All that Twitter jazz

[luzribeiro.livejournal.com]

Twitter psychology re POTUS, from a UCBerkeley cognitive scientist, author @GeorgeLakoff



All that being nice and all, I think what we are missing here is there is a good chance that Trump is not an aberration and instead a fruit of our time.

(1) An information revolution pushed quickly now by the Internet and recently satellite cable allows the emergence and separation of ideological communities.

(2) Information content is more and more individually tailored. Marketers work to provide content that supports an individual's biases in order to obtain traffic and a positive market context.

(3) The nature of man in confusing conditions prefers authoritarian modes. Humanity's millennia long history gives us religions of simple, unchanging life perspectives (authoritarian conditions), a natural human tendency against the overload and fast evolution of the information revolution. ISIS is not some strange, alien phenomenon. We are ISIS in different shades and hues.

We think that if all those other people would just learn and understand properly that a good portion of the madness being experienced would fade away. Yes, we must beat Trump, but beating Trump will be the easy part. The hard problem is how we are going to deal with a humanity that is becoming progressively out-of-sync with an evolving stability required in our modern time.

Trump's not the problem, he's a symptom of the problem.

Comments

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

Trump's not the problem, he's a symptom of the problem.

More or less every democratic leader rises by pandering to the zeitgeist. That is how politicians win elections, by connecting with the spirit of the times. It seems to me practically every president can be seen through the lens of "he is the fruit of our time." If this is true for Trump, it was true of Obama, Bush, Clinton, etc., all the way back to Washington.

The nature of man in confusing conditions prefers authoritarian modes.

I am still looking for this authoritarianism. You want authoritarian? Let's see if Trump tries anything like other presidents who served in much more confusing times, like Wilson or FDR, and see if that gets him anywhere. I'm guessing, no. Obama boasted about circumventing Congress and legislating using just executive and regulatory authority. I don't see further into another man's heart than the next guy, but if you are a real authoritarian, why nominate someone like Gorsuch to the SCOTUS? The judge is more critical of executive authority than even Scalia.


We are ISIS in different shades and hues.

If we are considering black and white as "different shades and hues", then yes. Otherwise this is a pretty facile kind of argument. Trumpian, actually.

a good portion of the madness being experienced

What madness? That people you think are icky are acting in ways you think are offensive? Or that people who disagree with your policy preferences seem to be getting there way in an orderly democratic process. Kind of. Sometimes. If that seems like "madness," then that is, itself, a kind of madness.

[oportet.livejournal.com]

Trump is eccentric - maybe to an extreme - other than that, not much separates him from our other politicians - present, past, and likely future.

Twitter started in '06 - definitely not popular enough in '08 to be a factor, so let's start with '12. The media loved Obama, so he didn't need it. Romney didn't have an established national personality (aka - shitload of followers), so it wouldn't have done him much good if he tried.

Trump had the option, and made the most of it - and unless you're in the 'everything Trump does is crazy stupid fascist wrong!' camp - you'll admit, it worked. It's a guess at this point, but I think most - if not all - future candidates will resort to Twitter (or whatever social media platform is 'in' at the moment) to get their message out.

Will beating Trump really be the easy part? I think Trump's re-election chances are entirely in his hands (despite 2020 undoubtedly being called the most important election ever!). What is his oppositions strategy? Nominate a minority (Booker?) to give the inevitable RACIST! argument it's best chance? Is that the Dems plan A? It seems to be - and it's a shitty plan. I'm not saying it wouldn't work, I'm just saying there isn't enough value in it to depend on it. It's like playing the same number in roulette and increasing your bet until it hits - genius and stupid at the same time - mostly stupid though.

Here's a neat article. It sorta agrees with this post - sorta doesn't - a month old - kinda rambles so not sure if I woulda or coulda built a post around it - so I'll stick it here. It's a sports person talking politics - still much better than a politician talking sports. (http://www.outkickthecoverage.com/why-has-the-country-gone-crazy-022617)

[dreadfulpenny81.livejournal.com]

Welcome to Idiocracy, next stop - The Running Man (which, scary enough, takes place in 2017)...

[garote]

Madness indeed.

Last year, around September, when the election shitstorm was in full swing, an acquaintance of mine dumped a screenshot into his Facebook feed to "start an important dialogue about cultural appropriation," as he called it.
The screenshot was of a First Nation-identified teenager posting angrily on Twitter that white people should stop using the term "spirit animal" because "it is not theirs" and they "do not get to have one." (A spirit animal.)
My acquaintance said he was outraged at this. People were being rude to this teenager! People were mocking her for standing up for her culture! On the internet! This is the ugly racism of white people! Why couldn't they just see the destruction their careless abuse of the term "spirit animal" was causing, and stop?

I told him I thought the issue was more complicated. "Making angry demands and calling people racists isn't going to win people to your cause," I said. "This is a matter of free speech and culture. The people using the term are probably totally unaware of its importance, but would listen if you approached them politely. Instead you're putting them on the defensive."
His response: "If you use the term 'spirit animal' and you're not First Nation, you're an asshole."
"I don't use the term myself. I'm just trying to say - jumping on strangers and accusing them of racism isn't a dialogue."
"So now you're making the tone argument?" he said. "That makes YOU an asshole."

