This is something different, not really related to a tea blog, but I'll share it in mine, in case it's of interest. A good number of ideas I’ve been considering seem to align,
in relation to running across the subject of synchronization, and comparing it
to cultural expression and perspective. This
runs long covering that, really as much about me using writing to collect and arrange the ideas.
In the most ordinary sense synchronization is about complex
systems including or developing mechanisms for aligning timing (described here). If you set two metronomes (pendulum based clocks)
beside each other in such a way that they can alter their base position
(hanging from something, on a shifting platform, etc.) they will naturally
align, by passing on physical stimulus between each. A footbridge in England
worked as a different example, not related to people walking in lockstep,
necessarily, but along a similar line, creating a problem that designers did
not account for, with reinforced synchronized walking all but destroying the
bridge.
This is all about something else, but it seems to be related. Spontaneous synchronization in physical or natural phenomena is about this, which I won't be getting into:
Spontaneous synchronization is a remarkable collective effect observed in nature, whereby a population of oscillating units, which have diverse natural frequencies and are in weak interaction with one another, evolves to spontaneously exhibit collective oscillations at a common frequency.
Instead I'll discuss this:
Online social groups and divided sub-cultures tend to align perspectives, faster than ever
now due to the effect of social media.
It’s not just about groups filtering existing perspective; it seems
to function as a feedback loop too.
In a sense that’s what sub-culture is, alignment of
interests, perspectives, preferences, and values. Self-definition and image are a part of
that. In what follows I’ll cover a
number of examples of how I see this playing out in a broad range of different
sub-cultures. I think it’s informative,
in relation to making sense of patterns that are obvious in one sense but not
so transparent in relation to root causes.
I’ll start by mentioning factors that seem to cause this, acting
like the limited input feedback loop of pendulums adding force to each other,
or the influence individual steps accumulating on a footbridge.
Inputs / factors
-online groups form around shared interest or perspective,
or serve a positive educational function
-social media channels filter feeds in ways that
over-emphasizing controversy, negativity, or exclusion
-filtering in online groups limits opposing views, narrowing
range of shared perspective, even adjusting standard perspectives
-social media “influencers” or subject experts condense or
lead perspectives (affected by the rest)
-interest group oriented media channel bias reinforces
marginal perspectives
-any of these factors can set up feedback loops, as a continual
and progressive input
All of these factors set up feedback loops that continually
support increasing uptake of divisions, and extremist perspectives, derived
from within a more normal range. It
happens across a broad range of perspectives, across a lot of issues. Often it would be a positive thing, mostly
about learning. In some interesting ways
gradual shifts in perspective and self-identification can occur, so that even
the “normal range” fragments and shifts.
Related to the social media channel issue, recent news
covers how Facebook utilizes negative themes to increase engagement (from “Facebook
whistleblower revealed on '60 Minutes,' says the company prioritized profit
over public good”):
"One of the consequences of how Facebook is picking
out that content today is that it is optimizing for content that gets
engagement, a reaction, but its own research is showing that content that is
hateful, that is divisive, that is polarizing, it's easier to inspire people to
anger than it is to other emotions," she said. She added that the company
recognizes that "if they change the algorithm to be safer, people will
spend less time on the site, they'll click on less ads, they'll make less
money."
Why wouldn’t they, I guess. Let’s get the most obvious
example of that problematic divisive content out of the way, or at least
introduced: the US is currently quite
polarized in terms of conservative versus liberal perspective. This sort of works as an example, although specific
use of the term “synchronization” here informs the deeper level intention, that
I’m trying to describe a pattern of change, made up of small inputs.
That political divide evolved naturally, and extended into
what is often described as a “culture war,” a mapping of lots of sets of ideas
and perspectives into two distinct versions.
Along the way a lot of people and companies benefitted from emphasizing
it. Maybe it’s as well to treat the base
context further and get back to how this seems to play out in that political
divide, related to saying more about those factors.
Synchronization related to online social groups
Synchronization can be used as a model for looking at
patterns, not necessarily as only one type of sequence of processes that
adjusts alignment. Of course people
divide into groups, based on shared preferences and opinions; saying that
really isn’t saying anything. The model
has to do more, to explain more, or else there’s no point to applying it.
