Thursday, August 19, 2021

Wandering....

I got caught up in a discussion on NextDoor that brought me back to the "early days" of the intertoobs. I didn't like it.

Even then, back on Salon’s “Table Talk,” everyone with an opinion (including your humble host) was an “expert” on whatever they wanted to opine about.  I spent too many years in those swamps, and finally pulled myself out of them.  In the interest of full disclosure, I only got on “NextDoor” because the county and city were supposedly posting useful information there during the winter storm/statewide blackout/no water disaster of February 2021.  They weren’t, and I didn’t do the smart thing and cancel my “NextDoor” subscription.  So I started getting e-mails about posts and comments, and too soon and too easily I was back in the fever swamps of the internet.

The most recent discussion was over masks in schools around here.  That’s no surprise.  The surprise is the number of people insisting theycan’t be “forced” to wear a mask (although during the height of the “mandates” around here, police were not arresting people parading in public without a mask, and only a few stores were keeping people out of their stores for refusing to wear a mask, so “being forced” is rather loosely interpreted.).* The surprise is the people who swore the entire pandemic was a hoax, that masks were useless, that the vaccine was useless, that liberty overrode any concern for others or any issue of public health or the spread of a communicable disease.  It’s just a handful of people, in the end; but the swamp they create is undeniable.

And the basis for their opinions?  The fine work of Professor Otto Yerass.  Expertise is discarded in favor of news reports; but only the news they agree with.  Knowledge is a fungible good, and a democratic one: who are you to say your knowledge is better than mine?  Ignorance is strength.  If it's on the internet, on Facebook or some random data point out there somewhere, it is undeniable Truth, while what the CDC says, or any other informed source, is bullshit.

It's a world of Pakleds.  They are smart.  They make things go.

Well, it seems like a world full.  It isn't, of course.  It's a handful of people, determined to troll or just announce their ignorance proudly to the tiny sliver of the world (what, 2 dozen people at most?) sharing "Next Door" with my "neighborhood."  They parrot statistics and "facts" they've gleaned from somewhere on the internet, which is the equivalent of getting your medical advice from TV ads for drugs, or from billboards.  Remember when "filtered" cigarettes were safer than "regular" ones?  Or how many doctors allegedly recommended smoking a particular brand?

Yeah, this group is no better informed than that.  And yeah, it's a problem:

"Their algorithms still encourage the most controversial, craziest posts to share," host Scarborough offered. "And they just simply are not putting a big enough investment into getting more people to scan their own website to find this information.

"Joe, we will cover and talk about no sadder story than the story we're talking about right now. those children in Mississippi -- Mississippi is led by a governor who refuses to acknowledge, really, the extent of the dangers involved in covid," Barnicle began before getting personal.

"The roots of the misinformation, you're right, it's Facebook," he continued. "I'm not on Facebook, but a friend of mine who I've known for a long time, is on Facebook. and I no longer know this person because he has been so victimized by the level of misinformation that he's been absorbing each and every day now for over a year about the variants, about the virus, about the vaccinations."
 
"I no longer know this person, he's a captive to the information. The information and misinformation that he reads each and every day is addictive and supports his crazy, crazy theories about the dangers of the vaccination," he continued. "You multiply that by hundreds of millions of all people in this country and around the world, and Facebook is an active accomplice in the rising scale of fear and deaths due to the virus."

"There's no doubt about it, none, zero, no matter what Mark Zuckerberg says. None," he added.
I know that stupidity cannot be fixed.  I've tried.  Neither can bad information be suppressed.  The only solution to this problem is understanding; but I don't mean "understanding" the fools who believe this shit, I mean educating these fools to understand the difference between valid information and bullshit.  But then I'm back to trying to fix stupid; which can't be done.  Ignorance is reparable; stupid is bone deep.  Do we ban Facebook?  Take it over and rewrite it's algorithms?  Create a "Fairness Doctrine" that automatically places correct information against whatever the new algorithm deems to be bullshit?

What, then, of current events?
As I type, this is what's going on at the Capitol: And yeah, it's another nut imagining his act will trigger the revolution he wants to see happen: Well, of course he's on Facebook.  Though I can't quite figure out how a pardon after your in bits 'n' pieces is gonna help much.  Maybe he imagines the government will collapse in the face of his threats.  Maybe he can't imagine his own death. Yeah, I'm pretty sure he can't imagine his own death. But he has friends! I'm a little confused because D.C. is in Virginia, which is "the South." Regardless, while his threat has to be taken seriously, one wonders if his four other friends decided today was not a good day to die, after all. Since they're keeping such a low profile, that is. Depressing how much of this comes back to the internet.

