i realize that there is a certain amount of arrogance inherent in me saying "your opinions are the result of an echo chamber, but I, here on this much smaller network, have opinions which are not"
but like, my opinions are based on primary sources!
I am comfortable in my ability to recognize my own cognitive biases and account for them. It's literally my job to be good at that process. Most people are *very* bad at it.
But if you are able to identify and account for your own biases, you can absolutely sit in an echo chamber and be better informed than someone else in a different echo chamber! Happens all the time.
“It’s possible we’re all idiots in echo chambers” is not the most fun way to use social media but it’s probably the healthiest way.
Not us, obviously. We’re just Built Different. But everyone else…
I think the real trick is being aware of my own assumptions and able to both be wrong and change if I am wrong.
The real danger of an echo chamber is it convinces us we are right and "everyone is saying it!"
I appreciate Bluesky because people will disagree with me here, with data!
Big difference is you don't have a bluechecks vs randos dynamic here, and since the panic is concentrated among the bluecheck commentariat it really gets amplified over there. You're more likely to see both panic and don't panic here and can evaluate the arguments.
I really need them to figure out what a self-fulfilling prophecy is, sooner rather than later, because uh my ability to lead a remotely happy life kinda depends on it
those of us who are most likely to see our civil rights crumble before our eyes do *not* seem to be the ones postpostpostposting our fantasies about changing candidates
My husband’s vibes and mine are just totally different (not in a way that’s causing strain, to be clear), but I think it’s entirely because he’s on Twitter a lot and I’m not.
This insistence in a social media context leads to the tiresome retreading of the same concluded bullshit in ways that saps enthusiasm for Beating The Shithead In November. Even if it is a small push towards inactivity and resignation, it is one.
Be adders, not subtractors.
the logical leaps and assumptions that are being taken as fact on Election/Polling Twitter are truly insane. Some decently reliable and levelheaded people on there becoming overnight brain geniuses that believe Biden stepping down as a result of growing and unstoppable political tide.
One fairly reliable data/polling guy yesterday was posting about how Whitmer tagged Kamala Harris before Biden in a tweet, and how this was an obvious signal that Whitmer was breaking with the administration. Absolutely poisoned by 2017-era palace intrigue nonsense.
I'm just am observer, but I see it too. Just absolute certainty with seemingly no comprehension there's only one relevant decision maker who can get you from step A to step B, and no one has a theory of how to persuade him.
You mean this blitz that just so happened to start right before Congress returns instead of immediately after abysmal debate performance? You see what this suggests, right?
going back on there and seeing ostensibly left(?) journalists(?) sharing a video of trump in the 2000s to go "wow he's so quirky and funny and likeable, unlike biden"...boy, i dunno about that place
i’m sorry but i’m getting massive 2016 hubris vibes from all this. we are just one premature “congrats to this future 2 term president” Dark Brandon twitter post to achieve a new level of Hell
I mean part of the reason that came to be is that large media publishers spent months focused on aggrandizing a relatively minor email server compliance issue with the objectively stronger candidate, so there are definitely 2016 vibes. How we react is our choice.
I also remember a weird sequence of events unfolding a few days before that election
Nov 1 or so: all media reports that there's more emails that are being looked at
Nov 1-7: anticipation of what is in these new emails
Nov 8: ...
Nov 9: sike! We were kidding about the new emails.
I'm still mad.
