5 ms·

It's very fashionable to suggest that social media is polarising. It's not clear from actual research that that is true. Most people lived in an echo chamber be

by ppod 10y ago

It's very fashionable to suggest that social media is polarising. It's not clear from actual research that that is true. Most people lived in an echo chamber before social media anyway. We live in the most peaceful time in human history. Yes, it's true that we can't know the tail risk, but we can take some comfort that, for example, war between two German provinces, or a North American civil war, are remote possibilities compared with 150 years ago. http://pablobarbera.com/static/barbera_polarization_APSA.pdf http://pablobarbera.com/static/barbera_polarization_APSA.pdf

bdamm 10y ago
American civil war feels quite possible at the moment. Even passing a budget is becoming a gargantuan governmental task subject to polarization and media trench warfare.
- JeffreyKaine 10y ago
  Insurgency, maybe, but a full out civil war would be very very implausible at this point. State militias are severely underpowered to launch a full on war.
  - stcredzero 10y ago
    Basically: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs
- PhasmaFelis 10y ago
  > American civil war feels quite possible at the moment. I think that's unrealistic. What group has both the motivation and ability to rally both state governments and a large chunk of the military into open warfare on American soil? Both parties love polarizing rhetoric to keep their base riled up, but they have nothing to gain and everything to lose in an open civil war. Various militias, "patriots," and racial and religious warriors can occupy some government buildings, kill some cops, and provoke disastrous police standoffs, but have no ability whatsoever to prosecute an actual war.
- smsm42 10y ago
  Passing a budget is a gargantuan governmental task - it's almost 4 trillion dollars, you think it should or could be just thrown around like peanuts? Now if somebody thought about making this budget less gargantuan, that would be interesting - but nobody ever does that.
- guelo 10y ago
  Indeed. As a political independent I was hoping for a Republican president this time around in order to give the more extreme right wing partisans some chill after 8 years of demonizing Obama. Hillary is probably the worst possible choice for those people and they are openly talking about armed revolt.
stcredzero 10y ago
It's very fashionable to suggest that social media is polarising. It's very fashionable, because it has produced jaw-dropping public idiocy with unprecedented immediacy on a huge scale. It has given a voice to the loudest idiots, along with the power of the mob. It has unprecedented power to give people license to denigrate other people and anger them, including people they know or are related to. This only figures, as its viral power comes from precisely that effect. (That effect on our affect, no less.) Maybe it's just like the stylized mock battles carried out by rival little towns in Tuscany dating from the middle ages and renaissance. Maybe it will just amount to blowing off steam and "local color" in the long view of history. I sure hope that undergrads screaming that Yale is not a place of learning is not a harbinger of the future.
- smsm42 10y ago
  Idiots were always around, and they didn't make too much effort to hide either. Remember that people used to gather mobs and actually hang other people, beat them to death, torch their houses, etc. instead of insulting them on twitter. I think there's an improvement here.
  - unclebucknasty 10y ago
    >I think there's an improvement here. I don't know about that. I mean, sure, it's better to be trolled with tweets than hung, but there is something insidious about the way social media, etc. is changing us collectively. We seem to be getting meaner and more polarized on a macro level. Our interactions are more superficial and staged even. And, the idiots seem to wield a disproportionate amount of "power" these days. It's like idiocy concentrate.
    - hairy_man674 10y ago
      A professor of mine in my first year of college gave a lecture on Determinism and Free Will. His thesis was basically what you described above: subtle yet gradual determination of how we think, believe what is important to us, what we buy etc through your environment and circumstances. Seriously, social media is a numbing poison to the mind....
drieddust 10y ago
> We live in the most peaceful time in human history. While it might be true for you and me, it is not true for a large chunk of populace, There is constant war going on in various parts of the world. For example Africa and Middle East is experiencing constant war and loss of lives. Ignoring the civil conflicts, look at the list of countries invaded. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_invasions https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_invasions
- CountSessine 10y ago
  For example Africa and Middle East is experiencing constant war and loss of lives Well, obviously they just need more social media and wikipedia.
- FeepingCreature 10y ago
  Honest question: were they ever not?
- Scarblac 10y ago
  Yes, but when was it ever better?
petre 10y ago
> It's very fashionable to suggest that social media is polarising Well, the media us polarising as well only in more subtile ways -- for example by throwing paranoid pro-Trump comments in an article about Wikipedia. > we can take some comfort that, for example, war between two German provinces, or a North American civil war, are remote possibilities compared with 150 years ago. What about the Yugoslavian wars? Or wars orchestrated by the US in the Middle East. If it's peaceful in your zip code it doesn't mean there's peace in Israel for instance, a country that has been in a perpetual state of war since it came to be.
fdgdasfadsf 10y ago
> We live in the most peaceful time in human history. Any actual evidence for this? Or do you just mean the most peaceful for Western countries time in human history?
- qq66 10y ago
  https://www.amazon.com/Better-Angels-Our-Nature-Violence/dp/0670022950/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1326321583&sr=1-1&tag=reasonmagazineA https://www.amazon.com/Better-Angels-Our-Nature-Violence/dp/...
  - fdgdasfadsf 10y ago
    Yeah I thought that would be posted. Steven Pinker's theories only work if you do things like imagine that we live in a world without slavery...
  - jhbadger 10y ago
    Pinker reminds me a lot of the Victorian Herbert Spencer. They were both social scientists fascinated by biology and who believed things were just getting better and better. Of course Spencer's fame took a nosedive when the first world war happened (which wasn't predicted at all by his rosy ramblings).
listentojohan 10y ago
There was a study[1] done in Denmark which showed that while the large population would refrain from engaging in political debates on facebook (me included, I simply don't have the patience), the ones who did often found that their views could be changed. [1]: http://en.itu.dk/About-ITU/Press/News-from-ITU/Danes-are-reluctant-to-discuss-politics-on-Facebook http://en.itu.dk/About-ITU/Press/News-from-ITU/Danes-are-rel...

by ppod 10y ago

bdamm 10y ago

American civil war feels quite possible at the moment. Even passing a budget is becoming a gargantuan governmental task subject to polarization and media trench warfare.

