I have been doing a bit of reading recently about the internet, communities and the concept of virtual communities which develop over time. The internet seems to offer an incredible ability for us to connect regardless of geographical boundaries. To find information on a broad range of topics and often to find first hand accounts of how the stories we see in the news are affecting communities around the world. To engage with people we might not otherwise ever talk to and find points of commonality as well as develop a certain level of respect for ideas we disagree with.
But I have found that the more I read other blogs, particularly political blogs, the more I appreciate my readers here. It seems that in any serious discussion, there are two basic types of comments left: “Amen” or “You’re an idiot.” There is very little meaningful or respectful discussion of any issue.
Maybe it is the nature of the blog and the internet. A million voices are shouting through the noise and the easiest way to attract a following is to market outrage. The e-newsletters I receive never merely outline an issue, provide some b
ackground and offer suggestions for organizing against an action. Mixed in with this purported goal of the newsletter are hyperbolic statements about the end of America. The end of homeschooling. The end of the family. The end of worker’s rights.
Everything is sensationalized. There is never a middle ground. There is always a call to arms. And someone like me who generally believes that most of the consequences we get ourselves so upset about were unintended consequences of an action designed for good is passed off as “blind to what is really going on.”
Speaking about the recent outrage over Prince Harry’s comments about the Taliban and an Pakistani officer, Bookworm Room (via To Love Honor and Vacuum) puts it best,
The level of anger and hysteria about everything nowadays — absolutely everything — just puts me off, especially because it leaves no room to paint with the real brush of outrage. If calling your enemy by a pejorative, or using a very low level slur in a sarcastic way to refer to someone who is obviously a comrade in arms, is exactly as horrific as using children as human shields, you’ve rendered your moral compass useless. To use an analogy only those of us over 40 understand, if you play your records at 78 rpm, they all sound like indistinguishable gibberish. We live in such a hysterical era.
Hysteria and outrage, not simple disagreement. This incident can be exchanged with so many issues going on in our culture and our government. That whole Subway thing? Sure, if you were upset about it you don’t have to eat at Subway. But the comparison to “Negroes need not apply” were a bit over the top for me. The Motrinmoms thing? I was all for baby wearing mothers to bring attention to the ads and to baby wearing in general. But in the end it reached a level of outrage which went a little beyond rational. Especially once I began to see blog posts popping up asking if Motrin’s actions were “enough” once they pulled the campaign. Even the current outrage over CPSIA. I am totally against this law, and believe that we do need to act against it. But do I believe that our elected representatives are sitting around in darkened rooms thinking up ways to kill small business and take books away from children? Hardly.
The Economist has an interesting article which Lynn of Bore Me to Tears linked in my comment box and I’ve been meaning to come back to ever since:
“We now live in a giant feedback loop,” says Mr Bishop, “hearing our own thoughts about what’s right and wrong bounced back to us by the television shows we watch, the newspapers and books we read, the blogs we visit online, the sermons we hear and the neighbourhoods we live in.” The Economist
It doesn’t seem to be about community anymore, but about isolation. The paths of communication between groups are getting narrower with the advent of the internet rather than broader, pushing us to the extremes of our political philosophies as there is a decreasing need to get along with anyone who disagrees. We are in a “giant feedback loop” as American society becomes increasingly fragmented according to religious and political views.
There is a danger in this. Studies suggest that when a group is ideologically homogeneous, its members tend to grow more extreme. Even clever, fair-minded people are not immune. Cass Sunstein and David Schkade, two academics, found that Republican-appointed judges vote more conservatively when sitting on a panel with other Republicans than when sitting with Democrats. Democratic judges become more liberal when on the bench with fellow Democrats. Ibid.
At first, I thought what I was seeing on the internet was a combination of providing a platform for extreme views to be expressed and the lower level of social inhibitions in online communication. But now I’m not so sure. As it becomes easier to associate only with those we agree with, we are pushed to the extreme. Outrage is cultivated and rewarded through attention, traffic and a following.
What could be an excellent tool for community building and crossing political and religious divides may actually be making those divisions deeper and more difficult to cross.
I agree on some levels and disagree on others. Perhaps it has to do with the blogs you decide to follow. As someone with a chronic illness who is isolated from the world in many ways, finding blogs has been a way for me to participate in community by responding to posts I read and learning about the people who are out there. I read homeschooling blogs, blogs about folks with learning disabilties, autism spectrum disorders, and several blogs written by Christians that I find very encouraging.
