Friends

Is it What They Do for Us? Or, What We Do for Them?

William Sundwick

Aristotle defined three types of friends in the Nicomachean Ethics. Friendship could be for utility, pleasure, or goodness. Friends of utility are like business relationships; goods and services are exchanged by such friends. Friends of pleasure are those to whom we are attracted, either by physical appearance or for amusement. The third kind of friend, however, the friend of goodness, is the Justice friendship. It is based not on what they can do for us, but what we can do for them.

It is this third type of friendship that is the deepest, and longest lasting. It also may take the longest to develop. It is marked by intentionality, whereas the first two may be accidental. Aristotle’s “city” needs all three types to flourish. But it is the third type, the justice friendship, which maintains the city as an entity.

To be called a “friendship,” surely a relationship with another human being must have a component of mutuality. All friendships are two-way. But the motivator is not always so mutual. Children start with friends of pleasure only. As they become more autonomous, common interests emerge, thus friends of utility. These continue into adulthood, some early friendships fading, new ones developing, and slowly the justice, or goodness, friends begin to reveal themselves. With modern telecommunications, not even distance can interfere with goodness friendships. They may last a lifetime.

But no friends are made unless we take a chance, either with stimulus or response. When we do a good turn or start thinking about opportunities to give, we are on our way to developing “level 3” friends. Often, the principal barrier to such behavior is difficulty in trusting others. As adults, we are vulnerable to many hurts, and even financial loss, when we jump too quickly at overtures from strangers and acquaintances. We also erect cultural barriers against friendship with “certain kinds” of people, based on our understanding of personal or tribal history.

Loneliness at all ages comes from the sense that something is missing, something either not yet defined or lost in the past. That empty feeling is aggravated by fear of the unknown – of taking risks. It is mitigated by the goodness factor. Through dispassionate risk analysis, or faith, we endeavor to overcome the fear.

It’s worth some effort, since there is evidence that friends can make the difference between good mental health and serious disability, even death. The deep friendships are the best, but the child (or adolescent) in us can also benefit from pleasure friendships, and the adult “operator” in us can benefit from friends of utility. Common interests, flattery, and physical attraction work at any age. Adults tend to dig deeper when they start asking questions like “where am I going?” In adulthood, we start playing chess in our relationships, thinking several moves ahead. And, we discover politics! “What can I get if I give this much? A little more?” The onset of old age brings new questions, like “Does anybody notice me any more?” – and, possibly, more assertive reaching out. We may discover that new friendships based on nostalgia have limitations. Activities, social or otherwise, are far more interesting.

These days, many of us live in two social environments -- traditional face-to-face friends sharing common interests, or mutual attraction, and  virtual friends on social media. The virtual world has friends of utility and friends of pleasure, but also friends of goodness. Your comfort level in either of these two environments may vary with practice. The virtual world contains all the same motivators for establishing and maintaining friendships as the “real world,” and all the same constraints.

One question I have about virtual friends is: do they see themselves as real people? Or, have they so given themselves over to the virtual world that they have now lost touch with their real flesh-and-blood selves? I have difficulty ascertaining this about some Facebook friends whom I’ve never met “IRL.”

There are some additional constraints in the online world -- language vs. physical touch and emojis vs. body language. Words do have meaning, but touch is more intimate (even given the same level of privacy). And, those emojis were invented by an artist in a studio, whereas your body language (including tone of voice) is likely unconscious and spontaneous unless you’re a trained actor. Then, there is eye contact – not achievable any way I know in the virtual world. Evaluating the quality of online friendships over “real-life” can be challenging, even in the Aristotelian schema. Your friends in the ether should help, just like IRL!

In retirement, I have probably developed a richer world of virtual friendship than my IRL milieu. This may have come naturally for me, as my network of real-world friends, beyond my immediate family, was always slim. Indeed, a primary reason for my decision to “cut the cord” four years ago was that the quality of friendships at work was deteriorating – without much hope for improvement. I had questions about mutuality with my work friends: was I doing as much for them as they were for me? When the answer to that question became “no,” I decided to leave. It didn’t hurt that I retained a fair degree of confidence in my ability to make new friends in retirement, thinking my skill set was perfectly adequate to the task.

