not american.
but echo chambers are cool in a way that goes beyond politics. it provides perceptible feelings of unity, belongingness, and validity to those that seek them. apes together strong kind of deal.
and since politics is about social issues, I don’t see why not.
Going to build on this to highlight something:
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Given the hyper-stigmatized, hyper-partisan approach to… well, a lot of things these days, not just US politics, engaging with those you politically disagree with is likely to not just produce calm disagreements but sharp, even vicious statements that your entire worldview/lifestyle/culture/ethnicity/whatever is literally the stuff of pure evil, and you are an absolutely terrible person for adhering to it. No nuance, no consideration, no empathy.
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On a different tack, consider that strong rejection/disagreement is shown to activate the same centers in your brain which are associated with sharp physical pain. To your brain, being slapped in the face conversationally and slapped in the face physically produce extremely similar results.
With these two points in mind, consider: Why would people choose to expose themselves to environments which promote something their brain interprets as actual, physical harm?
Unfortunately, the current palette of social media options don’t really offer spaces for nuanced, thoughtful discussion which doesn’t begin with people screaming their hostility to what they disagree with. It’s a big of a chicken-and-egg question whether that’s a cause or an effect, but the net result is creation of an environment which our pain-avoiding brains guide our choices away from people we disagree with.
Why would people choose to expose themselves to environments which promote something their brain interprets as actual, physical harm?
People commonly have a framework where they think of the slap as having kind of, occurred beforehand, right, and then they see themselves as slapping back whenever they respond, which is another part of why political discourse is so polarized and bad faith basically at all times.
That’s a fair point too; if you go in anticipating a conversational slap, you’re in a defensive posture from the start.
This reinforces my feeling that setting out to specifically create that no-slapping environment from the start is critical, but it also adds in another twist and problem: There’s increasing evidence that political “language” between various groups is diverging. In other words, ~20 years ago people used the same words to mean the same things, even when they disagreed. Now people on different sides of an issue use identical words to mean totally different things - including some that can be perceived as a verbal slap.
I’ve been tooting that horn for a while, but it’s a pretty hard point to translate into real political discourse with people. I try to weasel out of it, but at some point, people get really fed up and want you to “state your actual opinions”, or otherwise will just bully you relentlessly. Basically, I’m just saying that with any change of opinion, there’s going to be, probably, some necessary amount of discomfort. I guess my extrapolation from that would probably be that it’s a better policy as a whole if people just stop taking the slap so personally or so passionately. Better policy if your face goes numb, easier to work with, rather than handcuffing everyone, ja feel?
I dunno but there’s also definitely an amount by which that political polarization is strictly due to social media algorithms keeping people in bubbles where they’re constantly drip fed their own personalized optimal ratio of ragebait to wholesome garbage. It’s kind of inevitable that anyone starts to lose it, if they’ve been confined to their schizo microculture for long enough.
Yeah, I feel you. On both points.
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One whole “echo chamber” was built on stigmatizing the mainstream news which by definition means they’re pushing alternative news.
The only news I’m interested in are the facts. I avoid opinion articles or “framing” as much as I can.
If we’re calling factual reporting an echo chamber then fine. I guess the answer to your question for me is I like my echo chamber because the truth matters.
The “echo chamber” narrative only serves to legitimize and “both sides” bullshit.
Yep sometimes the widely accepted, popular view is the correct one.
Human nature; people do not want to admit when they’re wrong, so they seek media that does not challenge their beliefs.
Cognitive Dissonance is real and is powerful.
It took me years to realize that, just like being told I’m wrong about something, cognitive dissonance is the feeling that I’m about to learn something. Now it’s a way to make a connection over education.
While there’s truth in that, I also feel like the way OP phrased it is needlessly, simplistically cynical. For one thing, just because you’re in general agreement with a group doesn’t necessarily make it an “echo chamber.” There can also be groups that do a pretty good job collectively shining critical analysis on the news of the day in order to sort it out properly. That’s a real thing, and we can see it happening all around us.
Not just that, but never before has there been this level of disinformation injected in to Western society, primarily by Russia & China. They’ve become master internet bullshitters, and we’re now on the brink of democracy failing because of how many people buy in to their complete nonsense. Now to me-- that’s an echo chamber.
Not so much the ones who take the time to have real discussions about what the news of the day means. That part is much harder work IMO, it involves lots more uncertainty and even soul-searching, and overall I think Lemmy and the other place do commendable work, there. Bottom line, it feels pretty insulting to hand-wave away large groups like that as mere “echo chambers,” as if they came anywhere close to what’s happening in other places.
Not just that, but never before has there been this level of disinformation injected in to Western society, primarily by Russia & China. They’ve become master internet bullshitters, and we’re now on the brink of democracy failing because of how many people buy in to their complete nonsense. Now to me-- that’s an echo chamber.
While it’s good to see someone else actually acknowledging this as being something that’s actually happening, I wouldn’t call that an echo chamber as so much as it’s a propaganda agenda attack.
So much conflict online right now may not be truly between different members in the same society, but instead conflict that’s whipped up by agitators from outside of the society.
