Politics & Society
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Divided by tribes, sprinkled into individuals
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2 min read
Every mass system eventually morphs into tribes, balkanizing in the form of nation-states, denominations, political parties, and social media cliques. Those unproselytized, perhaps charged with individualism, eventually convert one way over the other. Even crypto enthusiasts suffer from waves of hyper-transmission. With high fives and pats on the back, bitcoin maximalists scream ‘up only’ to…
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Beyond logic, beyond greed
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1 min read
Beyond logic, stuck on wishful thinking, bias, and irrationality — it’s no wonder the world divides into tribes. The internet allows us to handpick the information we want and spit it back out to like-minded folks who amplify it. The curator — the finder and organizer of information — shares as much power as the…
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Don’t adopt other people’s anxiety
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1 min read
We rely on other people’s testimony. It’s no wonder, therefore, that their anxiety becomes ours. We then cognize every piece of information to fit our nervy narrative. Worries spread like viruses. And they provoke an unwarranted shock into mass health scares, money problems, and job pressures. Humans are a strange and contradictory animal who can…
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Collisions of thought
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2 min read
It’s not about how much information we consume. One can suck all the information out of the Twitter firehouse and learn nothing. News makes our brain fat. After all, it was Aldous Huxley who forewarned that we’d drown in excess entertainment and not care about anything else. Writes Neil Postman in Amusing Ourselves to Death. “Orwell…
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Nobody strange
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2 min read
She was out there, in ideas and intentionality. By high school, she had already separated from the herd. She refused to abuse herself into the maw of conformity. College was a continuation of being different. The more she resisted, the more natural it came. Listening to herself ranged beyond self-absorption. But then the internet came…
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Back to black
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1 min read
The cement of society amounts to a thin place that refuses to be exploited and homogenized. The world is flat once again, as nation-states, cities, and towns have gone back to their most nativistic urges. Globalization was never ruthless enough, spread unevenly amid the digital divide, and invariably vulnerable to the power-hungry few. The market…
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The script, the story
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1 min read
How many of us are just acting our way through life, adapting to different settings like chameleons? Situational elasticity lends its hand to the collaborative truth, that people inject each other with signaling serum. The slightest twang, the tinkle of dimples, the cleanest tucked-in shirt, belt, and Prada shoes – we try to demonstrate to…
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Hong Kong residents are trying to encourage the police to avoid tear-gassing their pets amid all the chaos in Hong Kong. According to Hong Kong-based photojournalist Alex Hofford, Animal Rights groups have also been organizing ‘Say no to tear gas’ rallies to spread awareness around the issue.
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The bullshit detector
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1 min read
You know it when you see it. Bullshit rings like a magic lantern, giving artificiality a spotlight. More people are susceptible to believing bullshit than ever. Politics is mostly bullshit, as is mass marketing. The irrational tries to take all the mystery out of life. When storytelling becomes manipulation, people lose their heads. Evil spreads…