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Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

economist.com

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Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#191

Post by amanaplanacanal »

nverno wrote: post #127
wolverine876 wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It doesn't sound difficult to me. It has nothing to do with whiteness and maleness; it's about political power. If there is a group that is a dominant political power, it's the same thing. That's why issues of 'reverse racism' are a different problem: Discrimination is about power, not race. If American Buddhists are discriminatory against Baptists, it's obnoxious but not an issue of oppression or much threat to Bapt…

If it was just about political power it wouldn't make much sense given we've had a darker skinned person as president half this century (slight exaggeration), not to mention the current vice president, etc. etc.

In the western world I’d say it’s more about economic power, or the power behind the politicians. The 1% and large corporations are the real power, not whoever happens to be in office this week.

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#192

Post by rascul »

anticodon wrote: post #183
pram wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a nonsensical comparison. Those were constituent republics in a federal system. The US built infrastructure in its “new territories” too. It’s practically unremarkable. A better comparison would be how the USSR handled its foreign occupations. Like Afghanistan for example, where they managed to kill 10% of the population to prop up a fraternal socialist government.

How many civilians in Afghanistan and Vietnam were killed by US troops? About 10% of Vietnam population at the time, as far as I remember. Also, USSR didn't try to occupy Afghanistan. It was a pointless war, but reasons for it are not as simple as "prop up a fraternal socialist government" and it wasn't fought to occupy Afghanistan. Also, where the number "10% of the population" originate from? It definitely seems an…

> BTW, unlike US, USSR build roads, tunnels, power plants and hospitals in Afghanistan. Some of them are still used today.

The US and allies have done that, with varying results.

https://www.usaid.gov/sites/default/files/documents/1871/201...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reconstruction_in_Afghanistan

https://www.wsp.com/en-US/projects/afghanistan-infrastructur...

https://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/afghanistan/in...

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#193

Post by amanaplanacanal »

systemvoltage wrote: post #44
lainga wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same in Canada. The CBC was particularly egregious. The "World" section was just the "US Politics" section. I stopped reading; but, of course, like all Canadians, I have kept funding it.

I miss 2010 in America. Politics was mostly an after thought on slow days in social discussions. It was so much more civil without everyone being primed to the teeth on social media with anger.

Trump’s presidency brought a lot of underground resentment (across the political spectrum) out into the open. It might turn out to be a good thing that people are having these discussions now instead of covering them up. It definitely feels less comfortable, though.

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#194

Post by amanaplanacanal »

systemvoltage wrote: post #160
nickelpro wrote: post #155

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's always been true? If you say something your boss hates, your boss has always been free to fire you. If you're a cashier and all the customers hate you, you're also getting fired.

I don’t think this is a matter of liking someone. Replace political views with religion and we provide protections against discrimination of someone based on their religion. Let me spell out the problem more clearly, it’s not as simple as your boss not liking you. 1) Coworker gets to find out someone doesn’t share their political beliefs. 2) They try to get moral superiority over the person … because disagreeing with…

The first three points seem like normal human behavior, we used to call it “the marketplace of ideas”. The problem comes in with the weak willed company management who decides to fire the person. Let’s put the blame where it belongs, here, not with the Twitter mob.

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#195

Post by amanaplanacanal »

esyir wrote: post #188
nickelpro wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't see how what your upset about is new or connected to social networks. McCarthyism existed two decades before the first networked computers and was the exact same thing as what you're describing. I agree, people are shitty, but trying to legally limit the speech of people you don't like is exactly opposite the values of free ideas that we usually try to support. Or at least the ones that I support.

Yeah, I agree. Let's rescind all protected classes ASAP.

Protected classes were supposed to be about things that are innate, like skin color or ancestry, not about your ideas or speech. Obviously religion is sort of borderline here.

