To me, this isn't isolated loners. It's the first real community I've ever known. The first one I've ever actually felt like I was a part of, where I was always welcome and could always rely on finding people like me.
I understand that some people dislike this shift. It's easy to see where it might be inconvenient for local communities that used to depend on coercing membership to exist. It used to be easy to erase those who were alone in the crowd.
You're absolutely right. We didn't get a Global Village. Instead, we have a network of Global Villages. They are many and diverse and offer genuine community to everyone in ways that the old approach no longer did. This is beautiful and terrible - it's a shift from surviving to thriving.
We finally get to see that there's an option other than ghettos run by the tyranny of geography.
why would anyone entertain let alone engage opposing viewpoints when it's much more comfortable to just retreat to a place with common similar beliefs. Make no mistake Hn is an echo chamber as well.
People want to be in a place with common similar beliefs - this isn't a bad thing, its human nature. Its far safer to be around people you know don't like to eat people like you.
The main argument seems to be that because we're not having forced arguments and considerations in meatspace, mano-a-mano, we're not challenged enough. I'd argue we're extremely challenged nowadays, but most of the difficulty is in finding how to deal with the new stage upon with the game is set. Its like arguing that we've lost the ability to form up a cavalry line because of the airplane. You're right in a way, but its irrelevant. The game is changing, and everyone is scrambling to figure out what the new meta is.
In meatspace social pressure exists unlike on the internet. An example is racist/misogynist jokes are not acceptable in most IRL contexts (especially those that are being logged/recorded permanently as is the case on the majority of the modern web) whereas on the internet it's not only discouraged but it's actually a great way to build a following quickly.
The internet is fundamentally changing how we communicate, ingest news, and share information.
The argument is that before safe spaces and echo chambers online, individuals that aim to engage general public with their message in any meaningful context are forced to compromise their extreme views. In my view Alex Jones wouldn't be a nationally recognized name before the internet, at best he'd be able to get influence over 30 or so of his local conspiracy theorists. No publication would print his views, because of how large a portion of the population they would alienate and anger. I'd argue this pressure is a net positive and having it removed online is leading us down a dark path.
That is my point and what is changing, as people figure out how to interact in the platform. In Oklahoma yesterday nearly all local news outlets reported on a group of adults threatening violence (or to have their children/grandchildren commit violence) on a 12 year old transgender girl. They did that on Facebook, and their names are out there along with their identities. People are moving towards more identifiable or at least moderated spaces, because frankly most people don’t want to interact on a platform that’s main feature is they allow anyone to say anything with no consequences.
Alex Jones may not exist if it weren’t for the internet, but the backlash to views like his is real as public spaces on the internet figure out how to deal with bad actors.
But in the original "community", you wouldn't actually be exposed to opposing viewpoints all that often either. You actively had to seek them out too. Ancestor comment pointed out that community was required for survival. Once survival and security is guaranteed, then you can start thinking about self-actualisation, which is a different kind of community.
> when it's much more comfortable to just retreat to a place with common similar beliefs
This is an age-old argument, but taking a new form. Of course people like just doing what's comfortable; we've just replaced the 5 hours of broadcast TV a day with 5 hours of mindless social media refreshing. It's only a minority that actively seek to challenge themselves.
I mean, "more comfortable to just retreat to a place with common similar beliefs" is a good theory. But it is hardly the only one I can think of. Off the top of my head I also have:
1) Wealth is being eroded by the response to the '08 crisis leaving known-bad cultures to thrive in the lending industry. Social fabric starts to unravel due to lack of wealth creation.
2) Academics have had a long history of being in tension with democratic ideals. Famously, right when they came up with the idea of 'academies' Socrates was executed by a jury trial. More recently, communism had strong support in academic circles of Europe. We've massively increased the exposure of people to the university culture in the last 1-2 generations. Maybe technocrat leanings are leaking out? Technocrats don't compromise well on social issues, they believe there is a best answer.
Basically, the problem might not be algorithms and search bubbles, even though this is a forum that knows a lot about algorithms and search bubbles.
You bring up very good points.