As a test of those skills, I now ask myself whether any work relationships have survived, four years on. Some have survived in the online realm but I’ve physically met up with work friends only occasionally in four years, and only at parties. A valid test?

Another question I’m asking myself lately – is there anybody I would ask to deliver a eulogy at my funeral? I am hard pressed to come up with any names aside from immediate family. Am I just too private? Have I not given enough to others? Surely, if there were somebody, I would know, right?

 “They may forget what you said, but they will never forget how you made them feel.” - Carl W. Buechner

Exit Strategy

Was Getting Out Inevitable?

Flint Series, Chapter 5

William Sundwick

Sometimes I think that friendships are simply a matter of convenience. While many people seem to make life-long friendships with kids they grew up with, my experience has been different. I lost contact with my childhood friends in high school, lost touch with my high school friends while we were all away at college, didn’t pursue college friends after the post-college diaspora. Indeed, even grad school, which was right here in the DC area, didn’t produce any lasting relationships, despite many of us staying here to pursue our careers.

No, my life has been marked by associations based on externalities, convenience, common interests – and those interests have changed over the years.

Through high school, in Flint, my primary interest focused on my future. Not that the present was so bad, just that it seemed to have no growth possibilities. Flint was already as big as anybody in my world could imagine it. My friends would say, “Well, you may not know where you’ll end up, but it sure as hell won’t be here!” My mother said with a look of anguish on her face, “Surely you must come up with a plan to go somewhere else?” My father mostly would laugh at the prospect of coming back to Flint after college – “What, and work for GM?” he chortled. And, he had been a General Motors “lifer.”

Only the “other Sundwicks” in Flint had any sense of attachment to the city. Perhaps it came from their mother’s family, the Stebbins. Perhaps it was from the complex web of social interconnections that the three siblings had woven over more years than my relatively brief Flint lifespan. As it turned out, only one of the three left Flint – middle cousin, Bob.

During one foray back to Flint, in 1979, staying with cousin John, I contacted a high school friend who was still in Flint (hadn’t seen him in more than a decade). He had graduated from MSU in E. Lansing, with a degree in oriental philosophy, and was working as a computer programmer for the City of Flint and raising his young family there. He was the exception.

Everybody else from high school, by that time, was far away. Even though, in 1979, I didn’t know where any of them were, it seemed inevitable they wouldn’t be In Flint.  I believe it was inevitable for me, and I never needed an exit strategy.

Once Google was available, I discovered a Ph.D. dissertation from friend Nate. And my mother had informed me, when I moved to Northern Virginia, that childhood friend Charles had married a “Korean girl” and was living in Reston. I never contacted him, though. I have no idea what happened to Abe, best of friends through both junior high and high school. But, it didn’t matter. The deed was done, escape effected. All who came before erased from memory.

Is there something wrong with me?

Once, during a trip from Kalamazoo in my college senior year (1968-69), I dropped in unannounced at Abe’s house on Mackin Road and talked with his younger brother, Sol. I introduced my girlfriend of the moment, who had driven there with me.

What transpired in the conversation is fuzzy, but one haunting aside from Sol keeps impinging on my consciousness. I believe he interjected, almost unnoticed by me at the time, “You know Abe is gay, right?” I think I didn’t want to acknowledge the import of that. I didn’t reply. In high school, he often joked (I thought) about “us” being “queer” – I had always taken it as a lame excuse for our not being able to find attractive girls to date at the time. I guess the meaning was deeper for him.

I’ve often wondered what happened to Abe during the AIDS epidemic of the eighties. But, I never followed up to locate Sol or Abe. No trace of either on Facebook, Twitter, or Google.

