This is addressed in the piece, too; some people believe that the "golden" age of radio and TV (roughly 1910 to 1970s, pre cable TV) by giving US population a mainly aligned set of media that dominated thought, was a temporary respite from the contentiousness we had previously, which was marked by many politically biased news outlets, many pamphlets, many fractured ideas, etc. There's a whole book about that idea actually.

Internet and social media can be amplifiers; that is what is explored. No one would pretend that if that is true, it means that there wasn't great division in the past. The piece is just examining the idea that: if internet/social media is a polarizing force (as a lot of psych and political science research has pointed to lately in various ways), what are some of the psychological pathways of that? It is a far from settled question; these are young techs, and our use of them changes quickly; it's a hard to study area.

Also worth pointing out: while U.S. had periods of great contention, by several important measures (political group animosity, voting of political parties in Congress) we are more polarized and divided than at any time since Civil War. This doesn't mean we are that ideologically divided (we actually are far less than is perceived), but it's to point out that something major is happening, and arguments like 'we used to have a lot of riots and assassinations in 60s' or 'some stuff happened a long time ago' doesn't take away from fact that our polarization has been increasing for decades, since roughly 1960s. In sense of how sorted we are, and in sense of how much animosity we have towards opposite political party (there's been much anger since Civil War but it was more varied, spread out amongst parties).

How open are you to the idea that the differences between sides right now are as irreconcilable as they were in the period before the Civil War? I'm not saying that we are on course for another civil war, but I suspect that the resolution of our problems will require some sort of conflict that goes beyond simple electoral politics.

Im sorry I missed that.

Fwiw, I dont actually disagree with your piece per se.
And maybe I shouldve put more emphasis on the "amplify" aspect.

But, currently it appears to me that a lot people will be quick to say, yes the internet/SM is at fault and all we need is something like censorship or SM sensitivity training and voila problem solved.

This imo is not the case and will only end up making matters worse.


Curious on your position on the following:
How do you think Parler will affect society?
Would you agree that we now see a basically uniform republican Parler aswell as an uniform democratic Twitter?

If so, on the one hand we have two extreme echo-chambers which supposedly amplifies extreme views.
On the other hand, people will (I suppose) get a lot less confronted with "content" that distresses them.

So, will it help healing or will it amplify even harder?

Fail to not name the book.

Title of book?

It's mentioned in the piece. It's called 'Writing on the Wall'.

I don't pretend to be an expert on these things. Either way (healing or greater animosity/conflicts) wouldn't surprise me.

It's a common pattern for very polarized societies/countries to have separate institutions (e.g., separate schools, separate churches, separate unions) so separate social media platforms fits this pattern, and it doesn't bode well; it's just another symptom of increased fracturing that means less ability of govt to function, increased gridlock, increased social animosity, etc.

People being in bubbles where they don't consume content that bothers them isn't a good thing; it means they become even less tolerant of the other political groups' views, which means even less chances of working together, finding common ground, etc.

While one could see some liberal leanings in Facebook and Twitter, I don't think it's as clearcut as you say. For one, these companies have a very hard problem, maybe impossible problem, trying to police controversial statements/language. It's virtually impossible to do it in a way that pleases almost everyone. There will always be perceptions of bias. You can even find many liberals who think Facebook and Twitter are biased towards conservatives.

Also, Trump supporters being increasingly distanced from reality (e.g., not accepting election results, half of them believing top Democrats are involved in a pedophile sex trafficking ring) and therefore wanting their own extreme social media platforms, doesn't mean that Twitter or Facebook is anywhere near that extreme on the liberal side, even if you can see some liberal leanings (and I wouldn't argue that they have some liberal leanings but I think they are trying to do their best at a nearly impossible job; creating and enforcing fair language policies).

Had interesting conversation with political scientist recently where he pointed out that everyone gets mad at Facebook and Twitter and such, but truth is that we really should have had better regulation for this stuff by now, but we are so gridlocked that we can't keep up with this hugely powerful technology (amongst other things we haven't been able to regulate well on). It was a good point. It shouldn't be up to these jackasses to randomly make their own polices/regulations for something that can cause such division, that can easily contribute to horrible things happening (e.g., Myanmar genocide). Don't get me wrong, though: I'm very angry at Facebook for so blithely spreading their hugely dangerous/powerful tools everywhere and thinking 'hey what could go wrong? what's the big deal' etc.

