Yet there are many differences between the folk spreading information online and the folks you encounter in the pub: the former will often posture themselves as an authority, while the latter you may know well enough to trust or distrust their authority on a particular topic. When people seek authority online, they are typically seeking someone who they agree with. While authority may be found in a pub, it is not really a place where one seeks it.

All of this makes educating people in venues like Twitter (and some of these exist outside of the online world) a very difficult prospect.

I tried this and was burned. Learned enough.

Yup. I think, as others like Chris Hedges have noted, individuals in Western society have become increasingly atomized and isolated, likely by design to sell more products and keep people feeling powerless/helpless: we're so close (in physical and online proximity), but so far (ideologically, wisdom, knowledge, and experience).

Instead of lionizing celebrities, money, infamy, or hyper individualism, maybe it would be worth respecting wisdom, mastery, expertise, monetary-agonistic accomplishment, and insightfulness.

The book The Mirror Effect by Dr. Drew comes to mind.

> Instead of lionizing celebrities, money, infamy, or hyper individualism, maybe it would be worth respecting wisdom, mastery, expertise, monetary-agonistic accomplishment, and insightfulness.

I wonder if that's ever happened in the history of humanity. I have my doubts.

I also wonder, but perhaps some of these may approximate more "utopianish" collective community integration:

- Genuine hippie communes (Do kibbutzes count?)

- Amish

- Indigenous tribes where elders are respected

- Rural/suburban Minnesotans because they tend towards hardy dealing with life and climate struggles and unimpressed by immodesty

- In the old days (80's/90's), my grandparents knew most of their neighbors, grocery store cashiers, butcher, hair stylist, and a number of other people well. What ever happened to that? I don't even know any of the neighbors in my apartment complex despite introducing myself, and one (Louis Vuitton-strutting cliché) woman neighbor next door won't even acknowledge my presence with pleasantries in passing. WTH.

I don’t think individualism is the defining characteristic of most twitters, they tend to herd mentality