I’m trying to establish that subtle mechanisms can cause
a specific form of evolution of preferences and opinions, as feedback and
adjustment, not just functioning as a sorting and grouping mechanism. People entering into perspective lockstep
with others can have the unintended consequence of enabling a new form of
perspective shift pattern, that can progress faster and further.
It’s not that the conservative and liberal American right
and left already existed and were already positioned against each other
(although that is true), or that positions on a limited set of issues caused
the divide. This synchronization effect broadened and further re-defined the
split. Let’s start with a simpler
example than politics, and then see how the same influence patterns can occur
more broadly.
I’m into tea, and we see this effect play out in online
social groups related to tea. Group
themes kind of evolve on their own, although a group founder or founders will
often have a lot of that in mind in setting up new groups. A group might be open, for example, intended
as applying to everyone with a broad interest range, or to a sub-set. Using tea as an example a group could have a
focus on people discussing their discovery of interest in tea, and starting
points (for people newer to it), or for advance practitioners to discuss more
evolved preferences.
It seems odd putting it that way, describing people making a
beverage choice as “practitioners,” but as with many subjects tea interest and
forms of experience become more complex as one explores further. Then to some extent that complexity tends to
even out and shift back to embracing more simplicity later on, but the rest of
this doesn’t do a lot with that last part, about patterns of progression of
types of interest changing over time, across varying forms, onto a natural
endpoint. A very extreme and developed
form of preference and perspective can occur before that happens, and it can be
accepted as a group norm, as not out of the ordinary at all.
Shared perspective of any subject is discussed in social
media groups, and other types of groups.
People find such groups and join in from whatever perspective or
position of topic interest they happen to already experience. Although tea makes for a strange example it
might work better for being odd (versus a sports team or university alumni
group, for example). It wouldn’t be so
different for lots of themes, like running, weightlifting, cooking, or even
interest in other subjects, like philosophy, religion, or mental health
topics. Touching on these different
subjects will help show what I mean about identification patterns and forms of
evolution of perspective. It’s tempting
to explain why my own interest scope is so broad, but maybe as well to get to
that bit by bit. I’ve led a long and
complicated life, and have waste a lot of time online.
But why discuss tea at all? People can self-identify through such interests.
Then it could also be about finding out about other options,
when chance contact brings up a subject.
But as I take it by the time much contact occurs at all it’s really
about self-identification, and to some extent that has to pre-exist to prompt
someone to look up a group through a Facebook search function, or however else.
Still on tea interest, perspective grouping most typically works
out along the line of those two extremes.
On the one hand in groups formed mostly by people newer to the subject
shared interest is about exploring what grocery store shelves carry, maybe
moving on to discussing brewing loose tea versus using tea bags, or showing off
mugs and teacups. There might be some
debate over whether loose tea is really better, or over sub-themes like
flavored teas versus more plain versions.
But everyone could be on a similar enough page, beyond someone wanting
to discuss relatively plain tea-bag tea, and someone else more into flavored
blends. It’s harder for extremism to
creep into a group defined in relation to a starting point perspective; developing
into different interest range would bump someone into the other kind of
grouping.
On the other extreme tea interest really is about
experience-developed preferences and self-identification. Ceremonial forms of brewing can enter in, or
meditation themes, or collecting expensive teaware that serves an artwork
function. Even limiting scope to just
the tea can cover a broad range, related to types, quality levels, brewing
approach, learning background, etc. I’ve
written 675 posts in a blog about tea, Tea in the Ancient World, just with some
of those on other subjects, writing about random themes. More than half are probably reviews, and
since the blog posts often compare teas probably around 500 versions are
mentioned. No wonder the subject has got
a bit old.
Self-identification can relate to claiming a
knowledge-related status, or mastering a certain sub-culture form. Eventually one would tend to reach an
end-point related to these themes too, and keep shifting to business interest, or
let active exploration drop, but those steps could take awhile. Prior to that one might assume a role as a
respected senior member in a tea community, regardless of age, more based on
status.
Self-identification, filtering, and reinforced perspective
shift
In groups this self-identification plays out in different
ways. This is really at the functional
core of the broader point I’m trying to make here, more than about how
filtering for specific interests works out.
Online contact lets people connect with others with similar interests,
and through such connection those interest forms evolve. I don’t mean that inputs like blogging or
video content is mostly driving that, or other “influencers” or experts, or
discussion input, it’s all that together, and a lot more. It turns into a subculture, and subcultures tend
to evolve, and have a life-span.