I wonder if he knows he's at the Library of Congress?  Does he hate books that much?  My guess is, absent the fertilizer Timothy McVeigh used, and the amount McVeigh used, the amount of gunpowder he's packing won't do much more than destroy his truck, and some damage to the facade of the Library.  Which is hardly an excuse to call his bluff or blow the truck with guided explosives, but:
"People screaming" seems a little out of reach by now. Maybe he should just give it up and make his points in his courtroom appearances. Oh, and call his "friends" and ask 'em if they got the memo that they moved the action up from Labor Day.

Banning Facebook won't ban these idiots.  But a more responsible press might; one less interested in being "fair and balanced" and presenting "both sides now" and largely reports from the vantage point of "absolutely nowhere," preening their feathers of objectivity by disclaiming any responsibility for what they report.  Or just sheer determination to make mountains out of molehills:
Given the state of the nation, I'm really struggling to figure out who gives a shit about "messaging." Beyond the Beltway, I mean.

We're never going to have a well-informed public discussion of public issues.  But we can do better than this.  From Afghanistan to the "big lie" to covid, the public discussion is just full of bullshit.  No wonder so few of us engage it either on-line or at the ballot box (and will pundits in 3 years be surprised if voters don't punish Biden for the withdrawal from Afghanistan?  Probably won't even remember it.).  If I was more conspiratorially minded, I'd say that's a feature, not a bug.  But then I'd have to think the whole purpose of "journalism" was to keep us stirred up with the latest crisis, disaster, outrage, or horror.

Which can't be true....can it?  Or is that just the way it works out?


*Yes, I know masking school children is not the same as requiring masks for adults, but don't try to parse it.  It's doesn't make any sense, you can't make sense of it.
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2 comments:

  1. rustypickup2:17 PM

    Our local school board decides tonight on the extent of actions the schools will take due to the pandemic. Tuesday night the panel set up by the board to make recommendations had their meeting to make the final recommendations and also allowed public comment (all these meetings are streamed.) A contingent of anti-maskers (also anti-testing, pandemic deniers, etc) showed up and spoke. It was very depressing to watch. Misinformation, distortions and just denial. The speakers also where often weirdly emotive in their appeals to have school without any restrictions. We are new to the state and school district. Our former school district also had these folks (some who we knew), and while they were loud they were a definite minority. Here, I don't know where they lie on the center of mass of opinion. One mother was almost crying as she rambled on, "the children need air on their faces". A father sat at the microphone and kept repeating, "why are we here". After patient explanation from the members of the committee he would repeat it again. Eventually it became clear that he thought the entire pandemic is fake and there was no need for any of this. I was getting more and more depressed, until the camera swung around to show the panel.
    Three of the five members where wearing masks and their chairs where widely spaced out along multiple tables put end to end.

    The panel recommendation has been posted for tonight's meeting. I don't think it's perfect, but it rational. They have a rubric for making decisions on the extent of protections including specifically masks that is based on access to vaccines, community spread, testing positive percentages and a few other factors. It also references that masks have become a political issue, there is no additional money for mitigation measures (and the State of New Hampshire, controlled by a Republican governor, senate and house will certainly not be providing any), and the schools lack adequate space for extensive social distancing. From what I can understand, since many middle schoolers are under 12, that masks will be required. If the board accepts the panels recommendation we will be good with the requirements.

    Facebook and other social media provide a self reinforcing feedback loop of misinformation. Having watched the Facebook feeds and now the streaming, I don't think there is a realistic way to approach these people. The only hope is to limit the damage they cause to those who have to live with them in schools, jobs and public places.

    I pray the board accepts the recommendations this evening.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Rmj3:07 PM

      I ran into "the pandemic is fake" on NextDoor. Truly, you can't fix stupid. Man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest. All of that.

      Yeah, no money now for on-line learning, and the logistics of setting that up for non-college students is overwhelming. (The state specifically didn't add money for it in the last session.) Distancing isn't possible (it only was because half the students, or more, were at home last year). Masks cannot be required. And almost every pediatric ICU bed in the state is occupied.

      I pray for the parents of school aged children now. And also for the people my wife works with in Administration in our school district. Her boss, the superintendent, is talking about early retirement because the shitstorm just won't let up (some of it covid, some of it Trumpites who fear "CRT" and going from at large school board members to districts, but districts must come). We're reaching a perfect storm of crazy.

      And its burning out everybody. Much like a divorce, the children are the battlefield. None of the screaming parents seem to care about their kids, except as objects. I saw it when I practiced family law. It's the same damned dynamic. And the solution in family law court is the same solution here: "limit the damage they cause to those who have to live with them in schools, jobs, and public places" as much as humanly possible.

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