We should all pay more attention to that meta, and act accordingly.
I’ll tell you why I’m pretty liberal with my block button and cool with my echo chamber. There are people out there who want me dead for liking my same sex. My trans friends are being legislated against / threatened with violence not because of science or health, but because of feelings and religion. I have family that emigrated legally being exposed to horrific racism and the threat of violence.
Do you support human rights? Or do you support death to the “other” ? Makes my choices easy. Not to mention I prefer actual truth to my information sources, not tabloid fluff designed to keep me enraged.
Because the opposite echo chamber is filled with lying liars who lie? ;)
You can’t take someone from an echo chamber, present them with facts, and change their mind. In fact, the opposite is true. They double down on what they think they already know.
It feels like politics in America is a game of team sports. Red vs Blue. No compromising, you either win or lose.
Pretty much, except that the Democrats ALWAYS compromise, resulting in a slow creep to the right over the last 50 years.
It’s not just a US thing. It’s human nature and tribalism. People will generally stay in spaces where they are validated, other people agree with them, and their beliefs are reinforced.
The concept of the echo chamber was invented by social media companies to gaslight people about how social media algorithms force antagonizing interactions between people who would avoid each other in real life because arguments mean participation means more ad revenue.
In real life constantly trying to hunt down people you disagree with to “expose yourself to the whole debate” isn’t seen as virtuous, it’s seen as grounds for a restraining order, and depending on how intense you were about it, an involuntary psych hold.
It’s not an echo chamber, it’s the fact that how humans naturally build their own social environment outside of social media runs directly opposed to how social media companies maximize their revenue off you.
force antagonizing interactions between people who would avoid each other in real life because arguments mean participation means more ad revenue.
It’s not even that they necessarily would avoid each other in real life, I find. It’s that the channels through which these confrontations take place are totally constructed to promote bad faith snap judgements. It’s why short form content is becoming more popular online, I think. Human expression is sort of pushed through a pasta strainer until it becomes the homogenous goop fuel that both spurns the parasocial gears and powers the skinner’s box roulette wheel at the core of all these services.
One thing that keeps me in my echo chamber is people not coming to debate in good faith. I’m generally all for listening to me ideas and viewpoints, but I find that so many people I talk to just want to convince me I’m wrong.
Before the 2016 election when thedonald was in full swing on Reddit, I thought it would be good to get both sides and entertained it for a while. What I got were the most vitriolic, ignorant, and disingenuous headlines and comments clogging my feed. So ya, I blocked it. If a huge part of a platform is pushing horseshit I don’t feel the least bit bad about blocking it.
A lot of people think that, yet still debate in bad faith when provided with evidence etc.
I think echo chambers is what the current form of the internet has provided us with. Especially the recommendation algorithms that make it so convenient. And it’s a downwards-spiral in itself.
Also politics in the USA seems to have that baked in. Two parties, strong opinions about everything and you need to take sides. Everything needs to be simple truths and about people, less about complicated topics and diversified perspectives. You’re either supporting something or the enemy.
Also in the present time some people struggle with the choices available to them. Some want guidance, simple truths and something to identify themselves with. It’s a part of being human to look for a way to define your own identity. And to want a group to belong to.
So we end up in a situation where everything is pushing towards it. People longing for recognition and validation, tribalism being part of our psychology. Companies pushing for it with their platforms and algorithms. And politicians recognizing and exploiting it to their advantage.
And I rarely see politicians talk about tackling actual issues… Saying it’ll take some effort but we need to address xyz, it’s the way forward. They rather make it emotional, make a show out of it. Other things would be widely unpopular in the US.
I’ve always been fascinated by the idea that Americans define themselves by their politics. Where I’m from people will usually say, “I voted for X” but in the US it seems people say, “I am a republican/democrat”.
Also the concept of registering as a democrat/republican. Is that just for being able to vote for your preferred party’s nominee in the pre-selection phase? It seems like it would go a long way towards mentally committing you to how you vote in the actual election.
I think people expressing opinions to othet that they don’t agree with makes people uncomfortable. People tend to avoid feeling uncomfortable. Also some people get angry when they get uncomfortable.
Its hard to have an meaningful conversation with someone who is angry.
Splintered media environment means we don’t actually have a shared set of facts to discuss with people from the other side anymore. We can’t have normal conversations when we can’t agree on the basic facts on the ground.
Because self-reflection is hard and most people have been taught that it’s equivalent to “hating yourself, your country, etc…” Taking an honest look at your own faults is inordinately hard for most people, so they would rather double down on their own wrongness, regardless of evidence.
For a rather unsettling take, you may be interested in the concept of the digital panopticon. Because of the degree of surveillance that is possible in what media we consume, it’s also possible that we are intentionally being kept in these echo chambers.
Not American; is this something that you come across offline too? Since I mostly see this online, and the behavior that you described are rewarded more since social media companies get more money from it.
America is pretty wildly segregated in several ways
Not really, seems like people are much more reasonable IRL than compared to the loud crazy crap you see online.
