I’ve been reading the media (both social and otherwise) a great deal over the last few years, and noting what gets noticed, what gets shared, what gets commented on. There’s been a great deal over the last few years – Brexit, Trump, Covid-19, Protests, #MeToo – that has been divisive and has made disagreements all the stronger and arguments all the fiercer. It’s an old adage that nobody ever changed their mind because of Facebook or Twitter.
I don’t think that’s absolutely true, but I do agree that it is probably vanishingly rare. I’ve watched arguments, people posting at cross-purposes, people linking and re-linking to articles that help them – some of those better and more reliable sources than others. Through it all I’ve come to think that the most dangerous thing in the world right now is Confirmation Bias (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confirmation_bias). Essentially, this is the phenomenon that states that people are likely to continue to believe what they currently believe, no matter what evidence to the contrary might be presented to them. Similar to what people call the “Echo Chamber” effect, that social media has allowed people to curate the opinions they see and hear so much that they only ever see or hear people that agree with them. These two things, whilst not quite the same, I think reinforce each other, and is something that social media especially makes worse. Now, before anybody thinks I’m trying to criticise a particular side in any argument – I’m not. This is non-partisan – I’ve seen this behaviour in people who lean either way politically, religiously and so forth. Neither am I trying to say that every opinion is valid – I don’t agree with white supremacy, for example, and societal cruelty of any kind is, I think, difficult to justify. What I’m saying is that everybody is susceptible to this, no matter is they are Leaver or Remainer, Right-wing or Left-wing, Republican or Democrat, Religious or Atheist, for PvP or against PvP, or any other disagreement. I don’t hold myself above this – I’ve been guilty of it. In some ways,I’m perhaps guilty of it right now in what I’m writing (though that gets a bit meta and gives me a headache). I’ve been called out on it in the past and when I was younger that angered me and made me dig in my heels. Now I’m older, I try to thank the person who has informed me and try to consider what they are saying. They aren’t necessarily right (they also suffer from bias), but I think it’s important to consider what they say. The media (both social and otherwise) thrive on Confirmation Bias – this is why headlines are sensational and Trump has one of the most followed Twitter accounts. People click to read more of things that they agree with – it’s always great to see that somebody else agrees with you! Who doesn’t like that? Especially if they are somebody who might have some kind of authority over the topic, or that we think may be especially well informed like a journalist. Headlines don’t win arguments – they try to make you feel what you’re feeling even stronger than you did before. Then you’ll click more headlines for more validation. It’s a vicious cycle and, unfortunately, what the media has become in the days of easily accessed online articles, rather than having to buy a paper. Maybe it was just as bad then – I don’t know, I wasn’t really paying attention back then. At times, people will try to take advantage of this. They’ll write about a current piece of news and they’ll miss out some vital context. Charitably, we might think that they are simply suffering from Confirmation Bias as well – their mind simply doesn’t see the counterarguments or counter-facts. In some cases (perhaps many), unfortunately, I think it’s deliberate. When people post pictures of 10 or 20 years ago and try to use them to raise outrage today – well, that’s a fine technique if your argument is that things never change. However, you do owe it to your readers to point out that your picture is old and not taken during current events. Please – be aware that my primary criticism here is those who first create those posts – not those who then go on to share them. The same goes when an article simply states a sound-bite from a speech or event without context – context is vital. I once read an article (I’m afraid I can’t remember where from) where a reviewer was angry that words from his review were being used in some marketing for a movie. He’d written, “One of the most astounding examples of hot not to make a movie I’ve ever seen.” The marketing on the poster quoted him as saying “The most astounding… movie I’ve ever seen.” As time moves on, this is going to get even more of a problem due to technology such as DeepFakes (https://www.forbes.com/sites/robtoews/2020/05/25/deepfakes-are-going-to-wreak-havoc-on-society-we-are-not-prepared/#1393167f7494). At the moment, it’s hard to trust what we read. Going forward (and, in fact, already) it’s getting hard to trust what we see if we aren’t there to witness it first-hand. And so I ask everybody, before you share something online, to read around and check it. Read the comments on a Facebook post before you share it – somebody may have done it already for you and called out the original author. Read the news story, rather than just sharing because of the headline. Especially if the thing you are sharing supports your own views – this is when you are most in danger. If it seems too good to true – well, it might be. Check before you share. If you can’t find anything reasonably quickly to disprove it then sure – go ahead. But please, before you make things worse, before you widen gaps in society rather than mending them, have a look to make sure there is some authenticity to what you are spreading. And, above all, be kind to each other. I'm still not saying that every viewpoint is as valid as any other, but if people are your friends, you owe it to them to at least try to hear them out and understand why they are saying what they are saying. If you can't do that, perhaps you shouldn't really be friends after all.
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AuthorChris is a writer currently working on his first novel. His work has been published in Parallel Worlds magazine and more can be found here. Archives
February 2022
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