The original article mentioned divisive. I think politics is the key driver to that, with the mainstream media being a willing and active enabler of division.
Yeah, but it also says we won't quit, even though we all know it's divisive. That's because it's also addictive. And that addiction also affects people who pointedly avoid engaging in politics at all online.
The ability to create your own echo chamber is contributing to divisive politics, yes. But that's not the media... that's self-selection. We tend to be friends with people like ourselves culturally. And we wind up unfriending/blocking (or at least muting) people whose politics and lives make our blood boil, out of self-defense. The media isn't actively enabling this... we are.
My own social life is mostly around the Minneapolis performing arts community - my friends are either active participants in or fans of local music, theater, and dance. So it's a bunch of educated upper-midwest liberals. That's a formula for political echo chamber, but it's not because the media is manipulating me! Likewise, I have a childhood friend who runs a Harley-Davidson shop in rural Pennsylvania. His right-wing politics are an echo chamber made up of his social life of bikers and rural white people. He's not a victim of the media. He just lives a different life than me.
I don't agree. The (news) media is misleading, if not deceptive, in how it presents itself. The major of the time it's not news per se, but shit that will draw the most eyeballs and attract the most attention, etc. Even for the casual observer it's easy to get sucked into that vortex.
Fake news is not simply a matter of truth or not. It's also about importance and relevance. For example, I took a dump this morning. That's a fact. But that doesn't make it news. So any any given moment, the news isn't pushing news, it's pushing - like everything else - increased engagement.
Intended or not, active participants or not, we are all victims of that because it manipulates broader perceptions, agendas, etc.
The ability to create your own echo chamber is contributing to divisive politics, yes. But that's not the media... that's self-selection. We tend to be friends with people like ourselves culturally. And we wind up unfriending/blocking (or at least muting) people whose politics and lives make our blood boil, out of self-defense. The media isn't actively enabling this... we are.
My own social life is mostly around the Minneapolis performing arts community - my friends are either active participants in or fans of local music, theater, and dance. So it's a bunch of educated upper-midwest liberals. That's a formula for political echo chamber, but it's not because the media is manipulating me! Likewise, I have a childhood friend who runs a Harley-Davidson shop in rural Pennsylvania. His right-wing politics are an echo chamber made up of his social life of bikers and rural white people. He's not a victim of the media. He just lives a different life than me.