News Feed Wars: How What You Click Rips America Apart.
Facebook algorithms learn what you like. Your “likes” trigger a cascade of ideas you’ll already agree with. Computerized perfection then assures that you are fed what pleases you and idea stove pipes form that ramp your emotions to the extreme. This disruptive technology forms a news feed war that is a disaster for our Democracy and it is ripping America apart. We must reflect about how we are learning about candidates and their issues as we select a President in this new era.
Your news feed will be shaped in a certain way by the candidate that you support, there are specific types of content you’ll see, there’s a set of things you’ll miss, and only you can alter your interaction with social media to turn it into a positive.
Consider what each supporter sees in their news feeds
- Trump supporters see pure positives on Trump. Trump’s ideas aren’t questioned, and supporters see pure negatives on Bernie and Hillary.
- Bernie supporters see every one of his positives, his ideas aren’t questioned, and there are floods of negatives on Trump and Hillary.
- Hillary supporters see all her positives, her ideas aren’t questioned, and there are floods of negatives about Trump and Bernie.
Your mind, attitudes, and emotions are then sharpened into an escalating reactionary extreme as your ideas are ripped as far as possible from anyone else’s. This is the news feed war and it is ripping America apart. How can we possibly think through things and talk to each other when we are set so completely apart?
Consider the specifics of the content you’ll see
- Bernie and Hillary supporters will receive a flood of the bigoted statements, mysogynistic moments, and crazy actions of Trump in their feed. There’s enough from this election alone to fill your feed.
- Bernie and Trump supporters will receive video clips of anything said by Hillary over the past 30 years, from thousands of appearances, under the public microscope. Things said in her 40’s are placed directly next to things said in her late 60’s and it feels like she changed her mind in four seconds. This high level of experience that might help a President do the job becomes an instant liability because there everyone has changed their mind, or said something wrong over that span of time.
- Hillary and Trump supporters will see that Bernie’s ideas cost too much, are impossible, are big government spending, or they’ll see every single attack Bernie made against their candidate until it creates a sense of rage. Trump supporters will see every example of how government can’t solve a problem.
- They’ll be put next to eachother, and seen so many times, that the attacks will infuriate you to an extreme.
At the extreme, readers stop reading articles, and instead become reactive only to the headlines. Furious comments pour out, that don’t relate to the article content. People begin posting unrelated content about their candidate in comments on a post.
Some people only follow pages for their candidate, join groups for their candidate, and read blogs supporting their candidate. That generates the maximum extreme in what those people will see. Then, people friend members of those groups and over time are only chatting with people who think exactly as they do.
Consider what you’ll miss when your feed is not diversified
- Politifact has rated nearly every factual statement Trump has made as completely false. Their lie of the year was his entire campaign. Supporters will believe nearly everything he says.
- Bernie and Hillary are the most honest politicians in the game. Even their controversial comments are often partly, or mostly true. Despite foibles gathered over hundreds of hours in front of cameras, while living an examined life, both Democratic candidates are legitimately honest people.
- You’ll entirely miss the reasons why someone else believes in the candidate that they do. You’ll be left with only negatives of the other candidates in their place. Your ideas won’t deepen, with the exception of ideas in the direction of what you already believe. You’ll miss a dialog on the merit of the specifics of their plan and instead just latch on to the headline of your candidate’s ideas.
Any candidate, but your own may be seen as zero redeaming qualities and zero ideas that can add to the success of our country.
Right now, this disruptive technology is changing our democracy. It is pitting everyone against eachother in the most fierce way possible. Emotional extremes are surfacing and pure rage is pouring out over competing candidates.
You’ve got to join a diverse set of groups.
You’ve got to read positves and negatives about your candidates and others.
You’ve got to click on each kind of material so that your news feed diversifies.
We’ve got to break the stove pipes of single mindedness that are perfected to a level of computer algorithm and figure out how to talk about the pros and cons of individual candidates ideas.
We’ve got to remember that we are selecting a President of the United States. We are choosing a person to solve national problems. We’ve got to look at their individual ideas, as posted on their websites, and see what both makes sense and can be carried out.
The news feed war is incompatable with thinking things through in this way. We’ve got to, or we’ll make uninformed choices, or be incredibly upset by the success of a candidate that may share 100% of your views.
When you click like, or open a post that is pro your candidate you’ll see more. Days, weeks, and then months of this will escalate you to the extreme. It is time to diversify and see the positives of each candidate because each has ideas that can strengthen America.
We’ve got to step outside the flood of material designed to amp up your emotional charge. Notice material that is factual in nature and click like, or those materials won’t spread. The only thing that will spread is something concocted to trigger a powerful emotional reaction.
We are living in a new technological era. How we interact with it will strengthen our Democracy, or weaken it.
Bottom line: Diversify your news feed or your brain will escalate to a point where only people who see exactly as you do are acceptable and everyone else is a demon overlord.
What we actually want to earn is an America that is an expression of the best ideas of each candidate. And, in the progressive movement we want the best ideas of Bernie and Hillary to win. For THAT we’ll have to move beyond a popularity contest, focus on ideas, and put our heads together.
