Homophily - The Reason Why The Internet Is So Full Of Drama


Walter Baxter link CC BY-SA 2.0 license

Homophily is the tendency of individuals to associate and bond with similar others, as in the proverb "birds of a feather flock together". The presence of homophily has been discovered in a vast array of network studies. More than 100 studies that have observed homophily in some form or another and they establish that similarity breeds connection. These include age, gender, class, and organizational role. - Wikipedia

We all like to be among people who are similar to ourselves. Whether it be religion, language, skin colour, gender, sexuality, political preference, income level, education level or nationality.

It is a natural tendency for people to self-segregate and this tends to lead to different neighbourhoods that are made up particular ethnic groups. It is not necessarily a negative racist tendency but more of a more benign group preference tendency.

Now on to the internet.


Frank Paynter link CC BY-SA 2.0 license

The Social Media

When the internet first started to become a "Big Thing" many pundits declared the internet as the dawn of a new and perfect age for bringing people and ideas together. How very naive those predictions were.

What we have today on the internet, and the tendency continues to worsen, are groups of people self-organizing into groups of self-similar people. These groups then become echo chambers of opinion, people who keep reinforcing each other ideas with the deliberate exclusion of the differing opinions of those outside their group.

This phenomenon was seen to a lesser degree before the internet in the age of the newspaper. Every large city or populous region tended to have a conservative newspaper that tended to be dedicated to financial and social conservatism. There also tended to be the labour class newspaper that tended to the more populist opinions of the working person and there were also papers that promoted more liberal and artistic viewpoints.


Mobilus In Mobili link CC BY-SA 4.0 license

This tendency now appears to magnified at least one thousand fold with the internet. Reddit is a microcosm of this effect with subreddits sometimes battling it out and the members of the different sub-groups fighting it out and insulting each other online.

What bigger fight online could there be but the two subreddits /r/The_Donald and /r/Hillary. I have never seen two groups hate each other more with the hyperbole reaching a crescendo just before and just after the American 2016 Presidential election. It was truly a phenomenon to behold.

Youtube as a social network seems to have algorithms that are specifically designed to herd people into their own little echo chambers. It appears that the algorithm records what you watch, subscribe to and upvote and then it provides suggestions in your Home Feed for videos that you may want to view.

Over time each user will slowly build up a profile and a subscription list that tailors to a worldview that suits each individual. Outside opinions will be tuned out and similar opinions will be reinforced.


AlbertHerring link CC BY 2.0 license

The Effects

Antifa, Nazis, commies, socialists, MGTOW, feminists, "feminazis", trolls, bigots, Black Block, patriots, pro-gun, anti-gun, MAGA, Never-Trumpers, pro-religion, anti-religion. The list goes on and on seemingly forever.

There are protests and even sometimes quite violent riots in the streets because these groups seem to have self-agitated themselves as well as agitating their perceived enemies into physical confrontations.

It is somewhat ironic because, worldwide, obesity rates continue to climb so these riots are not over food or starvation. Many of the seem rioters seem to be well fed, have places to sleep and pocket money to spend.

Why then do people get violent if they are fed, sheltered and have money?

The cause for the physical violence just might be homophily and our tendency to select our information feeds so that our opinions are heavily reinforced as the "only true opinion" and opposing viewpoints are vilified as "literally Hitler".


saulalbert link CC BY 2.0 license

Closing Words

Our increased access to the internet and our increased ability for discussion does not seem to have brought us together as one big happy human family. In fact the opposite might be happening.

It is so very easy to find similar opinions and so very easy to block opinions that we disagree with on the modern internet.

The effect is such that society is becoming more polarized than ever. Each election now seems to feel more like a war these days and less like a sober choice for who could best lead the country for the next 4 or 5 years.

To end this I would have to say that Steemit (although not perfect) seems to be a place where people tone down their wild rhetoric a lot and tend to be polite. Discussions tend to be more civil and I think the reason for this is that you stand to lose something of actual worth on Steemit and that is literal money.

I don't think that this platform promotes a bland uniformity of opinion but instead forces people to reasonably point out their differing opinions. Differing opinions tend to not be insulted, they can be politely ignored but at least flame wars don't develop (unlike Reddit).

Thank you for reading my post.

Post Sources

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homophily
https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev.soc.27.1.415
https://www.britannica.com/topic/news-aggregator#ref1235364
https://www.igi-global.com/dictionary/diversification-and-nuanced-inequities-in-digital-media-use-in-the-united-states/13212
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Echo_chamber_(media)

Sort:  

.

Yep. I can't wait for the 2020 U.S. Presidential elections. It will be a year's worth of entertainment.

Is it natural for everyone to try to engage with other like minded people, but I do agree with you that today we seem to have more groups of people that are too trigger happy when it comes to discussing any controversial issue.

And the fights I have seen in America's college campuses between "patriots" and "antifa" are crazy and probably a result of all of this.

Cheers @procrastilearner!

So many echo chambers with so many people winding each other up. People need to save the drama for real issues otherwise it become the 'boy who cried wolf'.

I think it is sad, and rather alarming, that many people seem unwilling to go outside their own echo chamber, much less invest the time to actually dig into an issue in a deep and meaningful way. Many of my relatives are Fox echo chambers. The ideas, words and phrases that I hear from them are straight from Fox. They are convinced that everything is opinion and that no one is reporting facts. They are not even willing to sit down and listen to deep discussions, such as those on Russ Robert's EconTalk. One of my favorite quotes is "Every man is entitled to his own opinion, but not his own facts." A quote often attributed to the late Senator, Patrick Moynihan. Unfortunately, these days it seems that many people feel that only opinion matters.

Thanks for the link to the EconTalk website. I will definitely be checking it out.

What I like the most about Russ Roberts is that is very up front about his biases/beliefs (he is very pro-free market and anti-government intervention), but he also plays devil's advocate to his own beliefs. I've learned a lot by listening to his show.

Divide et impera. Everything might be already written and the one who knows how to read it will have the key... → Echo and Narcissus by Ovid, Metamorphoses ∜mp

https://i.imgur.com/CuJcc1K.gif
Watch online here
►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►
Click here:
►► http://moviezland.com ◄◄
►► http://moviezland.com ◄◄
►► http://moviezland.com ◄◄
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Watch online here
►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►►
Click here:
►► http://moviezland.com ◄◄
►► http://moviezland.com ◄◄
►► http://moviezland.com ◄◄
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=

21133

Hi! This is jlk.news intelligent bot. I just upvoted your post based on my criteria for quality. Keep on writing nice posts on Steemit and follow me @jlkreiss to get premium world news updates round the clock! 🦄🦄🦄

Coin Marketplace

STEEM 0.35
TRX 0.12
JST 0.040
BTC 70541.68
ETH 3582.21
USDT 1.00
SBD 4.74