At an anecdotal level, I've found not just acrophily alone, but:
> Actual-activists often have strong but moderated and empowered views. The people making phone calls or writing postcards to get out the vote see politics as important with a right and wrong but not cartoon good and evil. The people doing the work do *not* go viral among their "team."
> Social media promotes non-activists with disempowered worldviews where cartoon villains are doing things because the villains are bad. You can't really do anything about that — which makes the more extremist views consistently easier to hold.
Extremism on social media is usually easy and requires less personal responsibility. All the good people agree with you and all the bad people are irremediable. Just like the conspiracy theories where lizard people run the government, nothing you do matters, so you don't have to do anything.
I wonder if anti-extremist activists might not create a resource of things you can do:
"Against white supremacy? Here are 10 things you can do."
"Against abortion? Here are 10 things you can do." ... And have all your readers blasting volunteer opportunities at people posting easy-extremism on social media?
At an anecdotal level, I've found not just acrophily alone, but:
> Actual-activists often have strong but moderated and empowered views. The people making phone calls or writing postcards to get out the vote see politics as important with a right and wrong but not cartoon good and evil. The people doing the work do *not* go viral among their "team."
> Social media promotes non-activists with disempowered worldviews where cartoon villains are doing things because the villains are bad. You can't really do anything about that — which makes the more extremist views consistently easier to hold.
Extremism on social media is usually easy and requires less personal responsibility. All the good people agree with you and all the bad people are irremediable. Just like the conspiracy theories where lizard people run the government, nothing you do matters, so you don't have to do anything.
I wonder if anti-extremist activists might not create a resource of things you can do:
"Against white supremacy? Here are 10 things you can do."
"Against abortion? Here are 10 things you can do." ... And have all your readers blasting volunteer opportunities at people posting easy-extremism on social media?