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#196

Post by nickelpro »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #190
nickelpro wrote: post #173

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If they only published the information via newsletter you'd need to subscribe to that. If they only advertised via newspaper spots you'd need to subscribe to the paper. These are natural social pressures that you're succumbing to and that's fine, that's how society works. None of us is an island. In any case, you're not being forced to engage with Twitter's algorithm _beyond_ what you've bought into via your engageme…

> you're not being forced to engage with Twitter's algorithm Maybe not forced, but strongly encouraged. On mobile, a quarter of my screen is taken up with prompts for me to join Twitter. Before it was made illegal in the USA and the UK in the 1930s, nobody "forced" children to work, they chose to (with the alternative of starvation). Regardless of their right to choose, child labour was seen as a harmful practice and…

And my point is that your personal annoyance with the nature and content of information in public forums isn't a valid basis for legal censorship.

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#197

Post by treeman79 »

ryandrake wrote: post #62
gscott wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have stopped posting to Facebook when they would just randomly kill my posts. Just things I thought were funny or sarcastic (all before covid). Now I am just interested in peoples life events. My timeline is devoid of anything.

It’s long past time to start thinking about social media systems as publishing platforms, not communication platforms. You post things there and the companies decide whether or not they want to publish them. As much as we may want them to be neutral pipes like telephones, they are not, and complaining about it is just pissing in the wind. If you want a neutral pipe, use the telephone or email, not social media.

So it’s okay for a handful of companies to control most of the commutation in the country?

Perhaps home / auto loans should he decided on how “truthful” these companies decide you are. Surely no sane country “cough China” would do such a thing.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_Credit_System

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#198

Post by addicted »

oefrha wrote: post #109
stubish wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unsubstantiated claim, followed by a seemingly unrelated segue into US political commentary.

> Unsubstantiated claim YouTube among others censored so much content surrounding SARS-CoV-2 (rightly or wrongly, I’ll remain neutral here), Apple and Google’s app stores straight up rejected apps for unofficial COVID info, including quite absurd cases like xscreensaver being rejected for including 3D renderings of the virus, or maybe just the word covid.[1] You really didn’t pay much attention if you’re unaware of t…

So your evidence that joebiden.info was censored is to point to something completely different that was censored?

That undermines the original claim in 2 ways. First it shows that you don’t have evidence for your original claim. Additionally, it also shows that it’s possible to present evidence for the kind of claim you’re making.

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#199

Post by seneca »

coliveira wrote: post #96
mc32 wrote: post #14

What's a bit ironic to me is that this extension of US cultural hegemony used to be derided as cultural imperialism back a few decades ago before other cultural exports became vogue (Anime, K-Pop, etc.) when it was the US vs everyone else. But now, many of the people who would have decried this kind of hegemonic influence delight in it. They delight in the fact we can establish norms for communication and discourse n…

It is clearly imperialism pure and simple. The US uses its financial stronghold on internet companies to essentially dictate what is allowed or not in public discuss. You don't need to be very smart to see that Google, FB, Twitter are bound to US norms and regulations (and its surveillance state) and give very little thought to what other countries need/want. If you think this is normal, just think again.

> Google, FB, Twitter are bound to US norms

They're actually bound to (for the US) extreme views popular in a small part of California. Much of the rest of the US is dealing with the same cultural imperialism, and resents it quite a bit. I agree with the rest of your post.

Re: Social media are turbocharging the export of America’s political culture

#200

Post by dTal »

nickelpro wrote: post #153
dTal wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>People who engage with social media do so freely. If the content wasn't what they wanted or sought out, it wouldn't be popular and successful. That's quite an assumption, one that is frequently called into question on this very site. The very largest social media sites have growth strategies unavailable to smaller competitors - "the rich get richer". People who want to participate in any social media are forced to j…

How is it an assumption? Are you saying that people are using Facebook under threat of violence? Or are you saying that peer pressure wouldn't exist if it weren't for TikTok and Twitter forcing us all to become followers? These are natural human social structures being extended by technology. Celebrities existed long before they were posting their butts on Insta. And just like you could choose to not engage with cele…

>Are you saying that people are using Facebook under threat of violence

Please. Nowhere in my comment did I even remotely hint at that. It's disappointing to spend time on a nuanced comment and be met with such a ridiculous strawman. People are nudged towards Facebook and other social networks in all sorts of ways, but not generally violently, no.

I could spend more time replying to the rest of your comment, but honestly I'm not inclined to after that.

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