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OK, so I'm reading a Hitler biography and it's affecting my outlook, but I think we all need to step back for a moment and acknowledge that people hated their p
by nineplay 5y ago
OK, so I'm reading a Hitler biography and it's affecting my outlook, but I think we all need to step back for a moment and acknowledge that people hated their political opponents long before Facebook came along.
I do think FB is pushing people to extremes. More precisely I think social media is pushing people to extremes, I find twitter a lot more antagonistic than FB actually, where people think they can 'destroy' their opponents in 280 characters or less. Reddit is a cesspool. We know, or we should know, that these sites are deliberately divisive . There are bad actors who want us to be really angry, all the time, because angry people are stupid.
It still is just the latest iteration. People used to gather in beer halls. People used to gather in churches. People used to have their social clubs and circles and had been able to carefully manipulate their environments so that people who disagreed with them lived and worked and went to school far, far away.
This anger doesn't go away if Facebook goes away. I'm not sure how to make it go away. I'd wish that people could take a step back and consider for a moment that maybe intelligent, decent people can disagree with them. Probably not.
- germinalphrase 5y agoCounterpoint: strong social bonds and centers of community make people less susceptible to extremist beliefs/behavior by reducing atomization. In my farm town, both the democrat and the conservative farmer go to the VFW for fish fry. Or - at least - they used to.
- Loughla 5y agoCounter-counterpoint: those social bonds made sure 'new' thoughts were excluded inherently, ensuring differences were small, local, and low-friction. Take segregation for instance. How open to conversation about abolishing segregation would the folks at the VFW fish fry have been?
- nineplay 5y agoMy father tried to go to a VFW meeting after Vietnam and he was treated like crap by the WWII veterans. These clubs are more exclusive than one might hope. That was a long time ago, but today's Afghanistan veterans may not be getting a warm welcome either. See also how Black WWII veterans were treated at the officers clubs. Not well. The matter I described earlier still applies too. When neighborhoods have been carefully and deliberately segregated, you don't run into much risk of seeing neighbors of a different religion and color at your fish fries.
- germinalphrase 5y agoI agree; however, I would argue that community bonds are a moderating force that prevents extremism - which can of course be bad. If everyone in town is racist, the abolitionist/desegregation advocate/anti-racist is extreme.