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U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

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Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#661

https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/13469288825958850... "This claim of election fraud is disputed, and this Tweet can’t be replied to, Retweeted, or liked due to a risk of violence" That's a new one. Twitter openly admits the content is dangerous, but they still don't want to ban him so they carved out a special quarantine mode instead.

Twitter and Facebook need to be held accountable. It appears that fomenting an insurrection is good for (their) business.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#662
post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

Your news is just flat out awful and has been for a long time. From OANN to Fox to MSNBC; it's all us-vs-them, fear the others, be afraid, be angry, and stay tuned in for more. Every time I visit your country I'm apalled and horrified by your news media. It's blatantly exploiting basic animal instinct and core emotions to hook viewers in order to sell ads. You are a product of your media. And then there's the network…

Very true, even media like NPR is very biased as well. I've stopped reading main stream media entirely.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#663
post #255
post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

It starts with the deregulation of cable news in the 1990s, and creation of mainstream media networks like Fox and CNN. The explosive use of the internet and later social media in the mid to late 2000s only amplified an existing problem of polarization.

[deleted]

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#664
post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

Advertising-sponsored news media that panders to what their audience wants to hear.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#665
post #646

It's the practical erosion of Free Speech. Liberal (small "l" liberal) democracy and liberal science thrives on members: 1. Being willing to admit they may be wrong 2. Having access to a diverse information diet But the past two decades have shown erosion of not only legal Free Speech, but practical free speech: * Whereas previously they were just ignored (or even rebutted), today employees, students, and professors…

This diversity of thought stuff is poison, but a lot of these people here seem to lap it up.

How is diversity of thought poison? I wouldn't want to be a part of an online forum or friend group where everyone thought the same way.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#666

It's the practical erosion of Free Speech. Liberal (small "l" liberal) democracy and liberal science thrives on members: 1. Being willing to admit they may be wrong 2. Having access to a diverse information diet But the past two decades have shown erosion of not only legal Free Speech, but practical free speech: * Whereas previously they were just ignored (or even rebutted), today employees, students, and professors…

And all of us in quieter nations, who have been laughed at for not having "real" free speech, are wondering what you are on about...

I don't. A civil war in US is no laughing matter. US has nukes.

This matters both because some could end up being used if the country ignites, and also because US serves as the linchpin of the MAD doctrine, which kept the world relatively stable for over a half century now. US becoming unable to credibly deter other nuclear nations would probably not cause a nuclear war, but would definitely leave space for other big powers to make big changes in the geopolitical landscape.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#667

It's the practical erosion of Free Speech. Liberal (small "l" liberal) democracy and liberal science thrives on members: 1. Being willing to admit they may be wrong 2. Having access to a diverse information diet But the past two decades have shown erosion of not only legal Free Speech, but practical free speech: * Whereas previously they were just ignored (or even rebutted), today employees, students, and professors…

This is the opposite of that. This is free speech coupled with poor education and misinformation spreading like wildfire to large amounts of people via the internet.

The solution, in my opinion, is a massive investment in public education (schools for the next generation and reskilling and educating for adults paid like a job via a stipend) and a shifting of American politics to the left so you actually have a left and a right like most democratic countries.right now you have a far right and right wing party.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#668

It's the practical erosion of Free Speech. Liberal (small "l" liberal) democracy and liberal science thrives on members: 1. Being willing to admit they may be wrong 2. Having access to a diverse information diet But the past two decades have shown erosion of not only legal Free Speech, but practical free speech: * Whereas previously they were just ignored (or even rebutted), today employees, students, and professors…

I see things almost completely opposite to you. Twenty years ago we had far less diverse access to information. You would get things from your local newspaper, or tv networks. Professionals would work and filter what we see. Today anyone can fire up a blog, twitter, youtube, and start talking about anything. People today thus have been getting exposed to all kinds of ideas, and being taken in by them: the earth is fl…

> I think a lot of HN readers who are fairly sophisticated forget that half of the world is not. Diverse information diets are not a good thing, because most people are not equipped to understand what is reasonable.

Sophisticated people are just as prone to bias and cognitive error as unsophisticated people. The danger with limiting the spread of information is that the task of deciding what to censor is vulnerable to corruption by the interests of the censor.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#669
post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

Social media censorship has pushed the right-wing to go to alternate sources for information. For example, after extensive censorship and harassments on reddit, the Donald sub simply created their own separate website, thedonald.win, and now it is ranked at #430 for traffic rank in USA by Alexa. That's a huge website considering it was just a sub on reddit at one point.

I think this is a valid point that no one wants to hear. I've argued from the beginning that closing our eyes and ears to the problem isn't an effective solution. Banning them from Reddit simply whisked them away to an even stronger self-reinforcing bubble.

It's a powerful bubble, too. I checked in on thedonald.win at Thanksgiving, and they had a meme aimed directly at me: "So glad you could come take some time off during your busy day to come make fun of us. You must be a real piece of work" or something along those lines. I burst out laughing.

But the other side of it is valid too: People say that there's no point in debating with folks who are "True Believers," since it merely gives them credibility and legitimacy. It's valid; I just don't personally buy that. The way to change someone's mind is to try to see things from their point of view, and really walk in their shoes, i.e. allow yourself the possibility of you changing your mind. At that point, it seems like both people are in the right mental space to be willing to change.

Tough problem all around. I'm not sure there's any effective solutions, so maybe both sides banning each other and enjoying their respective bubbles is the best we can hope for, given human nature. I just try to take a positive view.

The country will likely settle down in a few months, so this too shall pass. It raises question marks about the next cycle, but at least it's four years away.

Re: U.S. Capitol Locked Down Amid Escalating Protests

#670
post #72

How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality? Segregation of information sources? Politicization of media outlets? Self-reinforcing social bubbles? A combination of all of them and more?

> How did we arrive to this point where a huge chunk of the population is in one reality and another huge chunk of the population is in another reality This isn't an accurate representation of the US. There are 4 sides: - extreme left - left - right - extreme right The proportion of each is probably around: 5%/45%/45%/5% (maybe 10/40/40/10) The 5% on each extreme are the one making the news on the other side to insti…

The idea of left and right comes from having a 2 party system. Politics is not a line. There are n dimensions, where n is the number of issues you care about that have a non-muddled for-against aspect (if the issue is too muddled, it is probably 2 separate issues in this model)
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