Social Media & Polarization
2022-10-13 01:44:35.31293+02 by Dan Lyke 0 comments
Social media polarize politics for a different reason than you might think
Social media are polarizing not because they isolate us with likeminded others, as often thought, but because they provide spaces where we create social identities that increasingly align with our political preferences. ‘This drives conflict and creates an all-encompassing division between two homogeneous and opposed political tribes’, concludes digital geographer Petter Törnberg in a new study. ‘The internet is thus less of an “echo chamber”, and more like the Lord of the Flies.’ The study is now published in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).
How digital media drive affective polarization through partisan sorting
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2207159119
After the great unfriending/unfollowing/blocking of the Trump era, I've gradually started undoing some of that, and I think he's on to something: IRL relationships we get a filtered version of someone, but on online relationships we get everything. Get the hobby alone, and it's great, get that with a side of racism or Putin apologism or what-have-you, and it feels like I need to either filter that, or make a "that's not appropriate" comment.
I kinda wonder what this means for the work of organizations like Braver Angels, which seem to be "conservatives" (I'm not sure what that term means any more) trying to bridge the divide by creating human relationships, but when the basis of that divide bridging is politics, well... might be related to why Charlene and I walked out of the workshop we took thinking that this was counterproductive.
Via https://twitter.com/pettertornberg/status/1580106544729198592