Never underestimate the power of our personal echo chambers.

[Pacifist Patriot]

I actually delivered a sermon on this the Sunday prior to Election Day. And have been cautioning folks about it for at least a decade. I warned that the ability to create information bubbles around ourselves that reinforce our values and expectations was going to deepen the divide in our country.

It's why you see people claim that CNN is at one and the same time pro-Trump and pro-Clinton. That the NYT is both a liberal rag and beating the conservative drums.

The power of this is so strong, I fell victim to it even whilst railing against it! And I know it contributed to my shock and depression this past week. How in the world could anyone believe Trump was presidential material? It was so glaringly obvious that Secretary Clinton would make a spectacular president and Trump was a hideous nightmare no one could support. At least in my personal echo chamber.

I've already seen articles posted here today that link to sites designed to reinforce the solidity of our bubbles and resonate loudly throughout our personal echo chambers. Left oriented sites like this need to be treated with as much disdain as the ones we eschew on the right.

I have no idea how to pierce these bubbles and get us back to the point where facts are respected, even demanded, and opinions are unworthy of respect if they are not supported by reason and evidence. It seems like an insurmountable task. But if we don't find a way to get more people on both sides of the aisle to recognize the trap and free themselves of it, we're going to continue down the same treacherous road.

Question everything and find supporting documentation has to become standard practice.

[haele]

1. I try and run a historical analysis when I feel myself getting too re-enforced.

Step out of the bubble, and run a long-view projection, worst case, middling case, best case. Assess how isolated the involved actors are making themselves, and the level of support, no matter how small they are. Identify where the pressure points to change are, and try to figure out if the majority of participants will be willing to stick with the status quo or if things are bad enough they'll be moved to make a change. Who's acting on fear, who's acting on hope, and who's acting on revenge - that sort of thing. As for fact, most people will choose belief - truthiness - over facts and evidence.

There really is nothing new under the sun - not for fascists, not for conservatives, not for liberals, not for anarchists - and certainly not for the average, run-of-the-mill member of any number of herds. For we humans are emotionally-driven herd creatures at heart. Sad, but true.

The only difference between what's going on now, and what has happened in the past is in communications technology and how contagious opinions can be.

Haele

[frazzled]

2. Alas, it's a function of several trends of our times

First, the growing tendency over the past decades for us to cluster geographically. For liberals, there has been steady, and increasing, movement to the large, vibrant urban areas, especially on the two coasts, but also in the larger cities of the Midwest. Our votes are concentrated, and because of the electoral system, thus don't count as much, even though we are greater.

Yes, we all live in our little bubbles, blue or red, and we don't get around much to observe others.

Second: the Internet, and the proliferation of news sources, both real and fake—and the informational clusters and disconnects this creates. And social media. We live not only in geographic bubbles but information and social bubbles. This new digital world is inevitable, it has some important benefits to society, but it also has a heck of a lot of disastrous consequences. We are living in a technologically shifting time, and it's affecting the way we transmit and receive information, which creates a huge societal impact, as well as societal unease. Much as the Industrial Revolution disrupted the established patterns of society at the turn of the 20th century, we are feeling the repercussions of the splintering of information at the beginning of the 21st. I hope we can learn from what we have seen, and hopefully settle into a more rational pattern of existence in the not-too-distant future.

[Pacifist Patriot]

7. Your "second" hits it precisely.

That's what I so clumsily tried to say.

[TrekLuver]

3. I wasn't in a bubble but I was afraid to voice my "concerns" on this site.

[KT2000]

4. echo chambers right or left

mark the divide of values among us. The echo chambers serve those value systems. Like it or not the divide is wide and not likely to be traversed as the differences are very stark. We know who each other is now.
The right has used social media as a recruitment tool, just like ISIL. The seeds of hate are planted there and it all swirls around the many sites and grows.
I don't know of any left sites that compare to that.

[jmg257]

5. You'll need to branch out to other sites then, just likeother news outlets. nt

[Pacifist Patriot]

6. Exactly

I'm assuming you mean that as a general you and not a directive to me. DU is not the only site I visit on a daily basis. Never has been.