I think that like in most arenas in life, you will find what you are looking for. I don’t subscribe to the sensationalizers (is that a word???), but rather those I feel I can learn from or connect to.
So, do I think blogs are ruining communication? Somes, for some people, maybe … nice decisive answer, huh?
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I see what you mean and on some blogs that is certainly true. I think on mine we have some substantive comments, but I have had a few call me an idiot. Some of the best discussions have happened on some of my theology posts.
It really depends on how the post is written as well. Do you try to draw out a response from people. Sometimes posts are so closed and definitive that people are discouraged to comment.
I agree with both of you. I don’t have those issues here. Most of the comments here are thoughtful regardless of whether or not the people posting agree.
There is an opportunity for meaningful dialogue and communication, and certainly there are those who use that opportunity and benefit from it. It is most of why I enjoy blogging and the internet.
But there is also no temperance for extreme views. In a “real” community, we are all forced to interact on some levels whether or not we agree with each other. Now we have Paulville, a planned community for Ron Paul supporters. And the Christian Exodus movement which wants us all to move to South Carolina.
I’ve never heard anyone in real life call Bush a Nazi, but on the Internet you’re a moron if you don’t see that he is. Everything seems to push people toward extreme statements because that is what draws traffic.
Thanks for linking ot my article!
I totally agree with you (and perhaps some of the others should read the original article you linked to, and the one that linked to, to get the full perspective).
But when we have echo chambers, we do tend to get extreme. And there’s a danger in that, because we don’t recognize true evil.
We need to fight, we need to pray, we need to be engaged. But that’s different from being enraged. One is productive; one is just vindictive. We need to find that balance.
A-MEN.
I also agree that some of these things vary depending on what type of blog your follow.
Hmm… I tend to leave quite a few “amen” comments on blogs. I realize this isn’t the best form of commenting, but if I have nothing else to add, I merely nod in agreement–as I do in normal conversation.
And this leads me to the conclusion that while, yes, blogs allow us to have a broader application of our communication styles–and therefore allow for greater dysfunction in our communication–the medium merely amplifies people’s natural tendencies. If we are people who enjoy secluding ourselves from dissenting voices, we will do so on our blogs. On the other hand, if we enjoy a raucous debate, we will jump in with both guns blazing. And yet, if we can keep a level head, we will find blogs an excellent place to share ideas and discuss differences.
The bigger problem, I’m guessing, is that we have learned to sensationalize everything. We are trained in “debate” classes in school that “if nobody dies, nobody cries” and thereby can push anything to damnation and destruction. …which isn’t level headed at all. That is a learned form of communication, and the media push it and we feed it back into the system via our social media.
To fix this problem we must learn to be more balanced, gracious, winsome and wise in our interactions on our blogs and elsewhere.
My two cents.
~Luke
Great insight!
I do see alliances in blogging. In fact, it is one of the things that can keep me from voicing my ideal or thought in regards to a post. Unfortunately, or fortunately depending upon how you look at it, I tend to still open my big mouth and voice my opinion regardless. Sometimes it hurts too… when your idea or point of view is attacked.
Sometimes I like to voice an opposing view to make myself think further and deeper than my gut reaction… sometimes that opinion might not even be my truest or purest thought/opinion/reaction… it’s me trying to expand. So getting lambasted for such can send someone away, keeping their thought to themselves and then you end with a conversation that is pretty much an agreement with whatever was posted.
Also, I like blogs and posts that make me think, that reach beyond my comfort level or my realm of experience… they allow me to grow and exercise my power of thinking/reasoning/analyzing.
I hope people can keep this in mind when they are tempted to attack another for their responses. Think how boring and colorless the world would be if we all thought and believed alike.
Nodding in agreement with Luke, I think the debate or adversarial model for argument is the problem — as in court proceedings where the whole point is to craft and present two irreconcilable “sides” and then force an artificial choice between them, knowing neither one can be true because it’s intentionally skewed and slanted to “win” rather than figure out the real truth.
Collective wisdom models are a great improvement on this imo, as we pioneer ways to gather and pool conflicting facts and ideas and perspectives, intending to fit them all together into the one fuller version of truth or the solution/answer better for everyone. . .
Read the first few pages of Chapter 6 to see what I mean.
Luke, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean there was anything wrong with the amen comment on its own. They tend to come about on posts where there just isn’t anything to add to what the blogger wrote but you still want to leave a tip of the hat so to speak. I was referring more to the general idea that readers seem to either completely agree or think the author is an idiot.