Abe had been the ringleader of the whole Get Out of Flint movement, not that there was much opposition from anybody else in our crowd. But, he was the most vociferous. Could he have been motivated by some personal animus against that conventional blue-collar midwestern city? His alienation may have been stronger than the rest of ours, and not just because of his Holocaust survivor parents, either!

All this leads me to wonder if any of us has an obligation to our hometown. What is it about place that can inspire loyalty, a desire to return after leaving? To “give back”?

In the case of Flint, the city has become known everywhere over the last thirty years as a dying place. Poisoning its residents through willful negligence has only been the “icing on the cake” of a three-decades-long disinvestment by its corporate overlord, General Motors, and by politicians not beholden in any way to those residents – the poorest city in the country, from a 2017 survey. Flintoids don’t have the money to buy the politicians. And, that generations-long brain drain, common to many rust belt cities, depletes any wherewithal to resist. We all shed a tear for Flint, but what have we done about it?

In the last chapter of my saga, I will try to shed some light on where the city is now. Some folks there remain optimistic, others are merely trying to keep expectations low. Is the popular local meme true? -- “Flint, coming soon to a city near you!”

Friends: Virtual vs. “Real”

Don’t Feel So Guilty about Social Media

William Sundwick

Since the recent revelation of theft of personal data from Facebook, we are especially sensitive to privacy concerns in our interconnected world. And, while we can easily see the psychology of social media addiction and associated behavioral disorders, defending the omnipresent nature of our digital lives is harder. But, the truth is social media facilitate communication among people who may not otherwise be connected.

We know that Facebook’s all-powerful secret algorithm tracks all our behavior on the platform, and other platforms if we let it, sorting it into data packets that can be “weaponized” by advertisers and others. But, one consistent feature of Facebook, since its origin (2004), has been that you must enter a fair amount of personal information to establish an account. Other social media platforms have allowed easier anonymity, especially in the earlier generation of chat rooms and bulletin boards. In those late-20^th century and early -21^st century environments, you really didn’t know if the person you were talking with was anybody in real life (IRL). Today, Facebook is tougher than Twitter in this regard. Bots can easily prowl the Twitter platform -- I think bots may be my principal followers there. Twitter is probably as good as Facebook for news feeds, but its 280-character limit for tweets does constrain freedom of expression some – especially for writers. We resort to the tweetstorm for a solution.

Although Facebook tries to stifle “catfish” (assumed false identities, usually for illicit romantic escapades), it can do nothing to prevent users from adopting a social media “avatar” (persona) which reveals only what the user wants to reveal about themselves to their friends. But, isn’t that what we all do with our friends and acquaintances IRL, anyway?

So, how do we select friends in the virtual world? Different approaches seem to suit different social media users. Some consider their online friends to be the same folks they know IRL. The social media platform is simply another way of communicating with them – when voice and in-person meetings are not possible. This essentially relegates the social media platform to nothing more than email. I have heard of people who will “unfriend” any Facebook friend whom they haven’t spoken with IRL in more than a year. On the other hand, many social media users find the digital world to be an entirely different realm than the IRL world. Their Facebook friends may not have any overlap with their “real world” friends. Most of us fall somewhere in the middle between these two extremes. Of course, caution is required in accepting Facebook friend requests, but we’re usually willing to do some diligence for unsolicited requests.

Online friendships are important to some people. They may be socially isolated in their real-world environment, through no fault of their own. Perhaps they live in a very hostile social milieu, and don’t have the means to move away. Perhaps there are subjects which cannot be broached IRL within their circle; but online, anything goes. Geography can play a role as well. It may be too difficult to travel to friends. Perhaps you live in a wasteland, where there just aren’t many people – at least not many who share common interests. Disabilities can inhibit one’s ability to get out or navigate difficult terrain. This may include poverty or psychological deficit in communication skills. Online platforms can mitigate many of these problems, hence become one’s primary “neighborhood” for social interaction.

