I think majority illusion has existed even before the social networks. If you surround yourself with people who share the same view on most things, aka living in the bubble, you might end up getting caught in the majority illusion since everyone you know has the same views.
One of the few cases where I have listened and changed my(far right) views was when a close friend of mine talked me through the nuances of various(left leaning) views from his side. I was willing to listen to him because we were close friend by that time already. If he had tried to discuss various issues before we became friends, there is a good chance that I would have discarded all his views as wrong. The only place where people of opposing views can end up becoming friends is college afaik. It is difficult to form close bond later in adult life.
The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
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Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've read enough history to be convinced that democratic-anything is usually better. Social media is a more democratic medium than traditional media. On the whole, that will turn out for the better, especially as we learn how to control the worst aspects of social media. Before Facebook came out, how much did news reporters, even on MSNBC, lead the conversation against systematic social and economic injustice towards…
> I've read enough history to be convinced that democratic-anything is usually better. How did you come to this conclusion? Legitimately asking because I'd draw the opposite conclusion.
I recommend reading “Why Nations Fail” by Daron Acemoglu. At a very high level, nations often fail because of elite-driven rent extraction. Sometimes they don’t just fail for a few decades, they continue to spectacularly fail for centuries.
When people are forced out of their social and economic agency by a narrow elite, they will continue to be deprived of their agency long after that elite is replaced by another elite and another elite until people forget that they ever had culture and wealth. Now, I don’t think we’re seeing the worst manifestation of that in the U.S. Far from it. But it was striking to see not only how consistently problematic elite stratification is, but how good it can be to give power to the people.
Why Nations Fail: The Origins of Power, Prosperity, and Poverty https://www.amazon.com/dp/0307719227/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_i_pp...
Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#73About 2 years ago there was an online game/simulator where one could add “information blocks” onto network nodes and see if they become true. It nicely demonstrated how things became a “fact”. Does anybody have the link to it?
Nicky Case "The Wisdom or Madness of the Crowds" https://ncase.me/crowds/
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Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#74Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps you weren’t a member of any groups affected by the issues that have been protested recently and throughout recent history.
> Perhaps you weren’t a member of any groups affected by the issues that have been protested recently and throughout recent history. I am, and I still think that the protesters are making a mountain out of a molehill. Their response to police brutality is disproportionate. They are destroying innocent bystanders lives and livelihoods; the celebrities who are egging them on are doing so because their neighbourhoods, l…
> They are destroying innocent bystanders lives and livelihoods; the celebrities who are egging them on are doing so because their neighbourhoods, livelihoods and lives are not getting burned down (see https://www.rt.com[...])
With due respect, I fear this may be precisely an example of the "majority illusion" described in the article.
You're not seeing a representative sample of "their responses" or "celebrities" -- you're seeing a sample selected by the media specifically for the quality of being newsworthy. (Or entertaining, or engaging, or aligning with the outlet's political views)
If we're to learn anything from this PLOS article, it's that we should not be overly confident in our views about what "everyone else" is doing.
Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
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Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Perhaps you weren’t a member of any groups affected by the issues that have been protested recently and throughout recent history. I am, and I still think that the protesters are making a mountain out of a molehill. Their response to police brutality is disproportionate. They are destroying innocent bystanders lives and livelihoods; the celebrities who are egging them on are doing so because their neighbourhoods, l…
> They are destroying innocent bystanders lives and livelihoods; the celebrities who are egging them on are doing so because their neighbourhoods, livelihoods and lives are not getting burned down (see https://www.rt.com [...]) With due respect, I fear this may be precisely an example of the "majority illusion" described in the article. You're not seeing a representative sample of "their responses" or "celebrities" -…
> You're not seeing a representative sample of "their responses" or "celebrities" -- you're seeing a sample selected by the media specifically for the quality of being newsworthy. (Or entertaining, or engaging, or aligning with the outlet's political views)
You are quite correct, but that just means that the mob is getting positive reinforcement for their actions from a vocal minority.
After all, I am seeing what the mob is seeing, and it looks like overwhelming support for the disproportionate response.
Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#77Earlier quoted context omitted.
The term 'democratic' has fundamentally different connotations in politics, and in media. 'Social Media' is not 'more democratic' it's just a free-for-all where small voices have massively disproportionate power, and there are no controls or integrity - it's just crude, unbridled, bloody populism. A more democratic 'social media' would weigh every plebe's opinion equally. The 'Free Press' is a self-regulating institu…
To me, "democratic" basically means "majority rule". By that definition, a website offering "social media" is the antithesis of democratric. The website owner is always the deciding vote.
That's a huge mistake. Democracy means "people rule", not "majority vote". The minority are part of the people.
Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
Perhaps you weren’t a member of any groups affected by the issues that have been protested recently and throughout recent history.
> Perhaps you weren’t a member of any groups affected by the issues that have been protested recently and throughout recent history. I am, and I still think that the protesters are making a mountain out of a molehill. Their response to police brutality is disproportionate. They are destroying innocent bystanders lives and livelihoods; the celebrities who are egging them on are doing so because their neighbourhoods, l…
I have not seen any video or even claims of police using tear gas to cause looters to stop looting. It has probably happened a few times, but it looks abundantly clear to me that tear gas is overwhelmingly used on large groups of organized and peaceful protesters, and the looting is happening elsewhere. I’ve seen so much footage of organized protests marching down streets, and it does not appear that they are burning anything in their path.
Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#79Earlier quoted context omitted.
I think you fail to understand just how prevalent these issues are for people of color every single day . Yes, these issues might be just a speck for you. But they're a stain on daily life for millions of people around the world (which is why you see people empathizing not just domestically, but internationally). Justifying one's existence and identity every single day is exhausting on a level that all other problems…
> I think you fail to understand just how prevalent these issues are for people of color every single day. Beaten in public for not "taking a knee"? White supremacist. Fucking nazi scum. Latino killed by police? White person? Asian? Black cop killing a black person? CNN's silence is deafening. Only Black Lives Matter. > Justifying one's existence and identity every single day is exhausting on a level that all other p…
There's a Black family that's been living in a nearby neighborhood for over a decade. Their kid gets the cops called on him regularly because he's Black and walks to school through neighborhoods where people don't recognize him and their first response it to call the cops. Obviously he's not the only one that walks to school, and the other kids have never had the cops called on them.
His father's father was lynched back in the day in an effort to drive out a growing Black community.
Keep in mind this is just a tiny part of the story of one family. The issues are systemic through the default nature of things and understanding them requires understanding the various systems in effect, the context in which they were put in place, and how they've evolved since.
Too often people approach these topics as personal attacks when instead they're intended to describe a complex system that's been intentionally perpetuated. This requires study and context - and that's difficult - which is why people often just talk over each other.
For example, the Civil War is taught in some parts of the South as primarily an issue over State's Rights and very little other perspective is provided (personal experience here being a student in the South). Any sane student of History would recognize why this is a problem. Again, this is a tiny tiny part of how systemic these problems are - there's a world of literature out there if you're interested in learning more.
I don't believe anyone thinks the BLM movement is saying "Only Black Lives Matter". Literally no one thinks that or even wants it to be that - that's a false framing. Same reason why "Black History Month" is there for a reason. It doesn't mean no one cares about "White History"....that's just called "History" and it's already required study. It's the same reason why when organizations or people highlight Cancer patients and survivors, no one is going around screaming "All diseases matter".
Re: The “Majority Illusion” in Social Networks (2016)
#80Earlier quoted context omitted.
> I think you fail to understand just how prevalent these issues are for people of color every single day . > Justifying one's existence and identity every single day is exhausting on a level that all other problems are simply irrelevant when existence is in question. I struggle trying to figure out what this means in 2020, and I would think it would depend a fair amount on the individual and region where they live.…
> Is this observable mistreatment that people are receiving every day Yes. There is a daily burden that comes with being Black in America that is very distinct and systemic. You can educate yourself on this topic, there's great material out there; I'm still learning too. It has very much to do with the default attitudes in a society where interracial marriage wasn't even legal until 1967. That's not that long ago.
I've been doing a fair amount of reading on the subject from many different angles. It's interesting how much we (and here I mean everyone, of all cultures and skin tones) kind of take for granted that we "know". For example, everyone kind of thinks they "know" about MLK and Malcolm X, but how much do they "know", really? And how much (what percentage of the entirety of the big picture) did these two legendary men themselves "know", really.
And then what about other extremely substantial (but not widely legendary) people like James Baldwin and Maya Angelou (who doesn't even get a mention on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_civil_rights_leaders)? How many others are out there that I should make the time to read some of their ideas (like a list of civil rights activists, sorted by descending "importance" (relative to today) of ideas)? And for each, how to best educate myself? And this is leaving aside all of the other important thinkers from other domains who aren't directly associated with the civil rights movement, but whose ideas very much are relevant to the issue? And here again, same problem: who to educate myself on, in what order, and how?
To me, racism seems like an extremely complicated problem. It also seems to me that most people consider it to be rather simple.
Speaking of complexity and education, I wonder if we could dig a bit deeper into this:
>> Is this observable mistreatment that people are receiving every day, or is it more of a constant sense of not belonging, like being an outsider of some kind?
> Is this observable mistreatment that people are receiving every day
> Yes.
To my way of thinking, this style of thinking is way too imprecise, if one's goal is to truly understand the situation. I have a sense that this next question is very difficult to receive without taking offense (due to its heartlessly statistical nature), but hopefully by noting that first it will minimize that problem, at least enough to judge it worthy of a serious reply.
In your estimation, what percentage of people of color receive observable [1] mistreatment every day? Or perhaps a simpler way of putting it is: of all POC, what percentage receive at least one observable mistreatment, per day? (And then it would also be interesting to roll these daily statistics up to an average per year and observe changes over time, as well as break it out into different dimensions and categories, etc.)
Due to the complexity of humanity, there are an infinite number of different ways to consider any given problem. Racism is but one problem of many (albeit it an especially important one), and the above is but one perspective from which to consider it. I make no assertion about the relative importance of this perspective, but I strongly assert that it has importance in an absolute sense.
[1] By observable mistreatment, I mean that a diverse group of third parties would be able to recognize the event (perhaps after having the nuance pointed out to them first), and reasonably agree that it plausibly qualifies as mistreatment.