🤔 Human beings are social and (of necessity) political animals. Their potential is liberated by others, and through recognition by others. The absolute solitary individual is in fact de-natured and can't flourish.
There's a limit to the number of possible political formations of humans, of which democracies are the least worse. OTOH, the modern liberal bureaucratic State is the prime agent of no-feudalism, and the destruction of both the collective and the individual, such that it is fast losing legitimacy and inviting the dragons of the outer darkness in its place.
The "masses are mediocre" but one positive reading might be that they do care more than masses of the past - they are just misguided, or, more accurately put, misaligned with the methodology of the scientific process. So, despite their attempts to engage intellectually with what they see in the world around them, they come up short in their pursuit of a better opinion.
For example, the masses of the past may have effectively shunned giving much thought to political issues, merely consuming broadcast media content passively and mainstream opinion. Whereas the masses of the moment may listen to certain podcasts or disruptive information streams and entertain counter-narratives to the mainstream as they try to make sense of the world. To give this all a generous (and genuine) reading, this is a more "active" engagement with media.
However, the masses of the moment are typically not trained in the scientific process, the journalistic process, or philosophy. Thus, they are ill-equipped to become what they need to be - which is something akin to a newspaper editor... someone who has training to make a start on determining fact from fiction. The reason members of the masses now need this skillset is because much of the current media landscape - such as certain "news" channels - are found to merely be entertainment (as opposed to news) media. In addition to this, most podcast producers have given up on the role of being a journalistic editor. Or were never interested in that role to begin with.
So, the modern media landscape has pushed that editorial responsibility onto the consumer. And that is a high bar to place on your typical listener, reader or watcher. In a more educated society this could be an amazingly powerful situation - one where a broad cross section of society could participate in society's information feedback loop. This could allow, and indeed empower, the continued growth of the individual and society. But, if that is they way forward, then a radical round of intellectual tooling needs to be introduced into our education systems. And incentives in the media landscape need to move towards rewarding journalistically standardised information rather senseless soup.
Relating this back to the second part of question (1) - 'How are herds of "unthinking & unquestioning" individuals manipulated in society?' - we see that, for all the benefits of deinstitutionalising news & information media, we have lost an important role - that of the journalistic editor - in the process. And, next linking to question (6), I think that the group (or perhaps, more specifically, our societal systems) can play a very significant role in enlightening the individual. And perhaps the most important thing the group can give the individual is a range of methodologies that let the individual become informationally self-sufficient. But, ultimately, it will have to be the individual that undertakes the journey. This is for one reason alone - nobody can think for you. Each individual needs to become a better editor. Perhaps that is the path. And to drift off the path dooms one to blind conformity, mediocrity and being co-opted by tyranny.
That is an incredibly generous interpretation of the modern American hellscape (I commend you for your macro view). To my micro view, it looks like half way through the movie, War of the Worlds. But I confess that I’m a little too close.
You’re absolutely right though. I don’t know if this is true for other countries yet, but I can describe at least the U.S.
1. News & media is being decentralized - in the sense that we have podcasts and social media that are disseminating alternate stories. (Of course, those fools accepted money from a Russian company to spread Russian propaganda. So that turned out to be a weak link in the chain).
2. Mainstream media DOES view the news as entertainment. They want to make money on ratings, so they sensationalize normal things and normalize sensational things to keep people in the Reality-TV-zone that optimizes the most viewership and makes them the most money. I don’t think they care about democracy, journalism, or freedom. They’re capitalists too.
3. But it’s the same with government. It’s like there aren’t enough legitimate people who believe in the role of government they’re trying to take. It’s this very bizarre anti-position position.
A slew of people who exist in positions that claim to be one thing but clearly prioritize the very destruction of that value. There are con artists popping up pretending to be journalists & then ruining the art of quality news. And con artists popping up pretending to be politicians & then ruining legitimate political norms. There are political figures with religious agendas (in a country that was founded on the separation of church and state).