And a lot of bloggers cultivate that. As Shawna says, you can get attacked personally for disagreement. I don’t get it a lot on my blog. But there is a concept I ran across awhile back which explains the popularity of annoying, sensationalist blogs and forums where dissent is ridiculed…and why people go back to them for more:
Rather than let heated tempers rise, let’s blow off steam on the Net.Scandal mailing list . . . If you’ve got a beef, this is a good place to beat it to death. The list is “dedicated to the pursuit of sloth and irritainment,” it says, and of course, so are we.
—Angela Gunn, “Online Grapevine,” Computer Shopper, August 1, 1995 From: Word Spy
There is of course the question whether it is simply easier to see the fragmentation of America online rather than viewing the internet as perhaps causative or a catalyst for such a break up of our communities.
But you are rewarded for sensationalism, and in many ways socialized into it. I receive email updates from a variety of sources across the political spectrum and all of them contain the same kind of over the top twisting of facts and appeals to emotion. And these become talking points on blogs and in forums.
Emotional appeals work because they bypass our reason. It is easy to get caught up in it when you receive a newsletter from a trusted source, see it repeated in a few blogs and it is being discussed in your favorite forum. But what happens then is truly concerning to me, because even in places where you would think the community aspect would be stronger than any particular issue raised, people are figuratively taken to the stake.
Then I start getting emails like “You of all people…” and “You call yourself a Christian, but…” and “I’m so sad to see that even you…” as if my faith has to be backed up by outrage over every little sleight against Christianity, whether perceived or real.
Before blogs or my awareness of the internet, I would see similar extremists (mostly on TVs Phil Donahue show). I would always wonder how these people could be so one-sided. I came to believe that society often needs extremists to start or push movements along. Sure, it’s exaggeration, but usually calmer heads prevail after the nut-cases called attention to a problem.
Mass media (new or old style) seeks out the extremists as they are the most vocal and readily identified and, the vocal extremists seek out the media more than their live-and-let-live counterparts. Neither right-wing nor left-wing are as nutty as they seem.
Very true. But now they seem to have escaped out of Jerry Springer’s show and have their own stage and their own following, rather than just being some odd person dragged out for attention. This struck me from the article in the Economist (linked above) because I see it a lot:
America, says Mr Bishop, is splitting into “balkanised communities whose inhabitants find other Americans to be culturally incomprehensible.” He has a point. Republicans who never meet Democrats tend to assume that Democrats believe more extreme things than they really do, and vice versa. This contributes to the nasty tone of many political campaigns.
What I find terrifying are the comments left after stories on news websites. I will read the story and then read a few comments to see what people are saying, and usually without exception, the comments are mean, vulgar, and terribly spelled. The level of logic is below sea level it seems, and I am left wondering, “Are people really this stupid?”
Most definitely! I always wonder who they think they are talking to and who would possibly change their minds about an issue based on their attacks.
Liked your post. I think there is too much reaction happening.
I also feel like people/organizations are trying to be my puppet master. They want to tell me what to get mad about or exactly what to think about it. In the last week I have flagged as spam some org’s that somehow got my name that keep sending me articles that they think I should spend my time reading that will just get me angry. I have enough real life issues happening that I don’t need to hear every single thing that some org thinks its ‘group’ would like to be made angry about.
I am getting sick of being told what to do to ‘take action’ and ‘be heard’.
I am beginning to feel isolated because some things closer to my heart that I worry about it seems no one else is worried about. If everyone else is worried about the ‘hot topic of the day’ they are missing out on vital things that perhaps deserve more attention.
I saw a media story last week that angered me. A few minutes ago one of the org’s sent me an email to inform me. Well, too late I already knew it.
I feel the same way about newspapers (not WSJ). The local and city papers regurgitate old news that I read on the Internet or heard of in blogs first a week or more ago. I don’t need to pay for a print publication to tell me old news. And sometimes the bloggers are better writers than the journalists sometimes.
I am trying to be more in charge of what enters my head and what I choose to use my emotions on rather than being a puppet on someone else’s string.
Luke said : “that while… blogs allow us to have a broader application of our communication styles–and therefore allow for greater dysfunction in our communication–the medium merely amplifies people’s natural tendencies“.
I agree with this, and believe the principle applies to everything from violence on television and in video games to pornography. Those things in and of themselves don’t ’cause’ people to commit violence or become serial killers, but they do feed any inherent deviancy or weakness in a person’s character.
In the olden days, you had to be powerful, noteworthy or credentialed to be granted a platform for public speaking- now anyone with a working modem can speak to thousands of people. Many who could never hope to affect the stream of civilization can now find those who are like-minded, but this cuts both ways- the homeschool community, for example, has benefited tremendously from internet communication, but the web has also provided a very large soapbox for folks that have extreme ideas. You gotta take the bad with the good every time.
