We’re facing a lot of polarization right now. How are you processing it? Some examples:
“They are literally stealing the election from Trump with massive voter fraud! The evidence is coming!”
“Trump is such a loser he can’t admit defeat. Judges are throwing out his cases left and right. It’s a scam to raise money.”
“Trump is literally the last chance for freedom and democracy in the world against the communists. That’s why they hate him so much and why the media is constantly looking to destroy him.”
“Trump is a narcissistic lair who surrounds himself with followers who don’t think for themselves but are controlled by biases and belief systems they don’t even recognize.”
“COVID is a scamdemic! Yearly deaths are flat. The NWO death cult globalists want to sterilize, microchip, and kill you with an untested vaccine. If you wear a mask, you are a sheep, and you support their death racket!”
“The number of daily deaths in the US is approaching and surpassing historical tragedy levels. Wear a mask, get the vaccine, stay home, and we’ll all get through this. If you don’t, you’re selfish and are literally killing other people.”
“The Galactic Federation is real! Aliens are real! You aren’t ready for the truth.”
“People are stupid and believe all kinds of random gibberish on the internet. Conspiracy theorists are everywhere and should be ignored and silenced.”
“The US is printing money like never before! Quickly get yourself some cryptocurrency while you still can.”
“Bitcoin is a greater fool scam with no intrinsic value that will crash in price again and again and fleece those who don’t understand the game.”
“America is the last free nation against the globalist / communist agenda. Socialism kills and is creeping its way into every aspect of life through corrupt and violent government.”
“America is the last backward modern nation with no single payer healthcare, no social safety net, homelessness out of control, and capitalism profit seeking corrupting everything including prisons, universities, and government.”
These are just some of the examples of polarized views I see from my friends and family. Chances are, there’s something like what I’ve mentioned above that you are quite convinced is absolutely true and you “know” if anyone disagrees with you they are not only ignorant and wrong, but they are actively harming others with their beliefs and essentially making the world a worse place.
The wake up call, I think, is recognizing how others who completely disagree with you feel the same way about you and your beliefs.
Yes, there is a way to be less wrong, but I’m not as convinced in “absolute truth” as I once was because the world is a very complex place with lots of nuance. It’s very possible (and probable) that within a sufficiently large system, you can find corruptions and issues which will support a narrative about the whole system while at the very same time other aspects of that system demonstrate the opposite view of harm being done.
So how do we navigate all this? Do we give into fear, anger, and doubt? Do we steel our minds to one way of thinking and shut everyone who disagrees with us out? Do we keep our views open to possibility while still recognizing how people (including ourselves!) can be deceived? Do we censor and sever ties with friends and family because they seem so “lost” in their beliefs about reality?
If you’re struggling with this stuff, I recommend checking out Spiral Dynamics Integral. There is a way to understand these conflicting values and views of the world that integrates them all together. It becomes less about who is “wrong” and who is “right” but about understanding how someone can be “right” within their value system based on their community and understanding. To be different within their system would actually be “wrong” and cause more harm than good.
Understanding this helps us understand each other and judge less. You have more control over the outcome of your life than the beliefs of those around you so don’t get too upset with others. Also, be free to be wrong. It’s okay. Your identity and ego are not so fragile as to reject improving your understanding, even if it includes some redefinition.
We got this, human family. It’s going to be okay. Things will probably get even weirder. That’ll be okay too. Love really is the key to navigating through it all while continuing to improve our epistemology, knowledge of logical fallacies, and maxims which can guide us through what otherwise feels like chaos.
Be at peace.
Be well.
When you have love, you have it all.
I've been thinking about this increasingly for months; I appreciate your posting.
Like so many, many others, I'm navigating this with family, in particular, and others on the internet. It's easy to keep people at arm's length and ignore them or give only the most peripheral responses to beliefs they hold which I don't necessarily agree with, in order to sidestep an argument and "keep the peace."
But not engaging is not helpful to anyone, in the long run. The answer is to explore and to seek learning and growth, for everyone involved. To explore and challenge our own ideas and beliefs as well as those of others. To examine a concept, a belief, a practice, a policy, a whatever; to hold it in your mind and turn it over slowly, seeing its various facets, to weigh its strengths and weaknesses, it's potential consequences, is a sign - in my opinion - of less fearful, higher level thinking.