There are media companies claiming around the clock that they want to preserve democracy––when really they love that Trump was elected because all they care about is entertainment & ratings––and a healthy democracy doesn’t make for good Reality-TV fuel.
4. And then we have billionaires who have spent their entire career attaching their name to OTHER PEOPLE’S hard work pretending they want to run the country, when clearly they have no interest in working a day in their life––and none of the requisite skills for the job.
Musk wants to head a government agency? One of the wealthiest humans in the world wants to quit a life of privilege and head a beaurocratic agency that primarily deals with pouring over spreadsheets & boring federal employee salaries? I can’t think of anything I’m less skeptical of than that he’ll spend even one single second reading a spreadsheet on federal employee salaries & the description of their jobs and deciding which ones to cut.
I also can’t imagine ANY lazy billionaire wanting to be president––THE most difficult & strenuous job in the entire United States.
Obama used to joke that he aged twice as fast as his wife because of the job. But a 78-year-old billionaire who’s barely worked a day in his life wants to be in the most stressful job in the whole country instead of retiring and playing golf?
Until the end of my life I will never understand what compels a person to do something so stupid.
5. It’s apparent that money (& the power it represents) is the highest value (not freedom). And everything (including values, democracy, and self-respect) will be traded to make the most money. Which is a sad indictment of the deep nihilism inherent in the culture of this country - because it’s like all of the things a healthy human should want - they somehow don’t care about. And they’re willing to sacrifice actual meaning & values for something so cheap & foolish.
To me, that's nihilism––a rejection of meaning and value––at least the meaning & value that humanity has carried in so many of our stories and heroes throughout history.
6. But your analysis that this has pushed the “editorial responsibility” onto the common man is interesting.
As you said: “Nobody can think for you. Each individual needs to become a better editor. Perhaps that is the path. And to drift off the path dooms one to blind conformity, mediocrity and being co-opted by tyranny."
For sure we live in the most complex informational age of human history (a modern cacophany). And it’s clear that one of the things that will continue to occur is the injection of disinformation amidst this chaos.
I mean, no regulatory body could ever keep up with the amount of disinformation that currently exists throughout the interent. Not even ChatGPT is immune. ChatGPT learns from the disinformation by humans too.
7. I think that when someone like Musk purchases a centralized forum and actually promotes and spreads the lies - then the devil is from the inside. But even before he purchased it, the forum was infected with Russian & Chinese bots - and it had already impacted the electorate. I felt it pre-2020. But I also felt the American people resisting admitting that they were getting taken in by these bots.
I don’t know if I ever told you about the woman in 2020 who I was alerting to the fact that she was participating in a Chinese disinformation thread. And she argued with me and said, “But I agree with them.” And I was like, “And you don’t want to take a moment to reflect on the fact that your views align with Chinese propaganda?”
I mean “propaganda" means an intentional lie. It’s not an interepretation of truth––it is chosen for its dishonesty. The Chinese bot factories specifically choose lies that will sow the most disinformation into a healthy conversation, in order to create chaos, doubt, and fear… and you’re going to just admit that you know they’re Chinese bots but you agree with intentional and known disinformation threads? … Without even the slightest bit of self-reflection?
8. I’ve always thought the American people were so paradoxical. Because in a way, they’re stubbornly anti-institutional. They don’t trust the media. They don’t trust the government. They don’t trust the drug companies. They don’t trust educational institutions.
But the person they need to stop trusting is themselves. Their own opinions.
They’re taken in by their own crazy. And they’re so easy to manipulate because they have so many crazy views inside of them - and the second a random person on the internet flatters them and confirms their radical view (maybe they were waiting their whole lives for someone to vindicate this truth)… they’re just seduced and smitten.
Trump & then Fox News confirms all of these crazy things they’ve always wanted to have confirmed as true. The more bizarre and radical it sounds––the more they’re on board with this sensational truth. Bots feed them the crazy. Musk milks the conspiracies and drama.
