That's not what the first 2 guys said though, they just criticized his choice of words(even though he's an amateur) and started ranting about colonizers. It's not helpful. Comments like that just push new people away and make the community look unwelcoming.

You are right, we pulled a ton of invasive weeds and every spring I go to war with the garlic mustard that’s trying to take over my yard.

Native species are coming back and we just planted 3 beds of native flowers last fall, and I’ve got a bunch of native herbs to plant this spring.

A lot of the stuff we’ve planted just takes care of itself with no watering after it’s established which is nice.

It's a mixed bag. Some natives grow easily, as they are naturally adapted to the climate, but some can be tricky little bastards as they are only adapted to very specific conditions that may or may not exist in your home yard (or they would do well once established, but getting to that point is difficult). Introduced species can be easier to grow, because they're overadapted to the climate (that's what makes invasive species so, well, invasive!).

Your example of growing catmint is a bit of luck on your part: mint is often considered a weed for growing so vigorously, so it's a great choice for novice or "brown-thumb" gardeners. These are the types of plants we should be specifically promoting, so new gardeners don't have to rely on luckily stumbling upon easy-to-grow natives.

On that note, might I advertise my namesake plant, "fireweed" (Chamaenerion angustifolium)? Beautiful flowers, easy to establish, self-sufficient once established (it's called fireweed for a reason!), and beloved by bees. Native to much of Canada and the United States (and maybe northern Europe/Asia?). https://www.fs.usda.gov/wildflowers/plant-of-the-week/chamerion_angustifolium.shtml

There's such a thing as too much information, and it's not always relevant to a beginner.

At this point, seeing behavior and responses like this in so many communities of my interests, I feel like even that gentle of an approach is still too much agenda-pushing.

Not that the agenda in question lacks for value, ethics, or good intentions, but at the end of the day, based on the newbies inquiry, it's still some version of, "You're wrong for wanting to explore your interest. You should do what I tell you to do instead."

In the communities for my interests that I participate in, I try (and sometimes fail, we're all human), to explicitly steer clear of doing anything to diminish their enthusiasm, curiosity, and desire to learn. That's the little ember that they need to really get going, so for me, the priority is not to put that out.

Especially in a case like this where, sure, maybe a native garden is ideal...but the alternative if they get overwhelmed or shut down or forcibly redirected by the community is probably just going to be grass and weeds, or no plants at all.

I think it's great to offer up the natives as an alternative (while explaining the benefits to both the local ecosystem as well as to the gardener), but I would also say that if you're going to do that, one should also encourage them to get into their new interest regardless of whether they follow that suggestion or not.

If OP wants to plant tulips, fantastic, and I'll give you any tips I can on how to do that. I may suggest natives and why they're also a great choice, but under no circumstances will I go into negative territory in telling them they shouldn't follow up on their interest, unless of course it's illegal, dangerous, harmful, etc.

Unfortunately, the Chads used wrong argumentation that gets close to populism.

owww the angle of the shoe, that can't be good!!!

this is obviously AI right? (edit: just to be clear, the alternative is that it's a hand-crafted photoshop)

What the fuck is this image encoding ? Also what the fuck is the image ?