As Dana points out, it seems that nothing happens that isn’t exaggerated to the nth degree. I think this is largely because of the decline of journalistic integrity, which began before the internet became available to Joe Sixpack and Suzy Homemaker.
Sunniemom, could you explain this a little more?
. . .”largely because of the decline of journalistic integrity”
I’d like to understand what decline you see and how you think it has caused our communications to be exaggerated. Do you mean the cable news cycles?
As with most things, I don’t believe that change comes about because of just one or two factors. There are usually several elements that contribute to a culture or market reaching a ‘tipping point’ (Susan nods to Malcolm Gladwell).
From the biographies and other literature I have read on the topic, there was once a time when journalists prided themselves on being the objective reporters of unadulterated fact. Sure- they used adjectives like Tammy Faye used mascara, but one sensed a core of integrity and decorum about the vocation.
Not so today- the media is a commodity like panty hose and car tires, and now it is marketed using the same techniques. Stories go public before facts are checked and verified with reliable sources because print, networks, cable, and internet sources are vying for their market share. Another factor is availability- you can get the news on your phone, for Pete’s sake, and communications companies make big bucks if they can keep you hooked on one ‘breaking story’ after another. Which brings me to the idea of addiction- it is the nature of addiction to continuously need greater highs and increased thrills- thus we have a huge increase in gratuitous and graphic details.
I believe that one factor after another has piled on until journalism today is about as honorable as professional mud wrestling.
Even the current outrage over CPSIA. I am totally against this law, and believe that we do need to act against it. But do I believe that our elected representatives are sitting around in darkened rooms thinking up ways to kill small business and take books away from children? Hardly.
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An excellent example. Yes, the law as originally written sucked. But it is being rewritten as we read about it. But not without some input from the public.
So the bad news spreads quickly. The outrage piles up. The public speaks out. The law is rewritten. The new boring law will not be newsworthy and we may not see the new version broadcast as widely.
So we may be left with the opinion that we still hate the law because we feel the way we feel based on the original version. And never got personally, emotionally involved with the new version.
And we don’t take the time to go read the new version because that would be boring and we are, by then, onto the next wildfire.
So we can either join in the initial fun of overreacting or we can abstain or we can try to be heard through the crowd and urge speaking up to make the needed change.
The last choice is the least fun.
But probably the sensible response to all sorts of stories.
Whether this indicates any doom and gloom about journalism or mankind’s maturity when given a new toy?
Yes, it’s the end of civilization.
Oh, you wanted the sensible answer? That’s no fun.
Nance
LOL Nance.
To Sunniemom(Susan) –
I thought you might be particularly interested in this scholarly review of a book called “Spin Cycle” from Columbia U. Teachers College Record. It’s about journalism coverage of charter school research:
This post really struck home for me. I took a blogging break because of this very thing, and while that is restful I am finding the hysteria is in e-mail, and yahoo groups, yea, verily, all over the i-net. It is very discouraging, very overwhelming – and I promise you that I am on general a very even-keeled, very optimistic person.
I think that I am guilty, too, in the past, of being caught up in this very thing. I have “felt” that certain issues were life and death, and have written about them as such. In retrospect, they were important issues – but the only TRUE life and death issues were pro-life causes that I have written about. I wonder…perhaps it is true that because we are “rewarded” with traffic and comments it fuels the next post, the next hysteria, the next outrage. Very perceptive of you.
I will add that I have (very concretely) stepped away from anything remotely connected to the hysteria or the fueling thereof. I am seeing how this does not please God. We are meant to be strong, and courageous, to not be fueled by fear. We are to be joyful in Him, and content. (I don’t interpret that to mean that I shouldn’t voice my concerns to my congressman, ha ha!) but that I should be calm and consistent and logical…and trusting in our Lord.
I really wish that I could communicate all of these things better – particularly to those individuals that I am in contact with (Momys group, etc…)It seems, however, that there is a common consensus that we are more Godly when we are outraged, and hopeless, etc. Common sense is “pooh poohed” as naive. What a strange era…
Thank you, Holly, and you are right. It is everywhere, and it really doesn’t matter what side of any issue you are on.
And it does seem that some think you are “holier” if you are outraged. I hadn’t thought about it like that in particular, but those do seem the issues which have flared the quickest in forums I’ve been in.