It’s like their reality is a tabloid. The crazier it sounds, the more they believe it’s true.
What can you do when the propaganda comes from their own soul? When they’re feeding themselves the biggest spoonfuls of reality-TV delusion?
9. The only way out is through. Mistakes will be made. Consequences will ensue. And the crazies need to live out their fantasies and delusions. To truly see … just how true is true.
10. In the meantime, we can’t ensure that regulatory bodies will be able to keep up with all of the disinformation. The best we can do is things like “community notes” - which allow readers to provide context for information online.
I also really enjoy being able to “hide comments” and block people on Bluesky. Because when bots could hijack any post you made––and force you to become their carrier and you could do nothing to detach their comments… then in actuality all of the “good guys” became the carrier for the virus.
Throughout the election, all of the good guys had thousands of bot comments attached on each and every one of their political informational posts. Which meant ALL good information came attached with the infection.
When the good guys send around the infected email chain and you’re foolish enough to open it because it’s from someone you trust… then you’re screwed.
11. So between
A. The reality-tv entertainment media;
B. The billionaires (like Musk & Bezos) who wanted to hitch a ride on Trump’s manic power rocket
C. The centralized Meta––with Zuckerberg throttling any keywords he wanted to on Threads and Facebook;
D. And the good independent journalists carrying thousands of pieces of disinformation to the electorate because they couldn’t delete the comments on their own posts…
There were NO healthy sources of media this election cycle.
And that’s a really fragile and sad state to be in during the most complex informational age in human history.
12. So what are we going to do - except create our own forums and regulate them ourselves? Like blocking and deleting people on Bluesky or Substack. And keeping the forums we create healthy and honest through our own means.
🤔 Human beings are social and (of necessity) political animals. Their potential is liberated by others, and through recognition by others. The absolute solitary individual is in fact de-natured and can't flourish.
There's a limit to the number of possible political formations of humans, of which democracies are the least worse. OTOH, the modern liberal bureaucratic State is the prime agent of no-feudalism, and the destruction of both the collective and the individual, such that it is fast losing legitimacy and inviting the dragons of the outer darkness in its place.
*ugh* neo-feudalism..
Great article and questions. Some thoughts...
The "masses are mediocre" but one positive reading might be that they do care more than masses of the past - they are just misguided, or, more accurately put, misaligned with the methodology of the scientific process. So, despite their attempts to engage intellectually with what they see in the world around them, they come up short in their pursuit of a better opinion.
For example, the masses of the past may have effectively shunned giving much thought to political issues, merely consuming broadcast media content passively and mainstream opinion. Whereas the masses of the moment may listen to certain podcasts or disruptive information streams and entertain counter-narratives to the mainstream as they try to make sense of the world. To give this all a generous (and genuine) reading, this is a more "active" engagement with media.
However, the masses of the moment are typically not trained in the scientific process, the journalistic process, or philosophy. Thus, they are ill-equipped to become what they need to be - which is something akin to a newspaper editor... someone who has training to make a start on determining fact from fiction. The reason members of the masses now need this skillset is because much of the current media landscape - such as certain "news" channels - are found to merely be entertainment (as opposed to news) media. In addition to this, most podcast producers have given up on the role of being a journalistic editor. Or were never interested in that role to begin with.
So, the modern media landscape has pushed that editorial responsibility onto the consumer. And that is a high bar to place on your typical listener, reader or watcher. In a more educated society this could be an amazingly powerful situation - one where a broad cross section of society could participate in society's information feedback loop. This could allow, and indeed empower, the continued growth of the individual and society. But, if that is they way forward, then a radical round of intellectual tooling needs to be introduced into our education systems. And incentives in the media landscape need to move towards rewarding journalistically standardised information rather senseless soup.
