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Using polling to identify polarization originally caused by polling. Clever? Or unintentional irony? I stopped reading when the authors identified Facebook's "

Using polling to identify polarization originally caused by polling. Clever? Or unintentional irony? I stopped reading when the authors identified Facebook's "like" button as the culprit of accelerated polarization (during Obama's 2nd term). Um, what? While I regard Facebook and Twitter as pure unalterated evil, they cannot be held more responsible for today's toxic polarization than corporate media. To believe Haidt's thesis, you'd have to completely ignore the slope of decades of build up. I've read Haidt's prior works with great interest. Alas, his works amount to nothing more than self satisfied just so stories, telling fellow concern trolls want they want to believe. An actual historian's take on the how polling toppled political parties and begat polarization is Jill Lepore's book "If Then", which details the role of Simulatics. For more context, read Ezra Klein's "Why We Are Polarized"; how academics advocated and then reformers inacted polarization to increase accountability (to voters), how sorting and polarization inadvertently led to a "stacking" of our identities, creating "superidentities". As for Facebook and Twitter, their unique crime is using ML -- finding the difference that makes the difference -- to weaponize disinformation and profiting from the resulting lies, hate, outrage, and death. Dorsey and Zuck implemented a totality of rot and destruction that Edward Bernay couldn't dare dream of. PS: "Death" might be too strong. I'm not certain that Zuck directly profitted from genocide or teen suicide. Those might just be collateral damage vs intentional.

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jollybean 5y ago
True, but I wonder if you might be missing the participatory aspect of Social Media. Everyone gets to have a voice and put in their 2 bits of nonsense. Social Media also allows for the purposeful characterization something via slander, comedy, insult, quip etc. - basically, plebes trolling plebes, and that low form of communication tends to fire us up. As bad as mainstream news has become, at leas they have to remain mostly civil, and when the TV is off, it's off.
- specialist 5y ago
  Please say more. > True, but I wonder if you might be missing the participatory aspect of Social Media. My mental model for social media is feedback loops. Much as I hated prior corporate media (a la Chomsky, Ad Busters, others), I acknowledge that the editorial filter squelched virality (runaway positive feedback loops). Of course, we humans have always had fads, trends, groupthink. Social medias changed the filters (using Chomsky's term). Gone are the Advertiser and Publisher filters. Replaced with algorithms which boost engagement. To a degree prior medias couldn't even dream of. Like Stalin said, quantity has its own quality. What I still don't understand is how the social medias transmuted from connecting peers within my monkey sphere (family, friends, acquaintances, people with shared interests, and so on) to coordinating mass action and inciting mobs. > ... purposeful characterization something via slander, comedy, insult, quip etc I'm very interested in the repercussions of the Sandy Hook parent's defamation case against Alex Jones. Rights comes with responsibilities. Meaning speech has consequences. Perhaps if the courts allow individuals harmed by Freedom Speeches™, we won't need draconian hate speech laws and such. That'd be progress.
  - amadeuspagel 5y ago
    > Perhaps if the courts allow individuals harmed by Freedom Speeches™ I'm not sure what the purpose of this bizarre language is. It reminds me a bit of "freeze peach". Is it just to signal to anyone who believes in freedom of speech or, or just takes it seriously as a concept even if he rejects it, that you're not interested in a good faith discussion? But then why write a comment on that issue at all?
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - specialist 5y ago
      What do you call selective defense of speech while denying same right to others, the responsibilities that come with rights, real world power inbalances?

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jollybean 5y ago

True, but I wonder if you might be missing the participatory aspect of Social Media. Everyone gets to have a voice and put in their 2 bits of nonsense. Social Media also allows for the purposeful characterization something via slander, comedy, insult, quip etc. - basically, plebes trolling plebes, and that low form of communication tends to fire us up. As bad as mainstream news has become, at leas they have to remain mostly civil, and when the TV is off, it's off.

specialist 5y ago
Please say more. > True, but I wonder if you might be missing the participatory aspect of Social Media. My mental model for social media is feedback loops. Much as I hated prior corporate media (a la Chomsky, Ad Busters, others), I acknowledge that the editorial filter squelched virality (runaway positive feedback loops). Of course, we humans have always had fads, trends, groupthink. Social medias changed the filters (using Chomsky's term). Gone are the Advertiser and Publisher filters. Replaced with algorithms which boost engagement. To a degree prior medias couldn't even dream of. Like Stalin said, quantity has its own quality. What I still don't understand is how the social medias transmuted from connecting peers within my monkey sphere (family, friends, acquaintances, people with shared interests, and so on) to coordinating mass action and inciting mobs. > ... purposeful characterization something via slander, comedy, insult, quip etc I'm very interested in the repercussions of the Sandy Hook parent's defamation case against Alex Jones. Rights comes with responsibilities. Meaning speech has consequences. Perhaps if the courts allow individuals harmed by Freedom Speeches™, we won't need draconian hate speech laws and such. That'd be progress.
- amadeuspagel 5y ago
  > Perhaps if the courts allow individuals harmed by Freedom Speeches™ I'm not sure what the purpose of this bizarre language is. It reminds me a bit of "freeze peach". Is it just to signal to anyone who believes in freedom of speech or, or just takes it seriously as a concept even if he rejects it, that you're not interested in a good faith discussion? But then why write a comment on that issue at all?
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - specialist 5y ago
    What do you call selective defense of speech while denying same right to others, the responsibilities that come with rights, real world power inbalances?