And that's when we stopped talking.

This month, the same thing happened. A different acquaintance of mine posted a screenshot from an online store selling a Nike "sport hijab". (A real product, yes. And why not?) Beneath it was an obviously photoshopped additional item: A pile of rocks, on sale for $2.00, with the description, "In case your wife refuses to wear it."
A joke in bad taste, I agree. The acquaintance declared: "Fucking racists in this country think this is funny! This cartoon is obviously promoting ISLAMOPHOBIA!!"

I replied, "Actually the hijab is a fashion accessory that happens to be worn in primarily muslim countries. It's not a symbol for Islam, even though its use dovetails with the muslim tradition of modest public dress. But, some countries that mix religion and government have passed nasty laws that force women to wear the hijab. Those laws, and the attitudes behind them, are reprehensible. I'm not saying the cartoon isn't in bad taste. But connecting the hijab with the struggle for women's rights isn't automatically Islamophobia."

The reply I got was: "Your own statement shows your twisted view of muslims. Women wear the hijab by choice. It's just muslim extremists that force women to, and their numbers are tiny. How many people do you think are actually being FORCED to wear it by muslims? Go ahead. Give me some real numbers. I'm all ears."

"Well, for starters, about 23 million Iranian women. [wikipedia link]" I replied.
You know what response that got me? She blocked me from her Facebook feed without another word.

Over the last 16 months, exchanges like this have led me to pare my Facebook feed down from over a hundred people to about ten: The few remaining are people I've known in the flesh for years. But I still see it everywhere. The absurd self-righteousness. The sneering condescension, made all the worse by their own unrecognized, unexamined IGNORANCE. Everybody else is ignorant, proclaims the left, and now all those ignorant people are going to ruin it for us.

This IS madness. This is an absurd, chewing-your-own-leg, panic at the disco, invasion of the pod-people meltdown. And I hope like hell that everyone on the left eventually gets their shit together - gets it all together, in one place, maybe in a backpack or something - all their shit - and just takes it somewhere and buries it - so we can get back to being a voice of compassion, inclusivity, and peace through cultural interchange and trade rather than through divisiveness, militarism, and contempt.

Here's a handy signpost to light the way:

Stop reading what Trump says on Twitter. It's all shit. Also, stop reading anyone's responses to what he said on Twitter. That's all shit too. That's all shit, and it all needs to go into the backpack.

[dreamville-bg.livejournal.com]

One guy says "what madness", the other, "madness indeed".

It's been curious to observe the deep divide that exists in US society.

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

FWIW, I am arguing that I don't see "madness" in Trump (per the OP) and garote seems to be highlighting "madness" on the political left. Although, he is free to correct me if I mischaracterize his argument, I don't see much of a divide between our two points of view. We're just taking different angles on the same target.

[garote]

Pretty much, yep.
I remember all the hysteria surrounding "dumb monkey" George Bush and "darth vader" Dick Cheney as well, and all the hyperbole about sister-wives in the White House when Romney ran. This is that turned up to 11, with the knob broken off.

As I see it, all the moderates are still here and we're still just as unimpressed as we ever were. Just waiting for the left to eventually come down off it's booze-and-pills outrage bender.

[dreamville-bg.livejournal.com]

I also happen to remember Obama's death panels.

[garote]

I never said the hysteria was one-sided. :D

[policraticus.livejournal.com]

The problem is when you demonize people like John McCain and Mitt Romney as "dangerously unhinged" and "out of touch ultra-rich wacko"... you kinda blow your credibility when you set your hair on fire over Trump's tweeting.

People just aren't listening anymore. I'm pretty sure that is a good thing, but it is driving a good part of the left absolutely bonkers. That is not a good thing.

[garote]

I think the left needs/needed a swift kick in the ass though, honestly.

Too many people lost in echo chambers, chucking easy punches at rubber clowns in kiosks, instead of practicing civil dialogue and finding common ground.

That's the greatest threat on offer, socially, from 21st century technology. Technology has always made it easier to get things done without interacting with strangers. Now that has taken an enormous leap forward, almost instantaneously by historical standards. And natural selection is relentless: As soon as you make it possible to run a government without actually engaging in civil discourse with strangers - which takes effort - then civil discourse will crumble.

I ain't saying this is new, just that it's been given a big push. And it'll be interesting to see how groups try to combat it.

[debunkgpolitics.livejournal.com]

First, one must mind the source of this analysis. Prof. Latkoff is knowledgeable in cognitive science and linguists. But he is liberal. In the same way he talks about framing, Prof. Latkoff can easily tailor generally accepted principles of cognitive science and linguistics to suit his agenda. Just about everything on his Web site is anti-Pres. Trump. Prof. Latkoff lauds the framing by ex-Pres. Obama but not that of Pres. Trump. He assumes that mindsets can easily be changed by diction, which may be true in some cases. Second, people know certain policies are dysfunctional when they suffer from long-term unemployment, when their dollars have less purchasing power, and when their health coverage becomes even more expensive. Thus, they voted for someone who would change what was not working for them. If policies from the previous administration were that great, then Ms. Clinton would have been president.