly thinking confidence is the main thing that makes someone correct. Thinks their mom telling they they are handsome is a valid point. Idk, that’s all I got.

  • Wugmeister@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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    6 months ago

    Extreme/insane positions on everything. Not just one or two insane positions, not just political extremism; when I say everything I mean EVERYTHING. No nuance allowed. And it has to be fully sincere, otherwise you are dealing with a Jreg.

    There are milder versions of this, but I have rarely met a child that didn’t have a strongly held insane belief formed from their limited experiences. My favorite was a kid who told me that eating pasta supports fascism because it comes from Italy, so loving Italian products means you support Mussolini. Pizza is fine, though, because that’s American.

  • communism@lemmy.ml
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    6 months ago

    I don’t think there is a “dead giveaway”. Plenty of kids can pass as adults online and plenty of adults seem like kids online. And sometimes with stuff like word usage/grammar/etc you can’t tell if it’s a child or someone who doesn’t speak English very well or maybe an English-speaking adult who happens to type like that. There’s a lot of different people in the world.

    • morrowind@lemmy.ml
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      6 months ago

      Yeah seriously, every time someone makes a generalization online “that subreddit is all 12 year olds anyway”, “r/teenagers is mainly grown me”, it really bothers me because no, you’re just overconfident in estimating people’s ages from text

    • Badabinski@kbin.earth
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      6 months ago

      I imagine that part of it comes down to motivation. I pretended to be an adult on a special-interest forum when I was twelve years old because I needed an escape from my miserable existence. At that time, I had no control over my life and every morning I woke up meant I had a new chance for traumatic shit to happen. I desperately needed to be someone else, so I took my time, researched shit, and avoided any conversation where I might be outed. I’m sure I didn’t fool everyone, but I got some shocked responses when I went back as an adult and owned up to it.

      Kids doing it for the authority boost or just as a childish fancy will be easier to spot. Kids doing it as a coping mechanism for their horrible lives will probably blend in a lot better.

  • Todd Bonzalez@lemm.ee
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    6 months ago

    They like people like Lenin and Stalin.

    It’s a wakeup call for a lot of young people when they start to recognize the absurdity of anti-communist propaganda, but a lot of kids swing too far the other direction and figure all the bad things they’ve ever heard about history’s worst communist leaders are lies.

    It doesn’t mean that Communism is uniquely bad, but these men were violent tyrants who don’t share values with most mainstream western leftists today.

    Some never grow up and say dumb shit like that radical gender expression was common in the USSR or something…

    • MataVatnik@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      It was always a thing, had a tankie friend in high-school. Though you’re right, most people grow out of it. But I don’t think this guy did last I saw him

  • NoiseColor@startrek.website
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    6 months ago

    I don’t really know, but when they have weird illogical views that they defend with trump like arguments, I think they are kids. They might not be 10.

        • MutilationWave@lemmy.world
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          6 months ago

          That was really interesting. I had a friend who’s brother killed himself when he was a young teen. If things didn’t go his way or he was overly irritated, especially when he was drunk, he reacted by destroying things like a pubescent boy might. He also came from a wealthy family so I always thought that contributed as well, like not caring if he breaks something just buy a new one. But he didn’t just break his own things. I had to end the friendship when he drunkenly threatened a woman who lived in my building with a gun. I hope he’s ok.

          • dejected_warp_core@lemmy.world
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            6 months ago

            Sorry to hear about your friend. While I’m no doctor, that seems to fit the bill to me. I’ve known people that had other trauma when young, and yeah, maintaining healthy relationships seems to be the hardest thing for them. Your story reminded me of a lot.

  • TheFonz@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    For me personally the first tell is when they are morally loading every statement in an argument and are unable to engage with a topic directly. Adults should be able to discuss or debate certain topics on the value of the arguments alone without feeling pressured to include a declarative virtue signal in every clause.

    • chobeat@lemmy.ml
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      6 months ago

      “debate me” kids are another stereotype on the internet though. The idea that ideas should be entertained and discussed for the sake of it and come without implications attached is just another form of edgyness. It’s another thing that often goes away with age or with touching grass. I know because I was one of them. Now I understand that the fact itself of discussing something publicly has moral implications.

  • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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    6 months ago

    When they start calling people “jr” or implying anyone who disagrees with them is too young to understand.

    • Feathercrown@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      Yup, I immediately assume these people are children, because it likely comes from their own experiences being dismissed due to their age.

    • psivchaz@reddthat.com
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      6 months ago

      Generally when people bring up some personal detail, my immediate reaction is to assume the opposite. Especially if it begins with “as a.” For example: “as a woman,” this person is a man. “As a black person,” this is the whitest person you will ever meet. “As a 60 year old,” definitely ten.

  • shneancy@lemmy.world
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    6 months ago

    slang mostly, I mod a strictly 18+ space and recently someone used the word “skeet”, and would you believe it, they were a minor

    • chetradley@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      Skeet? Really? Lil Jon’s “Get Low” came out 22 years ago.

      Now if they had said “Skibidi” that would be a different story.

    • ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      6 months ago

      Tbh, no. I expected they would be about 32 using the word “skeet.” I’d expect the youth of today to say “cummies” or some other abject disgrace of a word lol.

  • Nath@aussie.zone
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    6 months ago

    The neat thing about anonymous discussion on the Internet is that it doesn’t matter. What you have to say is all that matters.

    I don’t know anything about anyone and that’s great.

    • MBM@lemmings.world
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      6 months ago

      At the same time that’s one of the bad parts of anonymous discussion. You never know if someone’s an expert or a random person guessing (on ELI5), engaging in good faith or purposely trolling, etc.

  • oxjox@lemmy.ml
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    6 months ago

    When someone asks what’s a dead give away someone is a kid, it tells me they’re not old enough to remember the ASL days.

    • Zangoose@lemmy.world
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      6 months ago

      Hate to break it to you but people born in 2006 are turning 18 this year (and are technically considered “adults”).

      • jaaake@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        Having just turned 43, I can tell you that I don’t think I became an adult until my early/mid 30s.

        • WeirdGoesPro@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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          6 months ago

          This is a truth that everyone under 30 denies until the day they turn 30. It’s like a magic spell is suddenly broken, and you realize you’re alone in an aging meat husk that now knows the glory of back pain.

          I know a young person will read this and think this won’t happen to them. To that person: I am you from the future. Remember us as we were.