To be a truly independent thinker takes practice at being open to the perspectives of others, being willing to be wrong, willing to stand one's ground, and willing to let others hold to beliefs that differ from our own. It takes being willing to be accused of "both side-ism," fence-sitting (intellectual, philosophical, and moral)*, and sometimes far worse.
We don't live in a vacuum. Our decisions and interactions with others have consequences. Perhaps that's where fear comes into play, especially when it comes to our dealings with people we care about, or with those who have some measure of influence over how we're perceived by others. I know some people who've felt a lifetime of being attacked for their views; they are less inclined to engage others.
There's an old Jazz number, 'Tain't What You Do (It's the Way That You Do It), that in a funny way guides me in approaching others. I really do try to meet people half way, show them I try to understand where their coming from and why, try to see the possibility of truth or usefulness in what they're saying, before trying to show them the path to my "side" of the scenery.
Sometimes, it even works! :-) Seriously, I think I learned this subconsciously, being a customer-facing employee in every professional role I've had.
It's all to easy to be rigid, to avoid nuance, to see the universe in black and white. It is with those who are rigid, have no time for nuance, are subject to a black-and-white worldview that I am still learning how to navigate. Sometimes people will meet you halfway, and then there are the other what...70%, 80%, 90%? [side thought: is your estimate a measure of how jaded you are?]
Humans can't grow alone. We don't improve without bumping into the minds of others in community. There are so many more dimensions than "left" or "right," so many more realms than the political, health, or economic. So much about which we need to talk with, learn from, and teach each other.
I've never heard of Spiral Dynamics Integral, but I'll give it a look. Perhaps it will be useful. Perhaps it won't be my cup of tea. I expect at the least to learn something, and I'm looking forward to it.
*And while we're at this: may the Oxford comma never die. So there!! :-)
Thanks for chiming in, Clark!
I disagree with this. Sure, both sides in major disagreements often actively dislike each other because of the perceived damage the other side is doing. But it's perfectly plausible and actually happens quite often that one side is mostly right and the other side is mostly wrong. And when the correct side is actually right, just seeing that the other side thinks bad things about the correct side isn't particularly useful, in my opinion.
This doesn't mean you shouldn't put forth effort to understand the other side, and more importantly, verify that you're on the correct side in such a dispute.
But this should be the case all the time: you should always be checking your ideas, even when there is no active dispute among most of the population. There's been plenty of times in the past where "everyone knows" something, only to find out that everyone was wrong. No special signal of disagreement should be necessary to trigger such questioning.
The "trick" in all this is to be rigorous in your collection of data and weighting of it based on its plausibility. Plausibility testing can be done in many ways: one of the basic ones is doing corollary analysis, such as "if this is true, what else would need to be true/false", and how reasonable are all those corollaries. This is where I think most people fail when forming opinions. They are too eager to accept data as true and find it difficult to maintain a certain amount of skepticism. And a few people suffer from the reverse problem, where they reject all data as untrustworthy, even when much of the data they have forms a plausible view of reality.
Plausibility analysis can also be done based on an information source's accuracy rating, but this is often more difficult than corollary analysis, since this first requires an often difficult vetting of sources. People often use this method when choosing what to belief, but they often don't do a good job of rating their information sources.
A proper vetting of sources would include things such as historical accuracy of sources, potential conflicts of interest of sources, etc. The reputation system I want to build will be designed to help in this latter endeavor, especially nowadays, when much of our data comes from sources on the internet that are difficult to get accurate information about.
As a final note, it probably goes without saying, but it's very important when doing either of these forms of analysis to struggle diligently against confirmation bias. Confirmation bias takes place when you give more weight and belief to the data and opinions which tend to confirm a desired belief you have. Because almost everyone is subject to some amount of confirmation bias, it's actually good to spend extra time trying to confirm the opposite to your desired beliefs whenever possible.
When there is a disagreement among people about a specific belief, politely talking to people with the opposite opinion can be a useful way to double check your beliefs, but when doing so, it's important to pick the best proponents of the belief and not simply the ones that are the easiest to defeat in an argument.