Yes.. You be either a) completely unable to get along with others IRL and/or have bits hiit insane ideas and find nirvana on social media... IRL you are ostracized acting like that

Would we have got to this point without DJT? In 20 years time?

Personally I think Trump is a despicable human being. Clearly mentally deranged

This site being social media I think is the best example of creating political animosity towards repuplicans or trump imo. (Im no trump fan or republican) but I don't have hate for them as much as others do.

It is the place where people come together and form their positions. People of different thought are attacked and not even heard.

I've heard of social media sites like 4chan where the right extremists get radicalized and some people say that social media asures thier hate and channels it. I've heard only because of that "group hate" and constant reasurement of other posters, the last attacks in Germany of far right wingers, happened for instance. They would never have done it if they don't get that confirmation of their hate from thousands of people.
That signals them they are in the right. (Which of course they are not)
They are just a group of hating people on the internet. (Meaning 4chan right extremist groups)

4chan has had this problem for a while, but it can be hard to discern the real stuff from the edgy humor there. Sometimes I think the lines are so blurred that the difference is not all that important.

But many migrated to 8chan when Reddit and 4chan started applying some minimum standards, and 8chan is a whole other ballgame. Brenton Harrison Tarrant, the New Zealand mosque shooter, had ties to 8chan. Similarly, you have the old "classics" like Stormfront, Daily Stormer and Gates of Vienna which are definitely radicalizing.

Of the mainstream sites, Facebook definitely is the one with the worst problem. A lot of radical and extremist groups have their social media home there, from Islamist extremists to US right-wing militas. They are also notoriously slow to respond with moderation and often have divest far too little resources to handle it. You actually have reports of worrying degrees of PTSD among Facebook moderators; underpaid, overworked and with little to no network to ease the burdens of moderating extremist content.

In the US you had the Boogaloo shootings in may when two law enforcement officers were killed. One of the killers, Steven Carrillo, had a large following on social media which cheered his acts on as they were happening.

The rhetoric from extremist circles does creep into the mainstream. In Europe there has been awareness for quite some years regarding this phenomena. It is often done purposefully, through techniques like ghost-skinning, extremists actively trying to gain entry into mainstream political parties, sub-cultures, law enforcement agencies or the military. The US, to my eyes, seems very naive about this development.

That makes me a little worried about the mods here. It should be a fun experience for the mods here and I hope the mods can take it light hearted.

Today I read an article about Qanon, and it is crazy, really crazy what is happening mainly in the USA. Families in deep animosites over it.
It is this article that I read, it is in german and I read it in print version.
It is about a girl, Nelly Smith, who is abondoned by her family because she is not in line with her familes stance to Trump and Qanon.
https://plus.tagesspiegel.de/gesells...ren-78497.html

I dont have time today, but would really like to discuss this topic.
If people are not familiar what it is I think this article would help.
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine...coming/610567/

For german folks:
https://www.tagesspiegel.de/politik/.../26589888.html
https://www.tagesspiegel.de/themen/r.../26160230.html

It is interesting that the person Q who started this, started it on 4chan.

Mods on 2+2 have extremely high autonomy which provides a high degree of control. There really isn't much (anything?) in the way of graphic extremist content, so all in all there is little to worry about.

Qanon is a classic example of a trend extremists will exploit to ride the band-wagon into a broader audience.

People often do the mistake of assuming extremist groups are just a collection of individuals. They function like most driven ideological groups, they seek to spread their influence and recruit people. While extremists aren't necessarily the brightest bunch around, it often attracts key influencers; people who enjoy the respect and control afforded by becoming the voices of the movement and who have the ability to word themselves well. Since it takes place in echo-chambers I suspect there is little of the pushback you get from trying to do these things outside the echo-chambers.

White supremacists in particular have become very adept at using social media to amplify their message and gain access to mainstream politics. The Daily Stormer "troll army" is a classic example and one people would do well to research it they want to see how that process goes.