Relating this back to the second part of question (1) - 'How are herds of "unthinking & unquestioning" individuals manipulated in society?' - we see that, for all the benefits of deinstitutionalising news & information media, we have lost an important role - that of the journalistic editor - in the process. And, next linking to question (6), I think that the group (or perhaps, more specifically, our societal systems) can play a very significant role in enlightening the individual. And perhaps the most important thing the group can give the individual is a range of methodologies that let the individual become informationally self-sufficient. But, ultimately, it will have to be the individual that undertakes the journey. This is for one reason alone - nobody can think for you. Each individual needs to become a better editor. Perhaps that is the path. And to drift off the path dooms one to blind conformity, mediocrity and being co-opted by tyranny.
That is an incredibly generous interpretation of the modern American hellscape (I commend you for your macro view). To my micro view, it looks like half way through the movie, War of the Worlds. But I confess that I’m a little too close.
You’re absolutely right though. I don’t know if this is true for other countries yet, but I can describe at least the U.S.
1. News & media is being decentralized - in the sense that we have podcasts and social media that are disseminating alternate stories. (Of course, those fools accepted money from a Russian company to spread Russian propaganda. So that turned out to be a weak link in the chain).
2. Mainstream media DOES view the news as entertainment. They want to make money on ratings, so they sensationalize normal things and normalize sensational things to keep people in the Reality-TV-zone that optimizes the most viewership and makes them the most money. I don’t think they care about democracy, journalism, or freedom. They’re capitalists too.
3. But it’s the same with government. It’s like there aren’t enough legitimate people who believe in the role of government they’re trying to take. It’s this very bizarre anti-position position.
A slew of people who exist in positions that claim to be one thing but clearly prioritize the very destruction of that value. There are con artists popping up pretending to be journalists & then ruining the art of quality news. And con artists popping up pretending to be politicians & then ruining legitimate political norms. There are political figures with religious agendas (in a country that was founded on the separation of church and state).
There are media companies claiming around the clock that they want to preserve democracy––when really they love that Trump was elected because all they care about is entertainment & ratings––and a healthy democracy doesn’t make for good Reality-TV fuel.
4. And then we have billionaires who have spent their entire career attaching their name to OTHER PEOPLE’S hard work pretending they want to run the country, when clearly they have no interest in working a day in their life––and none of the requisite skills for the job.
Musk wants to head a government agency? One of the wealthiest humans in the world wants to quit a life of privilege and head a beaurocratic agency that primarily deals with pouring over spreadsheets & boring federal employee salaries? I can’t think of anything I’m less skeptical of than that he’ll spend even one single second reading a spreadsheet on federal employee salaries & the description of their jobs and deciding which ones to cut.
I also can’t imagine ANY lazy billionaire wanting to be president––THE most difficult & strenuous job in the entire United States.
Obama used to joke that he aged twice as fast as his wife because of the job. But a 78-year-old billionaire who’s barely worked a day in his life wants to be in the most stressful job in the whole country instead of retiring and playing golf?
Until the end of my life I will never understand what compels a person to do something so stupid.
5. It’s apparent that money (& the power it represents) is the highest value (not freedom). And everything (including values, democracy, and self-respect) will be traded to make the most money. Which is a sad indictment of the deep nihilism inherent in the culture of this country - because it’s like all of the things a healthy human should want - they somehow don’t care about. And they’re willing to sacrifice actual meaning & values for something so cheap & foolish.
To me, that's nihilism––a rejection of meaning and value––at least the meaning & value that humanity has carried in so many of our stories and heroes throughout history.
6. But your analysis that this has pushed the “editorial responsibility” onto the common man is interesting.
As you said: “Nobody can think for you. Each individual needs to become a better editor. Perhaps that is the path. And to drift off the path dooms one to blind conformity, mediocrity and being co-opted by tyranny."
For sure we live in the most complex informational age of human history (a modern cacophany). And it’s clear that one of the things that will continue to occur is the injection of disinformation amidst this chaos.
