People on Lemmy are essentially the same as they are on Reddit
Don't get me wrong, it's a better experience over all, but basically group dynamics and mob mentality are the same, just at an acceptably lower volume.
I think the real strength of Lemmy isn't anything fancy, it's just that there's fewer people and that creates a more communal vibe and leaves a little more room for conversation.
It also has a host of knock on effects: better moderation, visibility without a ton of upvotes, longer conversations....
I don't know if anyone thinks it--I'm pretty good at arguing against positions nobody's taking--but overall people on Lemmy aren't any different.
I left Reddit because I couldn't access it through the API anymore. The people weren't a problem in the subs I followed. It was the ads.
Yeah, smaller subs are fine by virtue of being smaller--fewer political/corporate actors, better moderation, more visibility for comments regardless of votes....
I think the big problem with the API loss was moderation became even more difficult, leading to thoughtless (bad) moderation.