JeffreyKaine 10y ago
Insurgency, maybe, but a full out civil war would be very very implausible at this point. State militias are severely underpowered to launch a full on war.
- stcredzero 10y ago
  Basically: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rStL7niR7gs
PhasmaFelis 10y ago
> American civil war feels quite possible at the moment. I think that's unrealistic. What group has both the motivation and ability to rally both state governments and a large chunk of the military into open warfare on American soil? Both parties love polarizing rhetoric to keep their base riled up, but they have nothing to gain and everything to lose in an open civil war. Various militias, "patriots," and racial and religious warriors can occupy some government buildings, kill some cops, and provoke disastrous police standoffs, but have no ability whatsoever to prosecute an actual war.
smsm42 10y ago
Passing a budget is a gargantuan governmental task - it's almost 4 trillion dollars, you think it should or could be just thrown around like peanuts? Now if somebody thought about making this budget less gargantuan, that would be interesting - but nobody ever does that.
guelo 10y ago
Indeed. As a political independent I was hoping for a Republican president this time around in order to give the more extreme right wing partisans some chill after 8 years of demonizing Obama. Hillary is probably the worst possible choice for those people and they are openly talking about armed revolt.

stcredzero 10y ago

It's very fashionable to suggest that social media is polarising. It's very fashionable, because it has produced jaw-dropping public idiocy with unprecedented immediacy on a huge scale. It has given a voice to the loudest idiots, along with the power of the mob. It has unprecedented power to give people license to denigrate other people and anger them, including people they know or are related to. This only figures, as its viral power comes from precisely that effect. (That effect on our affect, no less.) Maybe it's just like the stylized mock battles carried out by rival little towns in Tuscany dating from the middle ages and renaissance. Maybe it will just amount to blowing off steam and "local color" in the long view of history. I sure hope that undergrads screaming that Yale is not a place of learning is not a harbinger of the future.

smsm42 10y ago
Idiots were always around, and they didn't make too much effort to hide either. Remember that people used to gather mobs and actually hang other people, beat them to death, torch their houses, etc. instead of insulting them on twitter. I think there's an improvement here.
- unclebucknasty 10y ago
  >I think there's an improvement here. I don't know about that. I mean, sure, it's better to be trolled with tweets than hung, but there is something insidious about the way social media, etc. is changing us collectively. We seem to be getting meaner and more polarized on a macro level. Our interactions are more superficial and staged even. And, the idiots seem to wield a disproportionate amount of "power" these days. It's like idiocy concentrate.
  - hairy_man674 10y ago
    A professor of mine in my first year of college gave a lecture on Determinism and Free Will. His thesis was basically what you described above: subtle yet gradual determination of how we think, believe what is important to us, what we buy etc through your environment and circumstances. Seriously, social media is a numbing poison to the mind....

drieddust 10y ago

> We live in the most peaceful time in human history. While it might be true for you and me, it is not true for a large chunk of populace, There is constant war going on in various parts of the world. For example Africa and Middle East is experiencing constant war and loss of lives. Ignoring the civil conflicts, look at the list of countries invaded. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_invasions https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_invasions

CountSessine 10y ago
For example Africa and Middle East is experiencing constant war and loss of lives Well, obviously they just need more social media and wikipedia.
FeepingCreature 10y ago
Honest question: were they ever not?
Scarblac 10y ago
Yes, but when was it ever better?

petre 10y ago

> It's very fashionable to suggest that social media is polarising Well, the media us polarising as well only in more subtile ways -- for example by throwing paranoid pro-Trump comments in an article about Wikipedia. > we can take some comfort that, for example, war between two German provinces, or a North American civil war, are remote possibilities compared with 150 years ago. What about the Yugoslavian wars? Or wars orchestrated by the US in the Middle East. If it's peaceful in your zip code it doesn't mean there's peace in Israel for instance, a country that has been in a perpetual state of war since it came to be.

fdgdasfadsf 10y ago

> We live in the most peaceful time in human history. Any actual evidence for this? Or do you just mean the most peaceful for Western countries time in human history?

qq66 10y ago
https://www.amazon.com/Better-Angels-Our-Nature-Violence/dp/0670022950/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1326321583&sr=1-1&tag=reasonmagazineA https://www.amazon.com/Better-Angels-Our-Nature-Violence/dp/...
- fdgdasfadsf 10y ago
  Yeah I thought that would be posted. Steven Pinker's theories only work if you do things like imagine that we live in a world without slavery...
- jhbadger 10y ago
  Pinker reminds me a lot of the Victorian Herbert Spencer. They were both social scientists fascinated by biology and who believed things were just getting better and better. Of course Spencer's fame took a nosedive when the first world war happened (which wasn't predicted at all by his rosy ramblings).

listentojohan 10y ago

There was a study[1] done in Denmark which showed that while the large population would refrain from engaging in political debates on facebook (me included, I simply don't have the patience), the ones who did often found that their views could be changed. [1]: http://en.itu.dk/About-ITU/Press/News-from-ITU/Danes-are-reluctant-to-discuss-politics-on-Facebook http://en.itu.dk/About-ITU/Press/News-from-ITU/Danes-are-rel...