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> I believe the parent comment is describing how most people had friends of various backgrounds that they saw physically and communicated with freely - instead

> I believe the parent comment is describing how most people had friends of various backgrounds that they saw physically and communicated with freely - instead of having a social filter over digital connections that blocked them immediately before they ever really knew them. In person or not, everyone has a social filter on who they interact with. Your wealth, race, gender, orientation, interests, and location all act as filters against who you'll interact with, let alone be friends with. If you go to Harvard, how much relative opportunity do you think that gives you to befriend someone who isn't a rich white person? Especially, ya know, when only white people (white men, even) could even go to Harvard. These filters are more or less permeable by the culture and scope of your life, but if you think there's some magical moment in the past when white people by an large all had black friends or rich people all had poor friends, you're dreaming. It's easier now to experience perspectives alien to you by a country mile. It's also easier for them to intrude into your life. Somehow, it's the most privileged people are the most likely to call this intrusion an attack. To call people wanting to re-establish boundaries with them a violation of their 'right to free speech'. Funny that.

free_rms 6y ago
Let's slow down on calling anyone else privileged when most of us are in arguably the most privileged profession to ever exist. A few things are true about wealth distribution, it's empirically become more concentrated and also more localized to elite urban areas. When people from this urban elite start calling everyone else privileged and intolerant to the point that they don't deserve a voice.. it's not a great look.
- stormbrew 6y ago
  Or, people here could admit their privilege rather than try to deny it. I am absolutely privileged on some very very important axes (somewhat the opposite in others). I'm throwing stones in the glass house because the glass house is shitty.
  - bumby 6y ago
    I don't know if you realize it but you seem to give yourself a more nuanced existence while denying that same understanding in others' parent comments. You (rightly) acknowledged that you can be privileged in some areas but disadvantaged in others, but seem to take the stance in a previous statement that there is no progress, just "gilded age nonsense" because there are still marginalized groups. We can acknowledge progress while still admitting there is a lot of work to be done. There's no reason to treat them as mutually exclusive. My worry is that those who take the alternate stance ironically end up alienating potential allies. Or, to butcher the old idiom, they fail to realize that expecting perfection can get in the way of progress.
    - stormbrew 6y ago
      Sorry, how have I argued there has been no progress? I would certainly say that on social issues I do not believe there has been enough progress, but there absolutely has been a lot of progress. On the specific issue of bubbles, I have argued for a complex view that the nature of the boundaries of people's social bubbles have changed. As I don't think there's a good way to measure this I take as a baseline that it may have largely stayed the same but the way we experience conflict over it has changed.
      - bumby 6y ago
        Your previous dismissal of in-person social interaction as evidence comes across as stating there was no progress on this front until the internet "finally" forced people to interact across cultural lines. My apologies if I misinterpreted your point.
        stormbrew 6y ago
        Oh, I mean, I think the bubbles have shifted to some degree historically depending on culture and conflict but did largely remain within the scope possible with in person interaction. Exposure to groups outside an individual's own has grown with every communication invention as well, from books to newspapers to radio to phones to the internet. Social media I think does, however, represent an exponential growth in how much "outside perspective" people are exposed to, as well as the intrusiveness of those perspectives. All those other communication inventions required filtering perspectives through layers of privilege (media, basically). On social media though I can post a tweet about my lunch and have someone from across the ocean tell me I deserve to die for who I am in the replies to it. No one in history has ever had to face that level of forced interaction on so mundane a social act until now. And that's why we put up walls. To get back to where we were 20 years ago. Not because we can't handle "disagreement", but because when I'm eating lunch I don't want to be told I don't deserve to live.
manigandham 6y ago
What magical moment? You seem to be reaching for extremes rather than accepting the very reasonable assertion that the vast majority of people now pick a side and never engage in any dialogue. All those characteristics you mentioned are outward and secondary to the one that matters the most - the way you think. The original post said "varying opinions". Your beliefs, character and worldview are far more important than what you look like and you had to actually communicate with people to understand this. This built much better dialogue and interactions. Now it takes a few taps to block millions based on assumptions and the most tenuous associations, as well as surface attributes like you mentioned. Someone merely liking a post you disagree with is enough to end a relationship. New perspectives being easier to experience also means they're easier to block, and the latter is the issue being discussed. As far as "right to free speech" is concerned, I don't see what it has to do with this but regardless you also have a right to not participate in any discussion. Nobody is forcing you to talk, and nobody ever could.
- stormbrew 6y ago
  I'm not the one who started with the comparison between past and present. The original post I was responding to was clearly saying that people were better in the past. My assertion is simple: people have always lived in bubbles (honestly this is so blatantly true it's hilarious anyone even tries to argue against it) and the internet has only strengthened those bubbles in so far as it has forced people to confront the edges of them more readily. No one ever had to "block millions" until twitter existed. The concept was meaningless. Every day of anyone's life before the internet every single person was ignoring the lives of countless people who had no way to reach them, an effective but implicit block on literally everything uncomfortable in the world.
  - bumby 6y ago
    >It's easier now to experience perspectives >the internet has only strengthened those bubbles I’m having a hard time tracking whether you think things are better or worse now, unless you are asserting the contact hypothesis is wrong