But, can you rely on virtual friends the same way you can on a “real” friend? It depends on what kind of success you feel you’ve had with those IRL friends. With most of us, there is a sliding scale of how “good a friend” someone is – and, it’s usually unknown where they fall on that scale until they’re tested. That test, whatever it is, can also be applied to virtual friends. Do they give you emotional support? Will they come to your aid when you need it? Are they loyal? None of these things requires physical presence – except maybe hugs (or physical intimacy). Facebook, at least, has expanded its collection of emojis to express “virtual hugs and kisses.” And, as a writer, I can vouch for the power of written language, when applied skillfully, to provide succor – as easy online as on paper.

Of course, the classic excuse for a friendship, even more than “loyalty,” is mutual interest. The online world is fine for sharing common interests. But if the interests involve physical manipulation of objects in the real world (like crafts), eventually people with the same interest will probably want to meet-up. They also want to meet-up just to experience dimensions of intimacy precluded from an online conversation – including innocent stuff, like body language, as well as romantic encounters.

If your philosophy of virtual friendships leans more toward viewing the online world as an extension of IRL social networks, then meet-ups are already part of the rules. Your virtual friends are already granted the same privileges and access as the IRL friends – they’re the same people. If you prefer to maintain strict separation of the virtual from the real world, you’re probably seeing the virtual milieu as a refuge from the IRL world. The corollary here is that your virtual friends have more privileges and access to you than your real-world friends – you may be more reticent to express feelings with the IRL friends. Meet-ups may be forbidden or purely accidental.

Meet-ups may not be all that you had hoped, in the case of trying to make plans online for an encounter. Perhaps physical meet-ups work better in the first case, where they’re conditions of the friendship from the outset, or accidental encounters for the latter case. I have not had such an experience with a digital-only friend, although I have many virtual friends, some in my local geographic area (I live in a major metro area, common interests might very well accidentally bring us together). But, the prospect does bring an air of excitement to my virtual life.

Technology helps provide solutions to the boundary problem with virtual friends. Both Facebook and Twitter allow use of photographs and videos. (And Instagram is built entirely around shared photos). Since most of us carry our phones/cameras in our pockets, visual and audio sharing is frequently part of the social media experience. Some research suggests that comparative behavior of your personal sense of self with what you see of your friends online may contribute to depression, but the other side of the coin is that you are communicating much better using a picture of yourself -- and voice if its a video -- than by using written words alone. The problem is that you may impose a level of intimacy on somebody who’s not willing to accept it! One should avoid online bullying, in any form, even if it amounts to nothing more than bragging about, or advertising, your life. 

I may experiment with more audio-visual communication in my Facebook net, but I will be sure to ask permission first.

So, if you want to own your online experience with virtual friends, and this should be everybody’s goal, you should feel that meet-ups are optional, not required. You always have the agency to decide what you want to share with your virtual friends. Your avatar is under your control. But, you must maintain respect for your friends’ feelings – don’t force anything on them that they may not want – just as in real life.

Remember to give lots of positive reinforcement to your online friends – we all crave “narcissistic supply.” On Facebook, those reaction emojis go a long way, but comments go even further. Despite his secret algorithm, Mark Zuckerberg’s famous “manifesto” of 2017 seems to encourage this. Avoid trolls, unfriend and block them as necessary – and stay away from Facebook Discussion Groups that don’t adequately police trolling. Nobody has time for the negative stuff. And, walking away is invisible online.

Let’s have fun out there!

Opinion piece from The Guardian, do we need "strategic silence" from media regarding extremism? Perspective on post from April, "Politics of Outrage"

Life on the Internet: No Fear, No Shame

Why All the Fuss?

William Sundwick

Why are so many people so afraid of sharing “personal information” with the world, anyway? Lately, especially with Facebook, it has verged on mass paranoia. Warp and Woof, the blog, was launched on Groundhog Day 2017. It is now 15 months old. And, I have been an active Facebook user for at least four years. Twitter about the same (but less active). Before I retired three years ago from the federal government, I was already well-acquainted with the public nature of the Internet, especially security risks – it was part of my job.

Let’s explore some of the risks of online presence in a cool, rational manner. As always, bad experiences can color a person’s feelings. But, I submit, so can positive experiences!