> Technocrats don't compromise well on social issues, they believe there is a best answer.
You are absolutely correct. Algorithms and search bubbles are just symptoms not the disease. Elite untouchable tech giants with no oversight molding human thought and behavior to increase their bottom line and power with a 'move fast a break things' attitude in regards to the any social or ethical implications - that's the disease.
The rule that seems to be working itself out is this: people can pursue any interest they want, but we have social contracts when those interests interact with other people. Groups converge and have little friction when many people share at least some of the values, so you get things like HN, reddit, etc, but not unmoderated.
Alternately, by removing yourself from your community you failed to give them examples that would've broadened their horizons.
Like, this is one form of problem with today's filter bubbles--they help polarize communities by preventing the natural mechanisms of discovery and compromise that are required for groups of humans to coexist in meatspace.
People weren't unenlightened because LGBT people were hiding, LGBT people were hiding because of a fear of violence and ostracization. Only when it became unacceptable to be violent towards people did they change, and that's a slow process. Only then can you effect any change. There are braver people than I who stayed in those situations, but most of them were also a lot better at fitting in with the community in the first place.
The only way to get to people like that is to hurt them, either physically, mentally, economically or socially. That's what we're doing as a collective by changing norms so that it's no longer considered acceptable to beat people up for being <insert whichever unique attribute you want>.
Doing that will result in conflicts. Sometimes those conflicts will escalate into violent ones. As a single person it's often not viable to proceed into that territory alone, and so it's better to widthdraw from that society.
For every MLK there were hundreds of lynchings. You can’t lead with no followers.
With that said, a more charitable reading might be that the person was noting the power of representation and role models to inspire.
That said, as all things, there's a balance. The Internet is a great tool for bringing people virtually close together and spreading ideas. Sharing those ideas is a great way to enhance your local community.
> tyranny of geography
Haha. We're a long way from being omnipresent so you better get used to having neighbors. ;-)
You're very right! Sharing ideas to enhance your local community can be incredibly valuable and rewarding! However, some people occasionally find that their local communities do not always uniformly and enthusiastically welcome the ideas they want to share. Some people, faced with such experiences and fears, might consider that analog and digital communities offer different tradeoffs.
It depends. I find the fact that people can isolate themselves into communities where it's very easy to censor out any possible dissenters and dissenting opinions to be pretty damn damaging to our society.
That can be said about every development ever. But it being more easy / efficient can bring out existing systems out of balance at some point, once counter-acting forces are overwhelmed... especially if those don't improve (as fast).
> reach out to other communities and individuals and make them feel welcome.
That doesn't seem to be a winning strategy in current US politics. And the shared consensus seems to be eroding fast. I understand there are a lot of additional problems (like the shitty two party voting system) feeding into that, even strengthening each other. But finding a shared consensus seems absolutely necessary when living with other people in the same city/country/planet at a time were we can dramatically effect each others lives.
There are lots of different parties between different constituencies that are incentivized to sow discord between them. I'm not sure any olive branches that are offered are even seen by the other side given all the blades flying about.
Yet, is it possible that this isn't remotely new? Is it possible that digital communities enable people to find communities where they are not pushed out, instead of being coerced into ones where they are? And that perhaps many people have had the experience not of isolating themselves in dangerous and damaging ways, but of being isolated by the people who are supposed to be their community?
You're absolute right about the danger. It's just possible that there might be some room for subtlety here.
I believe that our tendency to view unpopular beliefs a stain upon a person's immutable character is a more fundamental (as in, earlier in the causal chain) cause of the damage to society you describe.
What makes it "our" society? I've never felt like a part of it.
Until that, the current virtual "communities" seem like a poor substitute for actual communities, long-term. Yes, you get to meet like-minded people (or more precisely, one aspect of the personalities of some like-minded people), however what you can actually do with them is tightly restricted to the online sphere. No common activities, no parties, no activism outside the internet, no dating. No differing viewpoints. No even knowing who you are talking with.
This seems like a poor substitute to (non-coerced) physical communities.
Like most things, I suspect it may be best regarded as a tradeoff. Is presenting as your idealized in a restricted environment more or less harmful to society than being unable to present as anything that vaguely resembles yourself in a less restricted environment?
