My early years in Ravelry were wonderful. Through the site, I communicated regularly with fibercrafters around the planet. We collaborated on various charity events to help like-minded people who needed help with their own inescapable charitable pursuits. We were grand.
But then the climate changed. People with no real knowledge of politics suddenly announced themselves experts, and declared all who disagreed with their uneducated ideologies as white supremacists. HUH? Anything remotely supporting any ideology veering to the right of extreme leftist thought was pronounced unwelcome. Anyone who has a politically moderate point of view, or a conservative mindset, or is a Libertarian is despised on this site. These people are silenced while the ultra-progressives are encouraged to be nasty. In all my searching through the site's forae, I never located anything as profoundly hateful as the anti-white, anti-right rhetoric that now had a clear path to scorch anything within which PERCEIVED conservatism existed. Several people were driven away. Still, the majority of members are dewy-eyed innocents who would rather lie and hate and gang up on others so the site retains most of its enormous membership.
Then a major site redesign was thrust upon members. Even the far left members complained bitterly on the new design, a design which had not been subjected to usability or accessibility testing. The redesign was notably uncomfortable for many. Several members complained of discomfort or even outright pain from having to use the new design. When the complaints were laid upon Ravelry, its founder Cassidy went into a whiny rage, accusing people afflicted with pain of being liars, citing a half-baked article by a non-medical doctor stating that epilepsy with visual triggers was an unlikely cause of issues and reinforcing Cassidy's notion that the world was out to get her. I saw few member scomp-laints concerning epilepsy. Some seizure disturbances were reported but complaints were mainly issues with migraines and non-seizure visual disorders. The article was a poor choice of rebuttal, and why in hell would Cassidy do that to her members? Anti-white, anti-right-of-far-left, "inclusivity" does not include folks with various disabilities. This wasn't Cassidy's first assault on members' visual abilities, but it was the most egregious. Little effort has been made to help ease complainers' difficulties. According to Cassidy, visual disturbances do not exist.
I still check in on the forae in which I became acquainted with many good people. They are now generally quiet sad places. The ultra-left membership do not support the charity events we used to enjoy building. All the cameraderie is gone, replaced by suspicion and finger-pointing. Even in forae remote from the main boards. Ravelry is becoming a bleak wasteland.