I think I’ve finally figured out what’s making me uncomfortable about what’s happening on X and the whole free speech / Musk / Trump election avalanche of smugness, bitterness and hatred. And it’s something I don’t think I’ve heard anyone else address.
But first, have you seen X lately?! If not, you really should. For me, it’s become a shocking napalm fire of American nationalist bile, shadenfreude and ruthless character assassination. This post, liked by over 27 thousand people gives you just some idea:
When Musk announced his takeover of Twitter and declared a platform of free speech, I was stoked. I agreed that the Woke thing had gone much too far and that the liberal-nazism being waged on society was getting intolerable. Something had to be done, and maybe someone like Musk was the only one in a unique position to do it. Most politicians or people of influence couldn’t say boo against wokeism without committing career suicide. Musk was somewhat ‘above the law’ in that he’s loaded and (apparently) doesn’t care what people think about him.
But, no-one counted on the perfect storm of unfettered free speech heading right down the alley into a massively contentious US election season. Polarization of viewpoints is already a huge problem, but suddenly all the gloves were off as everyone raced to the bottom to demonstrate their hatred of their opposing team in visceral detail.
For me, there is nothing uglier in the universe than the rabid hatred of one human unto another. It makes no difference what their point of view is. That hatred is evil incarnate. But what’s absurd about it is that probably about 99% of it is completely unwarranted and only exists in this imaginary space where our online avatars battle for useless supremacy over a like count. Most of these warring avatars would not conduct themselves anywhere near as shamelessly in the street as they do online. It’s a war of smoke and mirrors. But it has a real world cost, and I think a really, really big one that no-one has fully thought through.
When we talk about ‘free speech’, we hold this assumption that ‘some people have something controversial to say and free speech now allows them to say it.’ That seems a noble goal—even if you don’t agree with what they say. But the false assumption here is that people’s attitudes are absolute and finite; ie. that there are a fixed number of people with something unpalatable to say. This is false. What seems to be happening now is that there is a growing number of people spewing hatred that otherwise might not have held those opinions.
Someone forgot that we copy each other, and that our opinions and emotions are dynamic and contagious, not absolute. As the hatred in people rises, more people are becoming hateful, because it now seems OK to behave that way. We are normalizing hatred.
My only hope is that we are merely experiencing a woke backlash that will eventually find equilibrium again and some semblance of normality returns, but I wouldn’t bet my house on it.
That the Democrats lost the election may actually be a blessing, as most liberal-minded people are not idiotic enough to take their jibe onto the streets with guns and flags, which, given their level of hatred, was a distinct possibility from the red camp had they lost.
It’s possible that Zuckerberg et al’s policy of censoring inflammatory content is a necessary evil to stop us from killing each other.
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