You know, I wish people in this country collectively had a better grasp on facts, statistics, and the self awareness to know when they needed to actually investigate before spouting opinion. I genuinely wish, as a society, we relied less on half-informed interpretation of our feelings and the parroting of our preferred deafening online echo-chambers before the words 'Lets have an honest conversation about...' slip out, because those long articles, posts, and rants are rarely honest, informed, or a fit starting place to have a meaningful conversation about compromise.
In the 'old days', people's social networks were small and information was slow, but you tended to know the people in them well and had to apply effort to find information. You had meaningful conversations at length, exchanging points of view that didn't have to agree as a prerequisite of maintaining your friendship. But now, it's the age of social media, where people's social networks have spread wide and shallow like Salar de Uyuni in the winter months. Fuck facts, fuck context; if you challenge anyone's ideas, they just go find people that agree with their preconceived notions and demonize you because thinking is hard and oh I bet I can google 10 headlines that agree with me in 2 seconds so clearly I’m ‘right’...
I'm not addressing a specific topic. This shit is every day, every topic. Last month, it was social outrage over I can't even remember how many different things from sexual assault to pay discrepancy to what Trump had for breakfast. Today it's guns because of a horrible shooting that the media is going to ring out for every bit of advertising revenue they can until a more sensational bad news story comes along. Tomorrow it's a new scandal. The day after, who knows, but you know this pattern as well as I do if you're honest with yourself. Almost everyone gets lured into sharing their opinion or parroting others that said things they agree with, nobody is honestly trying to consider what anyone that disagrees with them thinks because they know they’re on ‘the right side’ already.
To say that everything is fine and nothing needs to be done is simply denial, that much is obvious. There is tragedy in life, everywhere, always, period. As a self-aware species we should attempt to reduce tragedy, because we aren't clairvoyant and we never know when we'll be the ones experiencing tragedy. In the process of addressing tragedy, we should be cautious to not create the potential for another tragedy though. Reducing a very complex problem that has countless variables (that -ALL MATTER- in the resolution of the problem) down to a single 'well, we'll just get rid of this one thing I don't like, because that is clearly the only variable in this problem' is ignorant and counterproductive. If you aren't even willing to consider that a complex problem is multi-faceted, you are what is wrong with political and social discourse in America today. That behavior, amplified by social media and fast information (and worse, misinformation), has made it so incredibly simple for the powers that be to polarize this country and ensure that the only thing that gets done is what the elites in power want to get done.
It’s enough to make me tired. I understand my wife’s position on politics now in a way I didn’t when we first talked about the topic. I’ve essentially been plugged in to the internet for 24 years now. I was 10 when we got our first PC, and dial up internet wasn’t far behind. I always anticipated the technology getting faster and never getting enough of it. I still spend most of my waking hours at a computer, mostly for work now, and like virtually everyone I’m not immune to the seductive ease of social media to maintain communication with people I don’t see often anymore. Like virtually everyone, I spend more hours watching content online rather than old style television. All I see, constantly, day in and day out is polarized, opinionated droning on and it keeps getting louder. Louder and louder, every day. We’re at a fever pitch now, people are foaming at the mouth ready to rip each other to pieces just for the privilege of being ‘right’ on how to solve their chosen multi-variable problem with a single, half-informed swing. This state of affairs is, in my view, on part with a nation wide natural disaster. In some ways, a natural disaster would be preferable as that sort of major cataclysmic damage tends to force us to band together to rebuild.
It makes me want to find a way to buy a big piece of secluded woods, build a house away from society, and turn off my fucking computer...