#IsItJustMe?
I've noticed that in the #Fediverse, or at least on #Mastodon, people are endlessly open about exactly the topics of conversation you've been cautioned not to talk about in polite society.
Profiles abound with indications of their owners' political leanings, sexual proclivities, religious affiliations and biases, whether they use emacs and Arch Linux, and how many cats they have.
I made up that last bit. Cats are acceptable conversation even in polite society, no matter how much they make you sneeze.
This actually started as an observation that a lot of Mastodon profiles are extremely detailed but never tell you what country the person lives in. I thought that an interesting note on the assumptions of this worldwide distributed culture.
While the topics we consider not part of polite society are listed for a reason - our emotional reactions to them are often stronger than when we are talking about other topics - they're also important. I'm glad we have a place where those can be discussed; discussions here are often, but not always, more fruitful than in other social gatherings. Sometimes keeping to the rules of polite society is worth it to maintain a functional working relationship; but it's good for us to understand one another more deeply even if we don't always agree.
Country of origin or culture or residency is also important. If you ever do any #worldTravel you will learn, if you have not already, how very alike we all are. There are many differences; but people are people the world over. What you want for your family, your kids, your future is pretty likely to be a lot like what the rest of the world wants. A lot of that is evident in the Fediverse too.