bevinator: When people think of 4chan, they mostly think of /b/. Which is a shame, because /b/ IS the fetid pus-weeping shithole that everyone thinks it is. However, the other boards are places of incredible awesome, especially /tg/, /wsg/, /co/, and /x/. There are many great things that have come from there, from the Angry Marines to the SCP and Slenderman, and probably 50% of all memes. In a way, it's interesting that so many internet goers have a fear and misunderstanding of one of the primary sources of internet culture.

carnival73: .....mostly a discussion board for thirteen year olds?

Fake_Sketch: No, I like 4chan and 2chan is disgusting.

carnival73: .....mostly a discussion board for thirteen year olds?
Is that adult content warning meant for the adults? XD

Vestin: Funnily enough, I wouldn't say that even /b/ is evil. Not entirely rotten, anyway...
As far as I've been able to gather, the people there aren't necessarily douchebags and ill-willed ruffians ("trolls" if you will) but fundamentally broken individuals who've had their illusions shattered, their will to live stripped away, traumatic events piling up so high, they've eclipsed the entirety of their existence... Stranded in a hostile world, with no faith, no goals, nothing sacred, they indulge in playful nihilism, words stripped of meanings and ringing more and more hollow as time goes on. In the hivemind they find a semblance of "belonging", a group they can feel a part of; the ultimate rejects in their mercurial sanctuary.

Pemptus: Aaw, cute, you guys found out about 4chan! Next up: rotten.com, efukt.com (warning: internet sites).Pemptus: Whenever I'm doing the "gee, they are so immature" thing, I find it useful to avoid the "XD" emoticon, commonly associated with 13-year-olds.

saldite: and visit /v/ at night (when people seem to want to actually talk about video games, surprisingly enough).

Export: Someone summed it up quite well, though this won't sound accurate unless you've spent a lot of time on 4chan (and not on the shitty boards): the internet is stupid people pretending they're clever, 4chan is clever people pretending they're stupid. It truly is the best online community, but you have to allow yourself to adsorb it. So many things, like terrible emoticons, thinking you're special because you were sad once, finding stale old Reddit macros funny, etc etc, are just bad.

But when you go online, you go into "online mode" and just accept it as part of the culture. I've had the most mature, insightful and rich conversations on 4chan, but when you first go on there, you feel like you're having shit thrown at you by an army of monkeys; I can say now in retrospect that it's because - with the odd exception - you were inadvertently, through your actions and general stance, asking for monkeys to bombard you with shit.

Vestin: ಠ_ಠ

Vestin: I'm not certain about my theory but what little I've seen seemed to corroborate it to a degree. The people there didn't seem to blaspheme against their better judgement - they appeared fundamentally detached from naive (if common) world-views...

carnival73: Those in strange and uncanny circumstances are usually and erroneously demonized by naive world views. It's why those world views are usually the first to go.

carnival73: There's a point where one can find every show (especially News, Talk and Journalism) on television not only patronizing but also subliminally impeding of intellectual growth.