As it does so many.
The problem with the "Ask away" at Shroomery is that asking generally leads to people spamming one or more of three things:
- UTSF!
- It's bacterial!
- [Link to Tek that you probably already looked at that may or may not have to do with your pertinent situation]
Honestly, 90% of the time it's not the staff or seasoned members/Trusted Cultivators who spout that shit.
Don't get me wrong - they have their own rough edges.
But, for whatever reason, there's always this huge wave of novice growers who just hound new members who maybe don't comprehend the way the Teks are written or are simply just looking for clarification. I guess those novices feel like, because they've gotten through the shit storm, they can rain that shit down on someone else..?
I think that's a lot of times where the mods/TC's will also come off as assholes... trying to reel in the bullshit from people who've got one or two so-so grows under their belt and think they're Paul Stamets...
And, if I go back to my partisan rift mentality - there's also just a weird absolutism there to the methodology.. people are scarce to embrace the weird... Granted, a lot of times the weird is just a recipe for failure that people are trying to have others avoid, but it still feels stunted by 'which method is the best?' The RogerRabbits? The Hippie3's? Stamets? (Stamets is shat on there, too... sometimes duly, most of the time not.) For fucks sake, they're all basically the same thing even.
I dunno. I think the mushcult culture just started off on a weird foot and never really got its balance... at least as a whole community. There are, without a doubt, exceptional individuals all over it... but that's riddled with a lot of hostility between the lines...
I started off on Mycotopia and the community there was much much more inviting like this one... but the content just fizzled out and so did the membership... so it just kinda stagnated.
Shroomery, at the time, felt like going to an ICP show with a bunch of dudes who sold drugs out of trash bags...
I dunno where I'm going with this ramble...
Basically, there isn't a great sense of all-inclusive community in online mushroom cultivation world. There are really wonderful people with really extensive knowledge. But all the information you could ever need to grow an ounce or a warehouse of mushrooms is available there.
I haven't visited Mycotopia in nearly a decade... I might see if there's been any revitalization there...