Fear and resentment of powers unseen manipulating you are a large part of the bad feelings people have. But, the only difference between what advertising and propaganda have always sought to do and what modern data analysis can do is something called “narrowcasting.” The more data that can be harvested about you, personally, the more precisely advertising can be directed at you. The hope of the advertisers is that this targeting will diminish your resistance to the message. The product being sold will appear to be custom-designed for you, even though it may just be the advertising message that is so customized.

The recent revelation about Cambridge Analytica stealing Facebook user data for political advertising reinforces the concept that there is a great conspiracy to manipulate your consumer behavior. There is, but it’s not new. True, social media together with “big data” can potentially be much more effective than the older “broadcast” methods of advertising. But, to think that you are less able to resist a narrowcast message is to admit weakness and defeat. Maybe it’s really all the “other people” and their ability to resist that concerns you? Hence, politics.

Then, there is identity theft – the idea that personal information can be used as a key to enable burglary. It has happened to some people.  But, again, the digital world has plenty of entry points for this kind of intrusion. Point-of-sale equipment has historically been the most common. And, Internet purchases via credit card certainly add to the risk. That’s hacking. Best defense: don’t ever buy anything with a credit card! (And, don’t use online banking or brokerage services.)

Perhaps even more compelling than either the manipulation risk or the identity theft risk, for many, is the fear of hurtful trolling – or, even physical harm. It’s likely because of bad experiences in the past, either online or in some other form of bullying, that many will foreswear social media altogether, and would never consider publishing an open blog. They also would not want to comment on anybody’s open blog, unless they could remain anonymous. Even then, they may let their fears of losing that anonymity consume them.

While most of us claim we want to be respectful of other’s feelings, it seems there are more than enough nasty trolls out there who are looking for an opportunity to demean and bully. What they engage in is a concerted attack on free speech. It can be either selfish (it makes them feel good, like the schoolyard bully), or strategic (they’re trying to suppress dissent). In either case, it seems that resistance is incumbent upon us. It may be that “resistance is futile” for privacy advocates, and we surely should support cybersecurity efforts to protect us from identity theft (businesses have good reasons to protect their customers), but to abandon participation in the digital world is tantamount to surrender to malevolent forces. Living “off the grid” means you have been defeated, no matter how refreshing it may feel as a vacation. Nobody wants to admit defeat!

Of course, it is possible to mitigate the potential harm of online conversations. Regarding social media, choose your Facebook friends wisely, and if discussion groups get abusive, go away for a while. I’ve reduced my Twitter activity for that reason. The other Digital Golden Rule is: don’t be stingy with the good stuff – there can never be too many compliments and validations. They likely will be returned in kind. My Writer’s Group knows this rule well. Congratulations to all, we self-enforce.

And, remember, if you publish online (including micro-blogging in social media) and your readers lose respect for you, it’s on you! The final judge of the value in your posts should be you. It’s helpful to keep your purpose and audience in mind – and write well. Sometimes, ruffling feathers is your objective. Don’t be shy if it fits your larger purpose. Just be deliberate.

To recapitulate, we need to be mindful of scams like phishing schemes, but psychological manipulation and identity theft pre-date the current state of the Internet – i.e., social media -- by many years. A more powerful fear for many seems to involve possible damage to their egos. Not to minimize real physical threats, but reasonable prudence about revealing our location, and being deliberate about what we say online, should alleviate most of those fears. Again, it’s not so different from the way life has always been. There have always been bullies. There have always been haters. And, it’s always better to confront a bully than to run away. You also confront by ignoring the bully.

Clearly, if I allowed myself to be consumed by these fears, I would not have started my blog. While my motivation for the blog is not to sell anything, I will admit to a desire to give something to my readers. Unfortunately, I can’t determine how successful I am unless I get feedback. Blogger stats are available which show me page views by article, by date, by operating system, and break it down geographically. But, page views do not necessarily equate to readers.