I mean, no regulatory body could ever keep up with the amount of disinformation that currently exists throughout the interent. Not even ChatGPT is immune. ChatGPT learns from the disinformation by humans too.
7. I think that when someone like Musk purchases a centralized forum and actually promotes and spreads the lies - then the devil is from the inside. But even before he purchased it, the forum was infected with Russian & Chinese bots - and it had already impacted the electorate. I felt it pre-2020. But I also felt the American people resisting admitting that they were getting taken in by these bots.
I don’t know if I ever told you about the woman in 2020 who I was alerting to the fact that she was participating in a Chinese disinformation thread. And she argued with me and said, “But I agree with them.” And I was like, “And you don’t want to take a moment to reflect on the fact that your views align with Chinese propaganda?”
I mean “propaganda" means an intentional lie. It’s not an interepretation of truth––it is chosen for its dishonesty. The Chinese bot factories specifically choose lies that will sow the most disinformation into a healthy conversation, in order to create chaos, doubt, and fear… and you’re going to just admit that you know they’re Chinese bots but you agree with intentional and known disinformation threads? … Without even the slightest bit of self-reflection?
8. I’ve always thought the American people were so paradoxical. Because in a way, they’re stubbornly anti-institutional. They don’t trust the media. They don’t trust the government. They don’t trust the drug companies. They don’t trust educational institutions.
But the person they need to stop trusting is themselves. Their own opinions.
They’re taken in by their own crazy. And they’re so easy to manipulate because they have so many crazy views inside of them - and the second a random person on the internet flatters them and confirms their radical view (maybe they were waiting their whole lives for someone to vindicate this truth)… they’re just seduced and smitten.
Trump & then Fox News confirms all of these crazy things they’ve always wanted to have confirmed as true. The more bizarre and radical it sounds––the more they’re on board with this sensational truth. Bots feed them the crazy. Musk milks the conspiracies and drama.
It’s like their reality is a tabloid. The crazier it sounds, the more they believe it’s true.
What can you do when the propaganda comes from their own soul? When they’re feeding themselves the biggest spoonfuls of reality-TV delusion?
9. The only way out is through. Mistakes will be made. Consequences will ensue. And the crazies need to live out their fantasies and delusions. To truly see … just how true is true.
10. In the meantime, we can’t ensure that regulatory bodies will be able to keep up with all of the disinformation. The best we can do is things like “community notes” - which allow readers to provide context for information online.
I also really enjoy being able to “hide comments” and block people on Bluesky. Because when bots could hijack any post you made––and force you to become their carrier and you could do nothing to detach their comments… then in actuality all of the “good guys” became the carrier for the virus.
Throughout the election, all of the good guys had thousands of bot comments attached on each and every one of their political informational posts. Which meant ALL good information came attached with the infection.
When the good guys send around the infected email chain and you’re foolish enough to open it because it’s from someone you trust… then you’re screwed.
11. So between
A. The reality-tv entertainment media;
B. The billionaires (like Musk & Bezos) who wanted to hitch a ride on Trump’s manic power rocket
C. The centralized Meta––with Zuckerberg throttling any keywords he wanted to on Threads and Facebook;
D. And the good independent journalists carrying thousands of pieces of disinformation to the electorate because they couldn’t delete the comments on their own posts…
There were NO healthy sources of media this election cycle.
And that’s a really fragile and sad state to be in during the most complex informational age in human history.
12. So what are we going to do - except create our own forums and regulate them ourselves? Like blocking and deleting people on Bluesky or Substack. And keeping the forums we create healthy and honest through our own means.
Wrote a substack based off of one of the comments I made here. It’s not super relevant to you, Declan. But sharing it anyway.
https://open.substack.com/pub/resistrebelrevolt/p/why-i-rapidly-delete-negative-comments?r=fw3br&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web