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Oh yeah I unfortunately agree with you here. The ability to aggregate power around fringe ideas and bully other people into submission has truly allowed for a much less enlightened world - prime example is look how bareknuckle politics is around the world now.

The strategy that you can isolate one person from the herd with your online gang is deeply concerning for the future of reasonable discourse.

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That and many other dynamics. Bullying is one. A lot is just dumbing down. Reduction to meme. Thinking by affiliation. Picking sides. Factionalism. Populism. Statements have scores. Followers. Upvotes. Retweets. Everyone is gaming some sort of algorithm.

All the problems of politics, now permeating all of society.

We think, often, how and as we speak.. as we debate. Now that the conversation, the debate has become.. what it is, I think it really does affect how and what we think. That (garbage) mode of debating is now a major mode of thinking.

It's a mess.

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