What is your take on the history of the 4chan tumblr wars?
There was never any real conflict tbh, it happened during the tail end of 4chan’s edgy raiding phase, and had a pretty shaky ‘Casus Belli’ in that 4chan wanted “Trigger the Snowflake Tumblrinas SJWs” back when such terms were used unironically. In reality it was done, as most things the cloversite of that era were, strictly “for the lulz”.
The Chan “battle plan” was to spam tags that sensitive people might use with shocking material and then screenshot their reactions. Mental health tags, celebrities, and cute animal tags were primarily targeted for their reaction. It definitely worked, many screenshots were taken of people having strong reactions that were amusing to the user base. But not nearly as many as other raids, and the payoff was abstract and not immediate. Compared to Habbo Hotel raids, Gaia Online raids, and 4chan’s Favorite Target: Hal Turner, Tumblr seemed nearly unphased, and a large number of Tumblr users (compared to other sites) genuinely attempted retaliation, which endeared much of 4chan’s raiding user base to them.
4ch had found a kindred spirit back in those Wild West days of the Internet, a semi-anonymous site that valued posting and being clever, populated by late teens/young adults. Tumblr being Tumblr started the shipping, 4ch drew dumb little comics about being Tsundere, and now they’re Kismesises.
The raiding phase basically stopped shortly afterwards, as 4chan moderation made it against the rules to plan raids on it. But the user cross pollination was permanent- it’s when I started using Tumblr and I know of many others as well.
If you don’t know about the Hal Turner thing you should look it up. Golden Age Chan Behavior right there.
blakekathryn
romaincrisis