I promote Warp & Woof on Facebook, via email, in person to friends, and to my Writers Group. But, the responses, while always favorable, come back to me in the medium I used for the promotion – Facebook comments, email replies, in-person confirmations of reading or “seeing” the blog. Nobody makes comments in Blogger, itself (unless I beg them). That’s no fun. It’s true that the platform doesn’t allow for anonymous comments – but, I can anonymize the comment before I publish it, by making the comment myself, and quoting an anonymous reader. Perhaps that’s something I should promote, separately. Consider it done here. You must trust me, though.

So, consider this an invitation to follow Warp & Woof. Comment freely, I will anonymize before I publish your comments. It’s a blog with only one contributor (so far) – me! It contains my thoughts and expresses my interests. But, I’m interested in your thoughts as well. Help make it a conversation.

  Politics of Outrage

Debating Policy and Ideology Is Only Fun for a Few

William Sundwick

The first principle of politics: it’s about gaining and wielding power. Practitioners of politics are interested mostly in dominance. They’re motivated by biology and genes.

The second principle of politics: we all engage in political behavior. We spend our lifetime learning how to most effectively influence others, how to get what we don’t have, and how to protect it once we get it. It is the human condition.

In the United States, like most countries in the modern world, politics has become institutionalized as the profession of manipulating the feelings and thoughts of the population toward that singular goal of achieving and holding power. Professional politicians are experts in the use of the tools that make this possible.

Nothing gained by appeal to intellect

Manipulating emotion has been shown to be a far more effective motivator than appealing to intellectual faculties. Discussing policy planks does not equate to more votes. Emotional appeals tend to seek the lowest common denominator – gut instincts. Few voters can censor those gut feelings sufficiently to allow their intellect to govern their behavior at the polls. If they did, they might be likely to stay away from the voting booth altogether! (Granted, sometimes an effective strategy.) So, “Lock Her Up!” and #LockHimUp become popular rallying cries and social media memes.

And it’s not just voters who are susceptible to the appeals to outrage and baser emotions. Once elected, a public official will discourage independent thinking among staff, instead emphasize personal loyalty. Supporters are kept in the fold not only by producing a more entertaining show than the prospective opponents, but also through incentives and intimidation.

Successful politicians avoid revealing unpleasant aspects of the business of power – like throwing former allies under the bus, or any hint of corruption in their dealings. Unless, of course, the opponent shows even more unpleasantness!

Competition for attention

The 21^st century media environment is far different from the one politicians of a previous generation learned to master. Advertising must be targeted to more platforms than before, and narrowcast to many audiences, rather than broadcast to one audience. It has become a science. And, in the end, it is emotion, especially outrage, that will grab audiences best. Emotional stimuli are what generate clicks. Clicks are what you pay for. Data analytics are also what a savvy politician pays for. The winner in an election will most likely be the one who best understands the demographics and emotional signaling of certain narrowcast messages.

Who pays for all this? No changes here, only three types of financial resources. There is personal wealth, there is corporate cash (PACs as well as individual contributions), and there is grassroots fund raising. The distribution formula for these methods of fund raising may vary – many in public office have mastered one or two methods, but not all three. Any of the three may succeed individually, but only if well guided by  data analytics from consultants.

Identity politics and intersectionality

Recently, a new term has emerged to explain the “politics of outrage.” It is “identity politics.” In addition to the well-accepted propensity for voters to respond best to emotional rather than rational appeals, it now appears that there is, in the U.S. as well as many other developed democracies, an accelerating drift toward tribalization in politics. The tribes are not necessarily defined by geography, but may be defined by common backgrounds and interests, level of education, urbanization, etc. In the best post-Marxist sense, they are based on class divisions! Race plays a role, for sure, and language, too (both in the U.S. and Europe), as do gender and religion. But, among “whites” voting patterns mostly depend on those more traditional class conflicts, the same ones we’ve known throughout the last century in America. Party loyalties between Democrats and Republicans have flipped for working class white Americans and professional class white Americans. True, non-white voting patterns have not changed much – and Dems always point out that there are more of them now, if you can just get them to the polls!