It’s fascinating how organic that process is. Discussion is one main driver, and subject
expert input is another. Reinforcement
of shared perspectives plays a big role.
A narrowing or member pruning effect is a very important
mechanism in groups. That’s not
achieved mainly through formal group moderation, or clearly expressed limits,
but instead through self-selection.
Often moderation can also play a significant role, with a defined group
tone or perspective being actively enforced by admin / moderator control. But beyond that people come and go, and
groups evolve, with negative feedback playing a role in that. Groups of all kinds also tend to not stay
popular, or keep to a tight theme; it all shifts naturally over time.
Perspective shift reinforcement occurs through many small
steps, like the pendulum clocks synchronizing timing, or individual steps on a
bridge adding up. Every group
comment is met with positive reaction (likes, positive comment reaction) or
negativity (open rejection, “downvoting,” or varying forms of correction). This leads to a stream of shared perspective,
partly related to pruning, and also tied to positive reinforcement.
I first noticed the natural trend of group member transition
related to IT (information technology) service management groups shifting in
popularity, from one location to another.
That core group of subject experts was small enough that it was easy to
spot which online location was trendy; it was where those experts were posting. The same happens for tea, but to a more
limited extent. For a lot of other
subjects participation is so broad that it’s not at all like that, for example
related to sports interests like running.
There surely are well-regarded athletes and subject experts related to
that subject, but Facebook or Reddit groups would typically have nothing to do
with drawing on that. Group experts
would be “local.”
Plenty of prior experiences have related to those “pruning”
and group evolution functions. I left a
Reddit running group that I wasn’t allowed to post to because I wasn’t
approaching running in a way that shared their perspective. The short version is that I don’t use a
fitness tracking watch and application, I just run, experimenting a little with
different format approaches. Removing
posts is more a Reddit theme; in Facebook negative discussion feedback would
cover a roughly equivalent function. I’m
not sure if people insulting each other on Twitter also works as an example or
if that’s just part of the broader culture there, a normal interaction form.
Group or platform algorithms reinforce the positive and
negative feedback loop effects. Facebook
shows you more of what you liked in the past, and Reddit subgroup filtering
downvotes some posts to oblivion or mostly shows others that are upvoted. On the surface this is going to collect
together existing views and preferences, but to some extent it would also adjust
and shape those.
Evolving interest forms and perspective
So far I’ve framed these groups as filtering members by
perspective and approach, and serving an awareness function. That’s it, but form of interest and
understanding can evolve quite a bit in relation to this established shared perspective. Social media group forms set up a perfect
context for that. People are always
going to put their own spin or take on any subject (liking the teas that they
like, or varying running training), but “better practice” forms emerge,
potentially framed within a narrow range.
Running without tracking biometric stats can be seen as primitive or
ineffective, or brewing tea “Western style” versus Gongfu style can seem more
or less wrong. Or just liking green tea
can, versus oolong and sheng pu’er, far more typical type-preference endpoints. It’s taboo in many tea groups to even mention
tea bags.
This filtering / shared preference selection seems harmless
enough in these examples, and that’s generally how I see it too. It’s only odd in these examples, not
negative. In some other groups patterns
can typically show up that are far less positive. Philosophy groups tend to evolve towards less
and less traditionally grounded or academically based themes, for example, to
shift from considering what Kant and Nietzsche really meant in relation to
ordinary perspective onto topics that are really about politics, New Age
concerns, or popular takes on spirituality and such. They naturally degrade, per one way of
framing those transitions. I don’t see
that as an example of sub-culture evolution, so I’ll set that kind of concern
aside, about problems in conversation tone or scope development potentially
derailing shared interest group participation. I see it more as the opposite
instead; a failure for a well-defined or narrow group sub-culture to “take.”
Those runners probably really are advancing, in practice (training)
and related to discussion scope. Tea
enthusiasts too; what works well gets discussed, maybe just shifting a bit far
onto evolved preference, until contact with anything like “basics” can get
lost. That could evolve to a different
kind of natural endpoint for the discussion range, not because it degrades, but
because it runs some form of natural course.
Eventually people usually just drink tea, and stop talking about it. Sets of active group members form and later
become inactive together, and the cycle repeats with new members or the channel
goes dead.
