| 4chan predates all of them. And there were plenty of thriving forums where odd and extreme ideas of all sorts were discussed before 4chan. What mass social media sites like Twitter and Facebook provided was an easier way for the less technologically literate to discover extremist forums (as well as extremist ideas generally) without having to know someone from those circles beforehand. IMO, what happened is that Western culture over the past 60 years became increasingly cynical, including it's intellectual culture (e.g. post-structuralist, deconstructive ideas have come to dominate both the left and the right). So you have a mass of people who simply don't know what to believe, because everything is about "they" coming to get you or oppress you. Anti-corporatism, cultural wars, identity politics etc, etc. Then we take a massive population--educated and uneducated--which has internalized this notion that all "conventional" ideas are inherently suspect, and dumped them into cyberspace. I'm reminded of this quote from Oliver Wendall Holmes, > When the ignorant are taught to doubt they do not know what they safely may believe. And it seems to me that at this time we need education in the obvious more than investigation of the obscure. Years ago I would have reflexively thought that sentiment oppressively paternalistic. Now not so much, partly because in reflection on my own life I can see how our culture effected how I processed ideas. I've learned (or relearned) to appreciate the fact that simply because Holmes often was oppressively paternalistic does not invalidate the central truths reflected in that sentiment. |