free_rms 6y ago

Let's slow down on calling anyone else privileged when most of us are in arguably the most privileged profession to ever exist. A few things are true about wealth distribution, it's empirically become more concentrated and also more localized to elite urban areas. When people from this urban elite start calling everyone else privileged and intolerant to the point that they don't deserve a voice.. it's not a great look.

stormbrew 6y ago
Or, people here could admit their privilege rather than try to deny it. I am absolutely privileged on some very very important axes (somewhat the opposite in others). I'm throwing stones in the glass house because the glass house is shitty.
- bumby 6y ago
  I don't know if you realize it but you seem to give yourself a more nuanced existence while denying that same understanding in others' parent comments. You (rightly) acknowledged that you can be privileged in some areas but disadvantaged in others, but seem to take the stance in a previous statement that there is no progress, just "gilded age nonsense" because there are still marginalized groups. We can acknowledge progress while still admitting there is a lot of work to be done. There's no reason to treat them as mutually exclusive. My worry is that those who take the alternate stance ironically end up alienating potential allies. Or, to butcher the old idiom, they fail to realize that expecting perfection can get in the way of progress.
  - stormbrew 6y ago
    Sorry, how have I argued there has been no progress? I would certainly say that on social issues I do not believe there has been enough progress, but there absolutely has been a lot of progress. On the specific issue of bubbles, I have argued for a complex view that the nature of the boundaries of people's social bubbles have changed. As I don't think there's a good way to measure this I take as a baseline that it may have largely stayed the same but the way we experience conflict over it has changed.
    - bumby 6y ago
      Your previous dismissal of in-person social interaction as evidence comes across as stating there was no progress on this front until the internet "finally" forced people to interact across cultural lines. My apologies if I misinterpreted your point.
      - stormbrew 6y ago
        Oh, I mean, I think the bubbles have shifted to some degree historically depending on culture and conflict but did largely remain within the scope possible with in person interaction. Exposure to groups outside an individual's own has grown with every communication invention as well, from books to newspapers to radio to phones to the internet. Social media I think does, however, represent an exponential growth in how much "outside perspective" people are exposed to, as well as the intrusiveness of those perspectives. All those other communication inventions required filtering perspectives through layers of privilege (media, basically). On social media though I can post a tweet about my lunch and have someone from across the ocean tell me I deserve to die for who I am in the replies to it. No one in history has ever had to face that level of forced interaction on so mundane a social act until now. And that's why we put up walls. To get back to where we were 20 years ago. Not because we can't handle "disagreement", but because when I'm eating lunch I don't want to be told I don't deserve to live.

manigandham 6y ago

What magical moment? You seem to be reaching for extremes rather than accepting the very reasonable assertion that the vast majority of people now pick a side and never engage in any dialogue. All those characteristics you mentioned are outward and secondary to the one that matters the most - the way you think. The original post said "varying opinions". Your beliefs, character and worldview are far more important than what you look like and you had to actually communicate with people to understand this. This built much better dialogue and interactions. Now it takes a few taps to block millions based on assumptions and the most tenuous associations, as well as surface attributes like you mentioned. Someone merely liking a post you disagree with is enough to end a relationship. New perspectives being easier to experience also means they're easier to block, and the latter is the issue being discussed. As far as "right to free speech" is concerned, I don't see what it has to do with this but regardless you also have a right to not participate in any discussion. Nobody is forcing you to talk, and nobody ever could.

stormbrew 6y ago
I'm not the one who started with the comparison between past and present. The original post I was responding to was clearly saying that people were better in the past. My assertion is simple: people have always lived in bubbles (honestly this is so blatantly true it's hilarious anyone even tries to argue against it) and the internet has only strengthened those bubbles in so far as it has forced people to confront the edges of them more readily. No one ever had to "block millions" until twitter existed. The concept was meaningless. Every day of anyone's life before the internet every single person was ignoring the lives of countless people who had no way to reach them, an effective but implicit block on literally everything uncomfortable in the world.
- bumby 6y ago
  >It's easier now to experience perspectives >the internet has only strengthened those bubbles I’m having a hard time tracking whether you think things are better or worse now, unless you are asserting the contact hypothesis is wrong