Tidal Force: The Gravitational Online Pull of New Ideas
Who's Responsible for Online Debates?
I plan to keep this post short. Those plans don’t always actualize though.
We live in an age of accelerating changes in our politics and culture, nearly all of which are driven by changes in the information technology used by the public. We still hold opinions and forms relationships and evaluate claims in the old, biologically-evolved and culturally-mediated manner but we are increasingly being pulled and distorted by a number of very recent artifices. Among them are: algorithmic direction and suggestion (which has the intent of keeping us maximally engaged and the negative externality of making us-overall-more extreme and angry and intolerant), social networks (which allow for interaction with more people in an hour than our ancestors would meet in a lifetime and carry many negative psychological effects), and remote work and commerce (meaning we can and do stay in our homes more and our communities and physical friendships suffer). So stuff is way different.
Stuff is way different
There are a number of issues which seems to almost materialize out of nowhere and immediately create their own inertial mass and emotional reactions. These are byproducts of our new online ecosystem and the fact that we haven’t really developed norms and standards for the environment. Let’s use ‘draq queen story hour’ as an example of such an apparition. I’m not going to comment on the details of or the rationales for the meme. I’m simply observing that it’s a new proposal (I don’t remember even a single person recommending such a thing when I was in high school, for instance) which has drawn millions of defenders and millions of detractors. It has emotional and (weak) logical connections to other more important, pre-existing social issues and that is how it generates so much energy so quickly.
My point with this post is that nearly any issue which makes serious claims or recommendations creates immediate division and these divisions are likely to develop along partisan lines, simply through the dynamic of in-group bias. Ivermectin for COVID-19 prophylaxis or treatment is a good example. A few figures who aren’t in the mainstream begin making claims about the drug and people begin assessing those claims as much based on their view of the speakers as of the merits of the claims themselves. If you enjoy and agree with Joe Rogan you will tend to think that there’s something to the idea of ivermectin efficacy. If you think he’s a transphobic gym bro you’re likely to dismiss the claims and put them in the same nebulous category of ‘COVID misinformation’ (which I can’t resist pointing out has changed boundaries quite extremely in the past year or two; how’s that category holding up?). Even two rational and even-tempered people seeing the same information will tend to break along lines that reflect their own (ideological) group identities. So stuff is very polarized.
There is a tactic used by both sides: when one of these claims or proposals is made, they try to ask the other side why they care so much. That is dishonest. This is my rule: the group making the claim or proposal must bear responsibility for the social upset and division it engenders, knowing that such an effect is inevitable. They will always be willing to do this, of course, because they usually have a ends-focused consequentialist justification. When Republicans in 2020 alleged massive fraud in the election, they must bear the general responsibility for all of the time and energy spent refuting that claim, and for all of the diminished faith in American elections (an important feature for any democracy).
When progressives advocate drag queen story hour as a beneficial pedagogical practice, they are implicitly claiming that the practice is so important that it is worth all of the upset and friction that will inevitably result from its application. We cannot have unserious people introducing ideas and claims and changes into our society and then asking why the other side cares so much. If you’re advocating the change, you’re the one who cares, and you’re the one who must make the case for why the change is better than whatever we had before. Responsibility for new stuff (and most of its social effects) lies with those who introduce it.