It would take a controversial example to highlight how all
this could go very badly, and how unconventional and negative perspective range
could develop from this. I barely even
need to bring up politics as a potential example. Somehow conservative thinking led to people
reject vaccine and mask use during a pandemic, in the same country where nearly
700,000 people have now died (688k covid deaths in the US, according to
Google’s dashboard, as I write this first draft, but over 700k soon after
during editing). There are equivalent
problems on the liberal side, about gender re-definition, political
correctness, and fairness related to race and history being extended too
far. This kind of transition pattern
enabled a sub-group of people to reject that the Earth is spherical in shape,
something people have been clear on for over 2000 years.
It’s all partly the “echo chamber” idea; as range of
discussion narrows and shifts are reinforced potential for continually
progressive error increases.
It’s not just the “echo chamber” effect, in relation to reinforcing
existing beliefs, since it can also easily lead to gradual evolution of those. Almost all hardcore conspiracy theorists
thought the earth was round not that ago, and that “prepper” theme, about
readying for the end of the world, came on pretty fast. Some examples of men’s rights and extremist
feminist groups probably relate to this negative potential, extending real
concerns and experience-grounded personal perspective in relatively “toxic”
directions, in both those instances to broad hatred for almost an entire gender. Gun interest groups can move on from
discussing purchase options and features to tactics used military operations,
and then to applied domestic terrorism. It
was a strange early anomaly how “prepper” groups included people preparing for
completely different forms of Armageddon, which could’ve turned into a stable
perspective form, with everyone sure it would all end soon, just under
different circumstances.
It’s not just about these extreme and negative examples, or
filtering narrowing specialized groups further and further, as in the running
and tea examples. Any somewhat active
and cohesive group could reinforce some degree of perspective shift.
Expat (foreigner resident) groups tend to filter people into
two sets, as those new to an area, with regular visitors included, and then
also long term residents. Among the
second group one part integrates positively, and could continue to discuss exploration
and participation in cultural forms, and the other has more negative
experiences, and discusses problems and limitations in the host culture.
The more positive set is generally less vocal, since there
is less to say about participating in a myriad of routine or special-event
local activities, you just do that, while the complaining about negative
patterns and problems seems more sustainable as a discussion form, as commiserating. In the end you really get positive groups for
people newer to the experience and negative ones tied to longer term exposure,
with the opposites (people put off by short-term experiences and positive about
extended exposure) not being as active.
A tourist who had a single bad experience might discuss that with the
bar-stool alcoholic online crowd, but those people would’ve typically moved on
to experiencing failed marriages and businesses.
Sub-groups and mental health perspective
Another subject I’ve been looking into adds a lot of
potential for shift in individual perspective, related to considering
dissociative identity disorder (DID), previously known as multiple personality
disorder. In a sense it’s not a great
example, because it doesn’t lend itself to the same degree of “spectrum” effect
that conditions like ADHD, autism, and depression and anxiety tend to (or at
least it seems not to; in practice that’s not quite as clear). For many of those on the less extreme part of
the experience spectrum, for the other conditions, the average person would
have some experience of some of the same traits, or maybe many of them. We all feel some degree of anxiety and mood
changes.
As people discuss and learn about mental health subjects in
related groups the effect would have to be very different from that of learning
about tea, and changing brewing approach and such. If someone is trying to learn about a
completely abstract subject, as I’ve approached learning about DID, maybe not;
it doesn’t connect to my own internal experience. But for subjects like anxiety and depression,
with people exploring those naturally experiencing some degree of them, it
would probably be different, and hopefully positive inputs to causes of experiences could adjoin learning, with treatment being necessary as a primary form of resolution in more pronounced cases.
I’m certainly not claiming that people would tend to
over-diagnose their mental health experience, or conditions, based on hearing
of others’ experiences. If anything a
more grounded, informed, and accurate view of what they already experience
should really emerge instead, with better decision making about treatment options and requirements. But a
feedback loop of changing those experienced initial conditions would seem
likely, and it would be hard for me to guess if that form would typically be
positive or negative, if the change would actually tend to be helpful or not,
or would most often lead to positive life choices. Mental health issues can tend to seem black and white, and an example from my own life can fill in what a grey area can look like.