There might not one answer that's right for everyone.
People who think like you do, who will never challenge you about anything important, or expose you to uncomfortable ideas or opinions, or cause you to question your assumptions about the world.
This seems to be true of most squishies, no matter how they connect.
Communities built around what they love are usually good, but what if what you love is terrible?
We have the law to regulate what is acceptable or unacceptable - almost all laws are there to regulate person-to-person interactions. If what you love requires murdering someone, we already call that out. If what you love involves playing "I Will Survive" with a kazoo, we don't call you out unless you have a very loud kazoo and people are trying to sleep.
Laws and social pressure are also a moderating force. Forcing 2 people that are very opposed to have a forced interaction about the things they are opposed on probably results in quite a few bar fights - more often than not though they leave.
If the lack of general empathy and over-demonization of the "other" is a problem, well, try being a person of color in the 50s or before. If anything interactions have gotten better, except for those who need to have everyone look and act like them in order to function.
Perhaps this was true in the days prior to the internet, but it certainly isn’t the case now. In fact, social pressures in the online sphere can be the opposite of a moderating force. In the analysis of the online culture wars, many authors have pointed out how the alt right bursting into the mainstream was in many ways a response to the societal pressure to conform to ever increasing (and at times, absurd) rules of a radical “PC culture”.
As a disclaimer, this isn’t to justify the alt right movement or to condemn political correctness wholesale. But the point is that societal pressure is not moderating anything. On the contrary, the internet has allowed people to simply retreat from the parts of society that previously may have pressured them into moderation, and instead to enclose themselves in the parts of society that not only accept their radical culture, but encourage it.
> If the lack of general empathy and over-demonization of the "other" is a problem, well, try being a person of color in the 50s or before.
And yet the rights of racial minorities still made massive strides in absence of the internet. Many of the commenters here have made arguments that along the lines of “a gay person would never have found acceptance without the geographical boundary breaking communities of the internet”, and frankly, I’m not sure that is true. The changing attitudes towards LGBT persons isn’t any more radical than many of the other social revolutions that have taken place without the internet.
It's possible that this kind of conformity might be best treated as something other than a universally positive force.
I don't see anything you've stated as mutually exclusive to the previous comment.
I point out what I perceive as dismissive because I think there are important aspects of human character that 'tyrannical' circumstances help to shape, enabling us to learn patience and tolerance of opposing views.
It's how we ultimately achieve error correction in culture and progress as a society, and it's not clear to me that an option for people to utterly extinguish all of that from one's environment is an upgrade.
I should rephrase: this is the first experience I've had of what is commonly described as "community". I hope that clarifies matters. I am not describing a community encountered as an artifact. I am describing the experience of being a member of a community. I hope this helps! Do let me know if I can help clarify more.
The comment to which I was responding took a very narrow view of what defines a community. The definition offered is one that would have been obvious to an illiterate serf a thousand years ago - people nearby they have no choice but to cooperate with for basic survival. For the most part, you had two choices: membership or death. And membership meant conforming.
Some might consider such a choice coercive. Such a person might even consider the circumstances that require that choice tyrannical.
I have offered a much more expansive one, where a person can be a member of multiple communities non-exclusively in a way that allows them to find communities that suit them. This formulation, unfortunately, can be seen as dismissive of the value of the communities of the past.
This is a very understandable viewpoint. After all, the expansive definition would seem to do away with the basic tenants of the narrow one. Yet, it's perhaps possible that this view could become even more correct than it already is! There's absolutely value in what even the narrowest of definitions would consider a community. They teach the value of belonging, of collaboration, and of many hands making light work. It just might be worth considering that there could be other lessons to be learned in this world that might not be fully captured there.
After all, humans are not TCP/IP. Capital-T Truth is not always easy to come by. There are still people in this world who consider (for example) failing to say the right ritual words at the right ritual time every day to be a grievous error in need of correction.
In a world where the obvious truths of the past are today's errors to be progressed beyond, we are presented with the wonderful opportunity to let endless forms of community bloom most beautiful. That we might learn from this glorious array what can be progressed beyond and how.
