Quote Originally Posted by Vahnavoi View Post
They follow the Pareto principle. 20% of people make 80% of noise and 20% of noise creates 80% of responses.

So pretty much regardless of what the topic of the day is, a minority of people will be the loudest and majority of their arguments end up not influencing anything.

Death threats are a perfect example: only a small number of dissatisfied fans actually make them, with most of them never even intending to go through with them... but since threats of extreme violence are being taken seriously by those threatened, they have disproportionate effects on mental well-being and actions of the threatened.
Ive been a fan of fanfiction.net for like, 10-15 years now, and I have to agree with this. I cant count how many authors who have made tearful posts that they are suspending their stories and deleting their accounts because despite having literally thousands of positive reviews, a handful of vile trolls saying the most hateful things they can destroyed their enjoyment of writing fanfic. Its awful how this tiny minority of garbage people can have such an outsized effect on others.