Identity politics would lead only to fragmented coalitions, and destructive rivalries in a two-party system, if it weren’t for another trend, most visibly promoted by feminists. That trend is something called “intersectionality.” It resembles the classic Marxian analysis of power dynamics in society – namely, oppressed groups (the “marginalized”) have more in common with each other than with the oppressors (the “privileged”). Hence, alliances between marginalized groups are natural. One group should fight for the improvement of the other groups. It seems to offer a solution to racism, sexism, homophobia, and even economic inequality! But, alas, there are many who think that commonality of aspirations between the marginalized (“temporarily embarrassed millionaires”) and the privileged within a certain community, are stronger than the bonds between marginalized in different communities. Thus, tribalism overcomes class struggle. Perhaps, if intersectionality had as high a profile in the popular imagination as identity politics has recently achieved, we would see the balance of power shift.

Is it only the campaigns?

What must be done to win an election might not matter so much, if the actual business of governing were a well-oiled professional machine. Unfortunately, it is not. Once in office, politicians cannot escape the forces that put them there. They attempt to mollify constituents with boiler plate letters and town halls. Their decision making in preparation for a vote doesn’t usually require input from their voters. Only after the fact do politicians have to explain the vote. But, the outrage factor for the tribes makes any attempt at cross-aisle conversation risky. No elected office holder wants to be seen by constituents as a “collaborator.” And, the outrage merchants in the media are omnipresent.

When it comes time to stand for re-election (nearly continuous for two-year terms), a politician must think of those donors – what to say to them? How to conceal those conversations from voters? Time, once again, for those data analytics.

Can we voters resist the politics of outrage? Social media clearly need some critical review – not just for “fake news,” but for click-bait as well.  Can Facebook and Twitter be held accountable? Is regulation necessary, or can they self-police? For new voters, should schools be more actively training kids to censor those emotional gut feelings?

Understanding the economics of politics surely helps, but “follow the money” often leads only to further outrage. Knowing your allies and your enemies is the correct path to follow here.

As always, the inequality trap hampers effective political action by many marginalized groups – by definition they are poor, with limited resources. The powerful will be able to muster far more resources, unless strength in numbers can overcome their advantage. It points to the vital importance of intersectionality for any decisive change in politics.

A sober look at the immediate future suggests things will get worse before they get better. But, if we survive, they will get better …

Long form piece from Wired gives entire history of Facebook, and Mark Zuckerberg's, struggles over last two years. Reference: "My Struggle with Facebook Addiction" from December. I, for one, have not yet seen any change in my Facebook news feed since the famous manifesto promising "time well spent" with the platform. Still dominated by mindless memes and videos, seems to me.

  My Struggle with Facebook Addiction

Not a Teenager, But a Senior

William Sundwick

In Aldous Huxley’s novel Brave New World (1932), the World State exercised control over its population by administering a “soma” drug to them. It was a psychoactive drug, producing states of euphoria, and general happiness. It was addictive, and the state monopolized its distribution.

Substitute the amorphously managed “Internet” for the World State, and Facebook, a publicly held corporation in Silicon Valley, could well be the administering entity for soma in the 21^st century. When Mark Zuckerberg invented the social media platform at the beginning of the century, he built it around the idea that people universally wanted to be liked. They would always respond to positive feedback. Much like B.F. Skinner’s rats, they would continually come back to press the lever for more pellets of reinforcement.

If Zuckerberg could package content in such a way that his customers could share it, with some chance of positive intermittent feedback, he might build a giant marketing machine from his platform. Some think the idea sprang from his own personal need to be liked. He was incredibly successful. But, Facebook may have discovered a darker side to its success, as well. Apparently, users are just as likely to come back for more feedback from feelings of anger or sadness as from more conventional “feel good” vibes. The recent controversy over “fake news” planted by Russian intelligence operatives is an example.

