Does it have something to do with the rise of smartphones and no one typing on real keyboards? (Maybe why blogs died.)
Is it a consequence of voting, which blogs didn’t have?
What happens to your thoughts? Do you turn them all in the form of a question? Do you tear them down into a Mastodon one-liner and hope a popular person notices it?
If Lemmy had more of ourselves in this way, maybe it would be a healthier place.
Being idle until the media put out an article on something for us to talk about gives them too much power over us.
There’s an actual_discussion community, which isn’t exactly lively. There’s a casualconversation community, and even that’s all in the form of a question.
As to your title, who says it isn’t? Just because it isn’t as commonly used that way doesn’t mean it isn’t for that. Also, my understanding is that Lemmy was created as a federated alternative to Reddit, and while I would say that Reddit did have more engagement for general discussion, it was/is probably better known for questions, links, and memes just as you’re seeing on Lemmy.
This next part is just my opinion, but regarding this quote and your title contrasting commentary to questions, in my opinion posts with questions are likely to be more engaging as they give a direct point for responses. If you’re just posting your thoughts and ideas into the void, people are less likely to engage with them unless you are saying something particularly compelling or controversial.
Healthier in what way? Size of userbase? Number of posts/comments? Or are you referring to the quality of discourse and level of courtesy or toxicity between users?
I get that a question brings more engagement, but if I don’t have a question, I don’t have a question. And I might have a thought I want to put down in writing, and maybe someone will read it. Even if no one happens to read it, putting it where someone could read it and not just on paper or a nowhere unknown blog can feel better.
Healthier, maybe less combative from getting a better understanding of who someone is.
I don’t know if you’ve seen them, but since no one else has mentioned them, there’s a few other communities that might work for posting your thoughts besides casualconversation:
In one of your other comments on this post you mentioned somewhere to ask fact oriented questions rather than open ended questions as encouraged by asklemmy. For those, you might consider:
Otherwise just post your question in a community appropriate to the topic. Hope you find what you’re looking for from Lemmy.
Thank you, I didn’t know about goodoffmychest or general.