I just asked my son and daughter if they ever heard voices
that seem external to them, as not part of their normal internal thoughts, and my
son said yes, in some cases internal voices seem to be external, or at least separate from his own main thoughts or opinion. It turns out that as many as 10% of everyone
might experience some degree of “hearing voices” in such a way (with internal or external form being a real factor, but with interpretation coming into play related to that). Those occurrence percentage numbers shift a lot,
depending on what source someone cites from, and the intended meaning (/
inclusion scoping). On the one side that
could just relate to varying interpretation of a normal internal dialogue (maybe
his case, or maybe not). Of course now
I’m talking about schizophrenia, more or less, not the experience of distinct
and separate internal personalities, the DID case. It seems possible that maybe a division could
blur, even though that’s definitely not the conventional take.
DID is especially interesting because it manifests first as
a hidden condition, in almost all references or discussion of it. It might seem a little counter-intuitive but
people experience multiple personalities while they are not aware of this form
of experience. I’ll largely set aside
that some people pretend to have conditions that they don’t, or exaggerate
forms of their own experience to fit into a more interesting and extreme
paradigm. Maybe that is a basis for a
lot of online discussion, those false cases, or maybe a very rare occurrence. Either way it seems necessary to not
overthink or over-interpret that part, since there would be no way of knowing
who is being honest or accurately evaluating which experiences.
Just a bit off topic, I suspect that mental health issues
seem a lot more common right now than in the past (even 10 years ago) for a
number of reasons. One is that stigma
may be lifting; people feel free to discuss more real cases. If anything that might be overcorrecting,
back to the theme of it being popular to have certain conditions, leading to
the problem I just covered. Real
internal awareness probably increases too, better diagnosis, treatment, and
general awareness, in a positive sense.
An online contact raised an interesting additional point,
that what “counts” as a mental health condition may have shifted too. This contact has considerable experience with
mental health issues, with his own, and in knowledge of care practices. To be clear
this isn’t framed as expert opinion and final judgment on mental health care
practice in general, just as food for thought.
Per his input what was considered a problematic mental health condition
in the past was truly debilitating, with more borderline cases regarded as
normal / conventional experience. Then
over time that shifted, and a much broader range of people were diagnosed and
treated for less severe problems, less impactful variations of the same
conditions. He even connected that framed
as a standard deviation range, which applies percentages to that summary, but
it seems as well to stop short of conveying that here.
There could be a positive and negative side to this trend of
expanding definition of mental health disorder ranges (assuming that it is
accurate, which isn’t put forth as a given here). People with relatively mild depression or
anxiety could still benefit from treatment, prior to those having a lot of
impact on their life, and progressing to worsen. If approaches could function in a
preventative form, and relate to other scope than drug based treatment, early /
less-severe case treatment would seem like a relatively universally good thing. For example, if someone experiencing very
mild depression or anxiety takes up moderate exercise, or can use meditation
practices to counter those experiences, that seems like a relatively positive
outcome, much more positive than them just “toughing it out.” Putting half of everyone on “psych meds”
seems like a different thing, and a potential problem. But why shouldn’t my son undergo
psychological counseling, just in case?
He probably won’t, but we will definitely closely monitor that issue.
I’m reminded of a friend—an ex-girlfriend, really--moving to
Los Angeles to try to become an actress, and experiencing anxiety related to
that life change, which was severe in scope (the change, at least, and maybe
the resulting anxiety too). Maybe she
needed the psych-meds treatment she was put on after consulting a doctor there;
I don’t know. It was the first I’d even
heard of such a thing, back in the 90s.
Her take, after some experience, was that the side effects of the drugs
weren’t worth the positive outcome, which diminished in effectiveness over
time, so she quit them. But then maybe
they had already played a critical positive role in a problematic phase of her
life, whether she knew it or not. She
thought not, that doctors just prescribed those to do something, and to sell
medicine, but that in her case it probably wasn’t essential. Who knows?
How does this connect with synchronization of perspective,
one might wonder? Another example fills
that in.
I’ve recently ran across a blogger post with someone
explaining how they couldn’t get one of their children diagnosed properly for
conditions that they talked about but didn’t clearly define. From their description the children sounded
healthy and normal, maybe one less so than the other (which I won’t cite in
reference form here; it doesn’t add much, and implies a degree of negative
judgment I really don’t intend). It
seemed to amount to a claim that both of the two children might experience
ADHD, anxiety, and some degree of autism, with only one being diagnosed with
some part of that, but it stopped short of adding full details. That parent wanted them both to be diagnosed
and treated, but mental health professional review found one to not suffer from
any of these disorders, to their disappointment. If that mental health professional input was
that the child was healthy, why would a parent “want” the second child to
suffer from these conditions? It
probably wasn’t that.