It turns out that intermittent reinforcement is a very strong motivator, regardless of the emotional content of the initial behavior. Add the clever opportunities for self-expression on the Facebook platform, and you have the makings of a serious psychological addiction problem. Some studies have even shown physiological changes in subjects that use social media platforms extensively.

When social media are used for active self-expression, it appears that people’s mental health may benefit. Those who post and comment more on the platform are often happier than they were before Facebook. But, passive scrolling through news feeds and over-use of reaction emojis are mostly associated with greater levels of depression and poorer mental health. Also, comparative behavior tends to promote feelings of inadequacy, and perceived social isolation – Instagram is especially bad here -- but, all those shared Facebook photos of happy families and status updates about vacation adventures don’t help.

Facebook does allow you a high degree of control over what you see in your feeds. It would be worthwhile for any heavy Facebook user to explore the updated prioritizing tools for news feeds. You do determine what you see, and you can block things you don’t want to see. Close friends’ posts are now always prioritized ahead of anything commercial. Some say Facebook gives you too much control over news – leading to insulation in bubbles of like-minded screeds.

My own predilection for expressing myself in writing, even short quips in a comment, strikes me as a positive interaction with the platform. Is it really interaction with my friends, though? I sometimes ask myself, “does anybody care?” Of course, the intermittent feedback is largely to blame here. For my part, I try to react to anything my friends post that I feel expresses themselves well – but, there’s a judgmental quality to this. I intentionally fail to react when I do not feel they are expressing themselves well, or when I’m simply not interested in the content they are sharing. And, of course, I impute similar judgement calls to their reactions, or lack thereof, on my posts. Hence, I fall victim to the comparative trap that supposedly haunts teenage girls. Am I not good enough, or clever enough, to be interesting to my friends? Or perhaps to some friends, but not others? And, I’m 70 years old!

A disclaimer is warranted regarding my peculiar usage of Facebook. None (or few) of my friends are people with whom I have a day-to-day relationship IRL (In Real Life). As my immersion in the platform has grown, some friends are mere friends-of-friends whom I’ve never even met IRL. This does not fit the profile of the beneficial social capital some users gain from the platform. It appears that my social media avatar is literally the only me that my Facebook friends know. This is probably not a healthy social milieu! It’s acting. It’s a personal fantasy of who I want to be. Does it smack of narcissism?

With all these potential negatives, it may seem wise to take a break from the platform now and again. You should consider this when Facebook grows boring, when it seems too commercial, when you see too many news feeds whose authenticity you doubt, or when friends’ posts are too closely connected to their personal lives – and not you! 

Breaks can feel good, allowing you to “recharge.” Facebook even facilitates blocking feeds from certain sources (“hiding” them, or “snoozing” them for 30 days if they just get too intense). You can always “unfriend” people (highly recommended for exes), and all these things can be undone when you want to jump back in. Limiting your feedback to others also serves a purpose: I never pick fights, and often refrain even from giving positive feedback when I fear it might spin out of control (discussion groups are notorious for that). Purposeful restraint in use of reaction emojis and making comments can sometimes increase your control over Facebook’s algorithm, too. The platform keeps the details secret, but if you’re good, you may even be able to beat Facebook at its own game.

Dealing with the withdrawal symptoms is best handled by increasing your IRL interaction with people – try email for folks too far away to see in person. Facetime and Skype? For self-expression, try writing a blog (like me), or art? music?

And, do a reality check on that Facebook avatar – it’s dangerous when you start believing it yourself. Don’t delude yourself into depression because you can’t get the feedback you crave. It’s just narcissistic supply, after all. Since you invented the avatar in the first place, you can always tweak it as necessary. Once you focus your self-expression needs on real creativity, it may be time to re-enter the social media world – cleverness and effort should get you more positive feedback. Use Facebook to feel better about yourself, not worse.

There are plenty of tools provided by Facebook (and Twitter) allowing you to take control of the platform, if you’re willing to use your agency. Nobody needs to be a Facebook addict – the platform is not smarter than you! You are your own soma.