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Comment by nathan_compton | Hacker News Reader

>Now, as we can see from the previous section on dopamine-reward-systems, what social media and quantifiable discourse is doing is mentally limiting what we can say and do, not by way of oppression, but by way or ostracization, alienation and peer-pressure.

The overton window is wider than its ever been at any point in history.

Like I think this particular thing was overblown in the first place and also people are already correcting for it.

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If the author's theory were true and social media dynamics were indeed compressing the Overton window, wouldn't these sorts of "the Overton window is way too wide" posts be exactly the reaction one would expect to it on social media? Thinking that extremism is running rampant is what it feels like to be the thought police from the inside.

I think both you and the commenter you responded to are misreading the article. I read it as 'hey, currently everyone on social media is discussing $latest US political news, posting over-directed short-form content, etc., so you posting a family photo, a photo of your favourite plant, sharing a favourite song, or a passage of a book you're reading would be considered odd, weird, despite being a completely normal thing to do and many people used to do regularly.'

That reading seems obviously false to me. I routinely see people posting those things on social media.

Really? I don't, and self-censor in tune with that. shrug

Also how many of the posts you see hit the front pages or become viral? Are you sure they aren't shunned and ostricised by not being awarded comments/likes/shares?

I agree. This is exemplified by social media’s constant refrain to join “the conversation.” The subtext is you joining in to talk about what’s relevant, which, of course, ends up being the current talking points of the world/your niche.

In this way, social media can be almost unbearably lonely for me. So many people corralled to talk about that which gets them Internet Points. But they seem like they’re right there.

Concrete example is I’m trying to learn how to build a tone for djent metal, which is a highly syncopated guitar sound that needs special considerations from your signal chain to achieve a distorted, highly staccato (at times) clear tone. I find a lot of discussion when it was fresh (2010-2015) but have difficulty getting much discussion on it nowadays because it’s not seen as fresh. Is it because it is somewhat niche? Absolutely. But even the people that are into it are much less enthused. It’s like the info has to be dug up vs being easily passed around.

Yeah the fact that that statement got so much pushback in the comments sort of speaks for itself. I think in some cases, exposure to other views (or caricatures of them) is being confused with a widening Overton window in one's own group.

I was with the author until that moment and the list of things "we" have supposedly forgot. Overtone window seems to be widening if anything. With the most unhinged hot takes of the 20th century being talked over again and all that.

At least the article doesn't blame "them" for doing it to "us". Or is it implied? Does the other article blame on the usual suspects of the day?

The main difference now is that everyone sees everyone else's overton window because we are all just letting our asses hang out on social media and this engenders a lot of conflict, dog-piling, etc. Not great stuff, certainly, but not really evidence that the overton window is narrowing.

In other respects I think the submission is more on point, though still reactionary.

Maybe in certain domains, but I'm not sure.

Check out all the new religions that popped up, and new forms of communal living and societal organization that were being experimented with in the early 1800s in the United States:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burned-over_district

I feel like these kinds of conversations and experiments don't really happen anymore, despite our incredible interconnectedness. Where's the global Oneida movement?

Or think about the world during early to mid 20th century, when socialist revolutions were occuring everywhere. I believe the Overton window of this era was wide enough to cause sweeping change in capitalist nations as well, such as improvements to worker's conditions. George Lucas somewhat addresses the shrinking of the Overton window in this era in an interview: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SWqvaMEFIdI "They never would have let me make [Star Wars] if they knew what I was doing..."

These days, organization of society as a capitalist liberal democracy is a given. It's such a given that anyone even aesthetically organized differently is automatically the world's bad guy - e.g. market-organized but still "Communist" China. Or perhaps evil Iran, with its restrictions on what women can wear (outside of Tehran) (no capitalist liberal democracy restricts women's rights at a fundamental level!!!). I haven't seen a serious conversation about alternative modes of organization outside of little bubbles of fascists or leftists.

In what ways are you seeing a wider Overton window than before? For me I think the obvious ways are surrounding mental health, minority rights, and queer lifestyles. Definitely people talk more openly in the western world about that now, and it seems much less scary now to be queer than even a few decades ago.

There is no such a thing as the Overton window. It's a made up term created by insane people who can't perceive reality, and don't understand that valid opinions are restricted by it. So they didn't understand why some ideas were accepted, while other opinions got rejected, and thought that it must be some kind of social consensus, that could be potentially changed.

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