A thought on the "echo chamber effect."

[xiphias]

The Internet may allow people to have greater access to diverse opinions, but it doesn't work that way in practice, because most people tend to hang out with and read opinions of people who they generally agree with. This is called the "echo chamber effect," and it explains why I was so damn shocked that the tax override in my town was defeated as badly as it is: the only people I interacted with were other people who were also for the override.

So, a bunch of people have been taking the 2004 American Presidential Candidate Selector thing and and posting their results on their livejournals.

All my friends' rankings of the candidates look pretty similar. Maybe numbers 1 through 6 get shuffled around, but it's basically the same six in various orders. And then, after that, it pretty much looks exactly the same.

That means that, no matter how carefully I listen, I'm not likely to EVER hear anything positive about George W. Bush from someone whose opinion I respect. Similarly, someone who IS for GWB is not likely to hear any of the infomation that makes me dislike him so much.

I'd love to figure out a way to change this. Democracy can't survive like this forever.

Comments

[supergee.livejournal.com]

I do hear positive things about GWB from a few people I respect. (It sometimes surprises me, but not always.)

[red-frog.livejournal.com]

What about finding an online community of smart conservatives? They do exist--I'm RL friends with some of them.

[griffen.livejournal.com]

I can't seem to get the SelectSmart thingy to work for me, which is annoying. It keeps crashing my browser.

But yeah. The last time I had a disagreement with a friend about Dubya, he absolutely refused to hear anything I had to say, and we stopped being friends. *sighs*

[navrins]

Okay, something positive about GWB:

GWB is a leader. He is one of those rare politicians who does not allow himself to be swayed by the polls or deterred from doing what he believes is right. He decides what ought to be done, works to persuade those he is leading of the rightness of his cause, and does what's necessary to accomplish it.

I disagree with him on most of the things that he thinks ought to be done, and I think many of his methods are reprehensible. But I do respect him for actually being a genuine leader - and in fact it is the same attribute that attracts me to Howard Dean. The difference is in the direction each chooses to lead.

[mittelbar.livejournal.com]

What's the difference between a leader and a pigheaded demagogue?

[brooksmoses]

Leaders can get people to follow them.

Re:

[navrins]

80% whether you agree with him.
20% how he chose the path to lead.

Hitler was a leader. So was Ben Franklin. And Washington, and Mussolini, and Caesar, and Lenin, and Roosevelt, and Henry V, and William the Conqueror, and Napoleon...

[navrins]

Revision - add a big chunk for what methods he chooses to use to accomplish his goals.

[teddywolf.livejournal.com]

*shrug* If the now-disused Fairness Doctrine were back in effect we'd see more discussion back and forth in the media. Likely more stuff from a centrist or even liberal viewpoint too.

[copperpoint.livejournal.com]

Echo chamber is a good description. I linked to this from my journal, btw.

I guess it's more of what you LOOK to hear

[shmuelisms.livejournal.com]

I would say that in many (or even most) things, I radically differ in opinion from most of the people on my Friends list, or in alt.callahans for that matter (in RL the differences are somewhat smaller). Even the one person from both of these forums that I know in real-life (joshbrown), is radically different from me on some pretty major issues (Politics, which is EVERYthing here in Israel). But then again, I'm a pretty radical and outspoken dude, so maybe it's just me ;-)

One of the main reasons that I embrace these two communities, is because I know that I will hear opinions that are radically and diametrically opposed to mine, on almost all aspects of life.