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The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

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Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#311

Post by pasquinelli »

lkxijlewlf wrote: post #298
vorpalhex wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of my pet theories for why social media is such a cesspool is that it exposes us to the whole of someone else. If I play boardgames with Sue, that's enough. We meet, enjoy a beer and play some Catan and go our separate ways. That's a fine relationship. If I follow Sue on social media, now I know her politics, religion, sex life, drug usage, opinions on every little thing.. and frankly, I don't care or want to. I'…

> One of my pet theories for why social media is such a cesspool is that it exposes us to the whole of someone else. We are naturally inclined to be negative. Or, said differently, it takes a LOT less effort to be negative than positive. On social media it's just way too easy for people to pile on.

people are negative on social media for the same reason that most news is horrifying: it gets attention. social media is socializing made into a game. show people their score and they'll want to make that number go up.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#312

Post by xboxnolifes »

DEADMEAT wrote: post #271
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #263

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You think the vast majority of Americans agree on abortion? I'm pretty sure that, no, they do not. The division is real, not just a political strategy.

Since 1975 the percentage of Americans that think abortion should be illegal in all cases has hovered around 15-20% https://news.gallup.com/poll/1576/abortion.aspx

Abortion isn't an either or position. There are quite a few position and this stat only shows a single one: 15-20% believe it should be illegal in all cases. What about the subset who believe it should only be legal for rape victims. Or only plan B style drugs (I'm not sure how the linked data classifies the responses, but some people do consider such drugs on the same level as abortion). Or only by first trimester. Or only by second trimester. Or until birth? Or some other position that I am not able to remember off the top of my head?

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#313

Post by dmingod666 »

cylinder714 wrote: post #235
jameskilton wrote: post #12

"Never pass up a chance to keep your mouth shut" Words my Dad taught me as I was growing up, but only really sank in the last 5 or so years ago.

"Silence is a friend who will never betray you." —A Russian (or Italian) saying (works either way, as it turns out)

It can have a twisted meaning that could imply a silenced friend will never betray you.. :)

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#314

Post by gameman144 »

buryat wrote: post #280
MiddleEndian wrote: post #147

I got my twitter account MyfirstnameMylastname somewhere early in the site's existence, probably around 2009. But never really got the appeal of Twitter so I never used it for anything, I'd check it once every six months or so. I eventually learned I share a name with a tech journalist who is very active on Twitter, and occasionally I would get tagged instead instead of him. Every time, I would respond with the Navy…

> Every time, I would respond with the Navy Seal Copypasta, broken into eight twitter sized parts. Eventually they banned me for this. yeah, people like you should be banned

Is this sarcasm? If not, I'd love to hear the rationale behind this, as to me this seems far less objectionable than lots of things which happen on mainstream Twitter.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#315

Post by pasquinelli »

vorpalhex wrote: post #292
DEADMEAT wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's funny here are that the example issues you listed are exactly the issues that the vast majority of Americans actually do agree on. Those are wedge issues that were carefully crafted by political parties to try and create a division in popular opinion when there isn't one. It's a fairly common political strategy nowadays.

That is probably a sign you are trapped in an echo chamber. Those three issues are polling in the 50-60% range on Pew research, and tend to fluctuate heavily based on recent events and question wording.

not saying it is, but what happens if polling is an echo chamber too?

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#316

Post by vorpalhex »

progman32 wrote: post #301
vorpalhex wrote: post #267

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's throw in a more complex example. Is someone who identifies as a "trap" trans? Is that self identification trans-phobic? Is it a valid self identity? What if someone identifies as a "trap" but not trans?

Could you clarify your point? Not sure I follow.

If given a topic like "lgbtq" issues, the debate is not "Do gay people get basic rights?". Nobody is actually having that debate anymore and you're fighting straw men.

Ie, these debates are not between "pro-lgbtq" and "anti-lgbtq".

Instead most of these debates are more nuanced and complicated. I picked the "trap" debate because it's hotly contested, with both sides swearing up and down they are pro-lgbtq and both sides would even claim to be more pro-lgbtq than their opponents.

Which is to say, you can probably ignore the debate and not care, still be pro-lgbtq, and go back to playing your board game, even with friends who have a different ideological position on that particular debate.

A lot of social media fights are about this scale.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#317

Post by jscheel »

I know this isn't the main takeaway from the article, but I'm highly suspect of the "independence" of voters claiming to be independent. This is merely anecdote, but many people I know who claim to be independent are really just "aspirationally-independent". The like to think of themselves as open-minded and independent, but when they vote, they vote one way, and one way only. Looking into it a bit, this is not uncommon: https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/few-americans-who-ident... and https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2014/01/0....

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#318

Post by [deleted] »

toastercat wrote: post #71

I tried being a Twitter user for a bit last year, mostly because a lot of engineers I admire use it to communicate about interesting topics and also their work. But after a while, I realized even they will pollute my feed with politically divisive topics, whether it be from them retweeting something, or liking a tweet, or even entering into the fray themselves -- Twitter will find a way to get me to see it. For a whi…

[deleted]

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#319

Post by dwighttk »

toastercat wrote: post #71

I tried being a Twitter user for a bit last year, mostly because a lot of engineers I admire use it to communicate about interesting topics and also their work. But after a while, I realized even they will pollute my feed with politically divisive topics, whether it be from them retweeting something, or liking a tweet, or even entering into the fray themselves -- Twitter will find a way to get me to see it. For a whi…

One thing that helps (a tiny bit) is to go to newest tweets first instead of the algorithm. This cuts out all of the likes (which are 99% noise for me… I wish I could make it so people didn’t see my likes, that is what retweets are for!)

Still gonna get the retweets, but you won’t get the most “engaging” stuff brought to your attention which tends to be the worst.

Re: The new silent majority: People who don't tweet

#320

Post by pasquinelli »

cgrealy wrote: post #237
everdrive wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> For example, you can't "agree to disagree" on LGBTQ rights if you belong to one of those categories. See also pregnant people and abortion rights. Why can’t you? Is it impossible to imagine civil friendly people who simply do not share one’s views on these issues?

Because in general, those conversations are about important things that affect your life. It's not as polarised these days, but it was within my lifetime that consensual homosexual sex between adults was illegal in many parts of the world. It still is in some countries. You cannot "agree to disagree" when someone believes you are broken or sinful or whatever and wants to put you in jail. That's just one example. I'm…

> Because in general, those conversations are about important things that affect your life.

the conversations are about important things that effect your life, the conversations themselves aren't important and don't actually effect your life.

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