I just always think about the fruits of the spirt, especially that bit about love, gentleness and self-control. I don’t think we are to be ruled by our emotions. But then, I’m not a terribly emotional person to begin with. OK, right now maybe. But at seven months pregnant, I am just learning to deal with it.
I know I am a few days late on this one but I just wanted to say nice job on this post. I agree with you and you have done a very nice job of articulating my thoughts! Thanks for that!
Thanks for stopping by my place the other day, too. It’s nice to have visitors who leave comments!
I enjoyed reading this. As always, I appreciate your civility, reasonableness, and thoroughness.
I enjoy blogging, but I think we need always to be aware of the limitations of this medium. I find it impossible to really “discuss” issues thoroughly… While composing my most thoughtful comment, someone else might post one between mine and the one I’m responding to; we can’t pursue every bunny trail and get back on task in a timely manner; sometimes in writing, a tone can be transmitted that we don’t intend, and we don’t have the luxury of body language to fall back on as insurance against being misunderstood.
I think the proliferation of information, and information mediums, creates an illusion that there can be lots of meaningful discussion, but this is really a very flat medium, no substitute for face-to-face human interaction in real-time.
Thanks for the link, JJ- I read it, and found several points very interesting.
Quite true, JJ Ross. And you can see it everywhere.
There are always two sides (rarely three or more) and each side is represented by some group or organization that may or may not even be represented. Doing an article on the environment? Call Greenpeace. On animals? Peta. And it is very easy to paint all “environmentalists” with the brush of lunacy, but these groups are not really representative of the movements for whom they often speak.
I think there is also a certain “bias of the present” if that makes any sense. Stories have no history and no future. They only discuss what is happening right now. If there is an accusation against some government official, you hear the accusation and some statement from him or his party. Rarely is there much investigation into whether the allegations are true or even if they could be. And we continually hear what a bill will or won’t do, but I get the feeling the journalists themselves don’t bother to read the bills they are reporting on, and it is only recently that you are beginning to find links to primary source documentation on newspaper websites.
And two months later, no one picks up the story again. Finding out what eventually happened takes a bit of work on the reader’s part. But it isn’t hot news anymore, and people don’t really seem care.
Thank you, Janet. You are right that this does not replace face-to-face communication and simple human interaction. As I was writing this, however, I was thinking more in terms of information outlets from when I was a kid: television, radio and print. Talk radio was just beginning to really attract a following when I was in school, but it really was the first opportunity for people to interact with the news beyond the local coffee shop and to have their views heard on a wider platform.
I just read most of an interesting book (pesky library due dates!) about communities which talked about the different social effects of different media and it pointed out that while television and print media tend toward homogenizing culture, the internet tends toward diversification.
Both are necessary in a society. We need to both be able to engage on an individual level and have our individual needs met, but we also need to be able to deal with each other.
And thanks, Jules. Always feel free to jump in on the discussion.
There is no “late” although it sometimes takes me a little longer to answer comments on older posts simply because I don’t see them until I look through the admin stuff.
This morning I was re-reading Daniel Pink’s “Free Agent Nation” ideas about homeschooling and self-learning, and I came across Benjamin Franklin’s mutual learning society, his Junta. DH and I both noticed how much it sounds like what blogging can offer today, at least when it’s done in the right spirit, of “inquiry after truth” while “preventing warmth!” Seems our blog issues about how to stay reasonable and civil, and look for higher agreements rather than lower disputes, aren’t new at ALL!
Sorry, the “correct” name was not Junta but Junto — even though that was an error of gender.
Oh yes. The old philosophical societies and other debate type clubs organized back then would likely have a lot of similarities to blogging…except that it was more face to face which I think can both flare tempers more and also help to regulate some of it.
Those are the some of the things I come back to when we criticize papers today. While Jefferson argued that a free press was vital to our freedom, he had no kind words for newspapers. Of course, he was being dragged through the coals by papers of the day, but our animosity for those who control the news we hear has a long history.
It is as American as apple pie.
True, and hmmm, I seem to remember Monsieur Jefferson quite slyly and effectively using sock and meat puppet plants in the newspapers to his own political advantage, against adversaries including his own sitting president, John Adams, WHILE SERVING as his vice-president! Hardly ethical by my lights, and enough to make Jefferson hypocritical if complaining about how HE was being treated in the press. . .very American indeed.
You are ruining everything. This will be the end of blogging.
No really, I like the thought.
I have often wondered “When does the information age end, and the age of I don’t give a shit start!
Be ready when opportunity comes…Luck is the time when preparation and opportunity meet.