Yes, some instances are problematic, yes, some devs might have had problematic views.
I mean that’s basically the crux of it. That, and some moderation drama, and the software being very buggy a year ago giving people a bad first impression, and Lemmy still being susceptible to spam.
It’ll take some time before Lemmy (and the Threadiverse as a whole) improves its reputation and moves on from the “it’s a tankie website” take. That said, a lot of people in that thread are making the case for Lemmy, so it’s mostly just people worried it’s not as popular.
Yup, things have definitely improved, especially with more extremist instances like lemmygrad being defederated and phased out. I do also want to give a shoutout to the devs for not pushing their stance and letting the platform grow naturally.