>>1055320long story short, the 2016 and 2020 elections were by far the events that brought in the most people, largely through /pol/. of course people were coming in before and outside of the elections, but it was a slow trickle rather than huge waves of newfags. I guess for REALLY old fags you could argue that the whole Anonymous/chanology thing started it but whatever.
>what was it like being here in the old daysim no oldfag so I can't really tell you what it was like way back. but from memory around 2014 (when I started coming here) it was mostly just a bunch of autists shitposting, sharing dumb stories, and talking about things they liked. some were even "normies" irl, but many more were just social misfits that shared common niche interests. /pol/ was a useful containment board, but ended up backfiring and becoming a gateway.
the general quality of posts now have decreased. if its not racebait thread #912314 its some turd trying to push the next funneh wojak meme. if you look at /qa/, its a good caricature of most boards.
twitter and reddit tourists come here for the shock value, like "WAO, I CAN SAY NIGGER HERE!" and literal children come from ifunny because their favorite basedjack redpill boomer coomer meme spawned here. I'd say roughly 50% of the posters now are post-2016, especially on boards like /v/ and /pol/.
people clown on gatekeeping, which is totally understandable. but when you dont gatekeep, this is what happens