Though I understand if some would prefer not to.
Thank you very much, from the bottom of my heart, for the opportunity to engage.
It seems as though we are illuminating more nuance of the varied interaction and outcome of communal constructs.
I find what you've elaborated to be true and insightful, and reminds me that our perspective can always miss significant factors that may determine our outlook to be optimistic or pessimistic.
I wonder if what the aforementioned comment suggested is still unresolved; would some or all of us lose incentive and/or mechanisms that temper and shape our proclivity to compromise and coexist despite still unaltered and conflicting values and behaviors?
If it's true that the range and resolution of possible human values and behavior has grown considerably, with new nuance blooming all the time, it would seem to follow that there are new lines along which to fracture as well. Though not necessarily in a unique way never overcome before.
Would some of us lose the pressure to conform? Yes. And I think this is all to the better.
Ultimately, I think that conformity is what this entire conversation is all about. I do not value conformity and I reject the notion that forcing people to conform is a societal gain.
Apologies, but I don't agree that's nearly sufficient enough an "ontology", in the philosophical sense if you will, of community. You are involved in a community the moment you hear someone screaming out for help nearby; you are involved in a community when you're one of those scmucks stuck communicating to work in a packed trainer in the morning, you're involved in a community when you respond to the presence of minorities or certain of other races in a manner which may make them uncomfortable (100% not alleging a thing btw, most certainly not the point right now); you clearly join a community when you join the military, but you have, for better or for worse, shockingly few rights and freedoms therein.
My point is that, for human beings, we are by definition, as social animals, involved in a community some way, some how, because we inherently respond to one another's presence, even when that response is indifference (perhaps in the face of someone screaming out for help nearby). This is almost, for myself, the entire lesson of watching Mister Rogers (if you're an America, I don't know if you are).
Choosing a community for yourself, therefore, shouldn't be a reprieve, relief, or, worse case, a retreat from those other communities you're involved in, like your neighborhood or family. We all may have run into that person who appeared to us to be way too chatty and friendly in some public space that we were constrained to, say, the train; they're just answering to their involvement in a different way.
Have you stopped to consider the unintended consequences of this? Mainly, that you become so comfortable with lack of adversity and diversity (of ideas, etc.) that when the time comes to leave the bubble you're unprepared. You don't have the tools and mindset to adjust to those who are unlike you.
Yes. It's nice to find others similar to you. But just the same, there's also value in being an island and still being capable of interacting with strangers.
It's a terrifying thing. You've described the experience many have upon moving out of a small town in the Midwest. A good friend is having the same experience now when she looks to move away from the Bay Area.
I.e. echo chamber.
Not everyone is happy, plenty of people were and are misfits to particular bubbles they were born into.
There are communities where you pick the people who are associated with, and communities where you don't get to do that (or do it as much).
The internet gives you huge control over picking communities that think/have interests exactly like yours (and that's exactly what the parent was mentioning to like about the internet communities).
In real life communities that are not e.g. a chess club, but more like neighborhood, school, etc, you are forced to live with, and deal with, all kinds of people, not just the one you chose to. At best, you can move to a different location, but you still don't have the control to pinpoint and seggregate interests the internet gives you.
However, is it perhaps possible that I may have explicitly considered this kind of purely physical analog community? Maybe that I could have even been thinking explicitly about such examples when commenting that all kinds of communities are echo chambers?
One of the common characteristics of communities is that they enforce norms on the people who are their members. Physical neighborhoods and cities and schools are not different in this way. They are echo chambers too, generally reinforcing a distilled version of regional thinking, and the main lesson they teach tends to be how to bite your tongue.
The big difference between these analog communities and most digital ones is that in the case of the latter, a person can generally search for communities with amenable norms.
You're completely right! Communities of interest are very different from non-optional analog communities. It's just worth considering that despite this major difference, it may not significantly affect their echo chamber nature.
I love my echo chamber, thank you very much! :)
But I get what you are saying and agree, but also with OG comment as well.
I think we want same things, more genuine connection with people who are meaningful to us.