My guess (only offered as such here) is that repetitive
exposure to online discussion of these conditions led them to interpret both
their kids as experiencing this set of conditions, based in one instance on
normal range aspects / symptoms of life experience, which also overlap as
symptoms of more extreme cases and conditions.
For example, my daughter sometimes sucks her thumb, at age 7, which
could be an indicator that she is on the autism spectrum (as a “stim,” a
self-comforting action). To be clear we
don’t think she is even “on the spectrum;” she is just slow to lose that habit. If the parent suspects that their children
are suffering from conditions then of course they would want assistance in
resolving that. Then it could be a short
step from media and online discussion exposure of such input to expecting it,
based on incorrect evaluation, or even on to rejecting a psychological health
care professional’s evaluation, which is where they seemed to be.
Of course there are a range of other possible
interpretations of this case, or possible facts of the matter, actual real
status. Maybe the parent wanted the kids
in special programs to receive forms of assistance, for self-serving purposes,
whether or not they had experienced such disorders. I doubt that, but it’s possible. Maybe the parent is a better judge of mental
health issues than a trained medical professional, but again I also doubt
that. Most likely the expectation came
from real life or social media based exposure to ideas and incorrect evaluation,
which had to be informed by personal experience and online source material or
discussion. The “spectrum” idea probably
played a large role in this, and the parent just wasn’t comfortable with the
typical—or at least individual judgement based—cutoff point. It seems at least
possible that the mother didn’t “get the diagnosis that she wanted” for herself
either, for something related or different, and that some degree of projection
of that was involved.
Over and over in mental health discussion groups this theme
re-occurs, not just of self-diagnosis and interpretation, but of
second-guessing medical subject expert input.
A main subtheme is the feeling of validation and reward from acquired
recognition (diagnosis), as official entry into that sub-group, or rejection
from not receiving that. It seems like
an odd cycle. Group discussion members
use diagnosis status as a way to filter group members, to narrow inclusion of
false claims, which is probably mostly positive and functional. But this also seems to evolve to serve a
topic interest gateway purpose, as an informal indicator of full membership.
If that parent had multiple confirmations that both kids
suffered from no mental health issues then she would’ve needed to accept that
life is just normally as she and her kids experienced it, inherently problematic,
with no extra group there to support her form of day to day difficulties. The spectrum idea complicates things, in this
case, and in general. It seems quite
possible that the diagnosis for one or both kids would have been different 20
years ago, and might shift—based on the exact same circumstances—in another
decade.
Varying social input effect by subject
These effects vary by subject. It’s interesting jumping from random topic to
topic, learning about subjects instead of following fiction as entertainment,
and seeing these themes play out. In
many of my own examples it has nothing to do with actual current experience, as
with those mental health issues. I
lifted weights when I was younger, more than 25 years ago now, and more
recently it has been interesting learning about body related functions by
checking on steroid use themes through Youtube videos, almost entirely related
to bodybuilding. Testosterone and human
growth hormone—both normal internal body process regulators—double as drugs
used for building crazy levels of muscle mass, and also for offsetting the
effects of aging, I’m just not even considering using them for that. It’s also interesting learning background on
what my kids experience, in physically growing.
Then over time shared perspective on bodybuilding steroid
use changes. Over the last 5 years a lot
of well-known bodybuilders have died; that has driven the main perspective
changes. This kind of theme extends
personal awareness and perspective well into everyday life experience and
choices; people out there are putting drugs in their bodies based on current
conventional understanding, and a small percentage of them die from doing
that.
What I find most interesting doesn’t really relate to those
higher risk use cases, it’s about how the human body functions normally. But tying back to the sub-culture
synchronization issue lots of people would take it the other way, and make week
to week choices about drug use based on this input. They probably focus more on scandals and
deaths than the practical advice, given the context for what draws the most
attention I’ve already described.
