<
https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2022/05/social-media-democracy-trust-babel/629369/>
"The story of Babel is the best metaphor I have found for what happened to
America in the 2010s, and for the fractured country we now inhabit. Something
went terribly wrong, very suddenly. We are disoriented, unable to speak the
same language or recognize the same truth. We are cut off from one another and
from the past.
It’s been clear for quite a while now that red America and blue America are
becoming like two different countries claiming the same territory, with two
different versions of the Constitution, economics, and American history. But
Babel is not a story about tribalism; it’s a story about the fragmentation of
everything. It’s about the shattering of all that had seemed solid, the
scattering of people who had been a community. It’s a metaphor for what is
happening not only
between red and blue, but within the left and within the
right, as well as within universities, companies, professional associations,
museums, and even families.
Babel is a metaphor for what some forms of social media have done to nearly all
of the groups and institutions most important to the country’s future—and to us
as a people. How did this happen? And what does it portend for American life?"
Via Steven Vaughan-Nichols, who wrote "This is an excellent article on how
social networks have hurt our society far more than helped it. I’m sorry to
say, as someone who was using social networks long before most of you, that
this is all too true."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