Another way to attack confirmation bias is by "unlinking" beliefs that aren't logically related. Many of our beliefs are "group beliefs" where we form a common set of beliefs with a group we identify with. Often these beliefs have no logical relationship, they just happen to be held by most of the group. This tends to happen out of a desire to "fit in" and also because we get many of our data and belief from the people we commonly interact with, so if we mostly interact with one group, most of our information/beliefs come from that same group.
If you find yourself mostly agreeing with one group of people, and there is no logical linking between the beliefs of the group, it's a good idea to double-check such beliefs carefully, as you've very likely been the victim of confirmation bias.
I think you stated a version of what I stated in terms of the wake up call is recognizing the "other side" may feel the same negative emotions towards you as you do towards them. Recognizing this, I think, makes it possible to have the polite conversations that are so important for more clear thinking and understanding.
Just as you said, throughout history "everyone was right" even though they were wrong. That's why I hesitate to hold too strongly to "one side is mostly right and the other side is mostly wrong." Does that mean I'm ready to give time and attention to flat-earthers? Well, no, but does that remove the possibility that we are actually living in a simulation and those who think of the earth as "flat" may actually be connecting to some useful truth about the nature of reality? Certainly possible for those who can think in multiple dimensions and with nuance.
So much of what you said here is valuable. Thank you, Dan. Lots of confirmation bias going on. Trying to disprove our own beliefs is one of the few ways we actually gain knowledge as described in this simple game:
My friend Sean King has a nice list of life maxims which help him with his plausibility analysis. I think that's a great pattern to use. Find some wise, useful tools for clear thinking and stick to them, always being open to re-evaluate them and refine them over time, but ultimately settling into good thinking patterns which help us all be less wrong.
Hive is one of the few places where both sets of views are still permitted.
This is such a good way to look at it all. I'm convinced that the unexhaustive search for clicks and views and ultimately ad revenue drives a lot of the chaos in our world today, and that platforms like Hive and the web-monetization platforms will help calm things down a little and make everything less sensationalist/ right and wrong.
I deliberately opened up my online presence to include all points of view but I have to admit that during the last US election cycle it all got a bit much and was producing a ton of anxiety.
I really don't believe that people with opposing viewpoints to my own aren't bad or evil... I know they're coming from a place of wanting to support the things they think are important. Unfortunately with a lot of the conversations I've had, people seem uninterested in trying to learn or see other viewpoints.
What everyone has in common these days is a device in their hand. People are corralled into echo chambers by algorithms. Sorted into piles. What they can't see is the invisible cage placed around them. They only see massive approval ratings on whatever is being presented. That's been going on for long enough that opposition nowadays comes standard with shock value. Thinking differently and expressing those views after managing to escape the confines of your own prison of ideas is much like stumbling into a new tribe that hasn't seen other people before, and now they're hearing a new language they don't understand combined with natural tendencies of becoming aggressively defensive.
good read thx.
one day you humans will figure it out. nanu nanu
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Here's what #DonaldMarshall had to say regarding The Galactic Federation Of Light:
Donald Marshall (November 2012) - the galactic federation of light is a Vrill deception,... run by drones and dead chipheads... the andromedans and pleadians are vrill type 3, the long necked grey lookin guys, they will put their consciousnesses on chip and put them into beautiful women clones with big eyes to make them look exotic... they just want to take people underground... theyre the "nordics" too... another spinoff they talk...the andromedans are a lie... they are the long necked Vrill going to use man made saucers to come down and spread the "love and light" they want to bring people back to their "homeworld" (siberian D.U.M.B ) and eat them and drone them... Prince Charles tried to introduce me to the Vrill (type 2) and say they were andromedans crash landed in antarctica on a crescent shaped spaceship... that wasnt true though,... theyre just Vrills... troglodytes... they have no tech and are too dumb to discover any...
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STOPDo not miss the last post from @hivebuzz:
In everything there is a truth and a lie (Sometimes mixed). If a person jumps on a volcano he dies, there is no middle ground here.
Regarding friends and family, I think it is good to avoid discussing points that both are on opposite sides. If the discussion happens, do not try to win and say that the other is right and you will still have friends.