To be a bit clearer there are a set of 10 or less main
Youtube influencers who define this specific subject realm (weightlifting /
bodybuilding, in relation to health and drug use). In many cases those subject specialists align
in sets, sharing follower bases by doing cross-over videos together. There is a lot of potential for a narrow
group of ideas to be shared very broadly as a result, which is most often a
positive thing, related to sharing valid warnings about unsafe practices, but I
suppose the opposite could also occur.
Interesting scope omissions seem to occur; none of those people tend to
ever acknowledge that liposuction even occurs (cosmetic surgery, versus
work-out approaches and PED drug use), because there is no benefit for them in
covering that topic; it’s off their central message. Even a single sports injury by a high profile
“influencer” figure can cascade into a lot of related discussion, and can bump
a large base of follower perspective about related risk factors.
There being so many groups covering so much scope is hard to
place. No matter what tangent or
interest one pursues there are groups and references out there about that. It seems possible that in every single case
the members experience some degree of perspective shift that goes along with a
learning curve, maybe leading to more balanced, informed, functional perspective,
or maybe the opposite tends to mix in, biases that are more negative.
It’s tempting to conclude that this is a potentially bad
thing, the evolution of lots of small interest groups, enabling rapid shifts in
perspective. “Small” here is
relative; I’ve personally co-founded a Facebook group about tea that currently
has 22,000 members, and collected Quora answers in a Specialty Tea Space that
has 7400 followers.
The runners and tea drinkers I kept talking about aren’t
really hurting anyone, beyond maybe slighting other runners and tea drinkers
now and again, for not being on their level.
It all feels a bit unstable though.
A lot of “cult of personality” forms of this influence seem negative,
when people manipulate these patterns to elevate themselves, often to sell
whatever they are selling to others. In
the form of a conventional ad that’s easy to spot, but other “thought leader”
or celebrity roles are something else.
Back to the steroid theme a very popular figure, Rich Piana,
talked openly about risks and benefits of steroid use, focused quite a bit on
risk, but his own heavy use and routine video posting about training methods
and gains implied that risks could be kept moderate, or at least accepted. His early death at age 46 implied otherwise.
That sort of correction would only occur over time, that the most interesting
or actively developed parts of a given subject could turn out to involve
non-sustainable practices.
Of course one could draw related parallels with covid, a
topic I’ve already mentioned. Trump had
a lot of people believing there was no pandemic going on in 2020, up until
about 250,000 or so people had died from covid, and it seems like forms related
to what I’m discussing enabled that. Now
I’m not so sure that a lot of people who reject covid vaccine protection are
even clear on why they don’t, it just fits in with other assumptions and shared
perspective they hold. Changing that
perspective, even in light of overwhelming evidence about vaccine safety versus
covid risk, would trigger negative reinforcement within those groups, and tied
to media content inputs.
I recently looked up what Fox News was saying about
vaccinations and they were only running three stories on problems related to
violation of personal freedom from vaccination mandates, nothing at all about
comparative risk levels, or the benefit of being vaccinated. The current 7 day average of US covid deaths
is 1783 per day, according to the Google dashboard; they wouldn’t mention that.
Resolution of effects from these kinds of inputs
The way forward seems to relate to greater self-awareness,
to identify and control the impact these associations have on us. I spent a long time sorting out how one might
go about acquiring that self-awareness, of inputs that tend to occur on a sub-conscious level, but it all stopped short of giving
anyone practical advice, for the most part.
It wasn’t mostly about social media use, the practices of self-awareness
I’m referring to, but other approaches and forms of review could carry over.
A higher order awareness of the forms of these patterns may
work out. That news-story Facebook
whistle-blower confirmed that Facebook was aware that tone, controversy, conflict,
and other negativity were factors in feed algorithm selections. Facebook chose not to moderate or restrict
that in any way, valuing ad revenue and profit over positive social media user
experience (per the allegations, at least; the story is still unfolding). This kind of higher-level discussion of
social media influence could be positive, in the longer run.
People joke that to witness the decline of civilization and
general perspective one only needs to browse through Tik Tok. It’s only partly a joke. 4chan really is a horror show, across some
scope, and Twitter really can be much more negative than positive. It’s not just related to extremist positions
though, and adopting the practice of arguing online. Every subject can fragment
and lead to more and more extreme positions, with plenty of shift of initial
perspectives along the way. I hope that greater awareness of these inputs, and
the results from them, can lead to some forms of partial resolution in the
future.
