The paper is also worth reading. Here's part of the conclusion:
"Understanding the factors that make social media posts go “viral” online can help to create better social media environments. While social media platforms are not fully transparent about how their algorithmic ranking system works, Facebook announced in a post titled “Bringing People Closer Together” that it was changing its algorithm ranking system to value “deeper” forms of engagement, such as reactions and comments (68). Ironically, posts about the political out-group were particularly effective at generating comments and reactions (particularly the “angry” reaction, the most popular reaction across our studies). In other words, these algorithmic changes made under the guise of bringing people closer together may have helped prioritize posts including out-group animosity." [0]
X can get everyone to agree in principle that Q is bad, but no one will pay any attention to it.
And Y can get everyone to pay attention to Q, but a lot of people who would otherwise oppose it will switch to supporting it just because they’re so mad at the way it’s being publicized.
At least Y got them to pay attention! They’re traveling up an incentive gradient that rewards them for doing so, even if it destroys their credibility.
Eh, the easiest most effective arguments are also the most toxic. The people who disagree with me aren't just wrong but they're disingenuous liars with an agenda so terrible even they won't admit to it. The people who disagree with me don't even understand what they're saying because they're just mindlessly repeating things they have been indoctrinated to believe.
Neither of those will convince anyone of anything but it makes people who already agree really happy and it drives those people who disagree up a wall.
> Unless social media companies start penalising polarising content and rewarding more constructive posts,
Twitter and Facebook are not shy about having a hand in the conversation. If anything they reward polarizing content, and they've shown interest in censoring wrongthink, but do they have any interest in turning down the temperature?
> these platforms will continue to be swamped by political animosity that risks spilling into real-world turmoil.
It's more than a risk, it's been spilling into real-world turmoil for years.
When I was younger I got a bit notable online by doing just this. You can pick up thousands of followers on twitter in a couple weeks by just picking hot topics and big targets, and publicly dunking on them.
Ive grown out of the behavior but its definitely left me very cynical about politics.
Well yes, because all political reporting is basically TMZ for boring, ugly people. It molds politics into some fantasy world of rap battles and gang fights rather than a productive discussion about making good policy.
And if your first impulse is to think well yeah because the other side blah blah, you're part of the problem too.
It would be fascinating to do a study where you take politics news articles and replace all names with A, B, C, etc. and likewise any mention of Party. So just policy and blank identifiers. Then see how people respond to the news. Are they more likely to agree with or disagree with policies when they don't know who they're coming from?
I suppose in practice there are enough shibboleths in each political camp that readers will still be able to tell which side is their tribe, but it would be interesting to see.
In my opinion long form podcasts are fixing this. The gotcha nonsense on Twitter isn't going away, but at the same time long form discussions about complex topics are growing in popularity. So there is at worst a duality where things are getting worse on one hand and better on the other.
>It molds politics into some fantasy world of rap battles and gang fights
Politics is a world of rap battles and gang fights. It's war by other means. That's the fundamental essence of anything political. The boring, ugly people are the wonks who actually think politics is about 'good policy consensus' and have been spending a little too much time on Laputa.
Maybe some of this is due to how little variation there is: I've yet to see a politician who isn't neoliberal (though Trump was more than a bit fascist at times). Even 2019-20 Andrew Yang still built his ideas (mainly UBI) off of neoliberalism, and imo, appealed to a ton of more traditional neoliberal values: that UBI is about providing equally and flatly for everyone, not specifically and directly helping the disenfranchised and indirectly aiding worker control of the means of production (how I'd view its effects). And then he abandoned the UBI campaign this year, becoming even more centrist.
Then, if we shift our focus further left, we see Bernie Sanders, who is just not all that socialist because he's really working within the neoliberal framework that his years of politics conditioned him to work in. Further left than that, well, there are no anarchists or communists in politics.
I could make the case that this is here (and bad) bc neoliberalism will slide towards fascism if we give equal weight to everyone's ideas, but that does feel like I'm sinking further into divisions, and it presupposes that my positive opinions about the far left are actually supported by facts, regardless of any ground truth. But really, it wouldn't be an issue if we had more variety in ideology: discussion would be more varied and more thorough, we'd all question our own ideology's assumptions just a bit more, and overall it would be easier to engage in someone else's ideas if you knew they weren't coming from the same baseline as you.
Neoliberalism is not a neutral or balanced ideology: let's have more communists, socialists, anarchists, libertarians, hell, maybe a few fascists or stalinists could do some good.
This story is so meta. Most of the comments here are slamming the press and social media users for slamming politicians for slamming eachother. Slam slam slam. And here I am, slamming the lot of you.
Serious question though. Is this merely a neologism used to describe a phenomenon that was old before Cicero lost his head?
People just regurgitate their sides last night narrative presented to them on their favourite news network. the commitment to truth has been lost. Its all about framing now.
> People just regurgitate their sides last night narrative
In my experience, this is one of those tropes. Yes, people will harmonize on their explanations and positions on certain debates. That's human nature. Watch a family describe one of its members and you'll see the same phenomenon.
If you go out and talk to voters about what matters to them, however, one tends to find a diversity of topics.
IMO, framing things as "truth" or "falsehood" is part of the problem. Each side dismisses the other side as just not knowing the right facts (or denying the facts), as if everyone would agree if they just knew the right facts. The media dug in on this very hard after the 2016 with the "fake news" and "fact-checking" crusades.
Reality is a lot more complicated. Even if we agreed on the facts, we don't agree on conclusions based on those facts. Or even what the right result should be. For example, there is a big factual dispute over whether the border is having a "crisis." But the earnest dispute is really just whether the US should allow illegal immigrants to come here or not.
I think the biggest problem is we avoid grappling with our fundamental disagreements and we don't honestly engage with what the other side is arguing. Both sides have basically labeled opinions they disagree with as, at best uniformed/ignorant, and at worst, evil (racist, communist, bigoted, depraved). Nobody is really trying to convince the other side. They are just trying to whip up a frenzy on their side and shame the other side into shutting up.
I've voted for both parties in the past (W Bush & Obama), but I don't think I could have a real political discussion with someone I meet at party without being attacked personally and viciously. And I know I can't post political views on social media without some psychopath trying to get me fired.
I've noticed this hilarious thing where within the left leaning media sphere, the only verbs that Ocasio-Cortez and to a lesser degree Bernie ever engage in is "slamming".
They don't eat, sleep, debate, propose, or discuss. They just slam 24/7.
I googled her to verify the spelling on her name and the first headline was:
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams the lack of diversity in an all-white group of lawmakers who drafted a bipartisan infrastructure deal"
That's kinda also the reverse as well. AOC ran a well-ran campaign to win her place at the table in congress.
Republicans slamming her day-in and day-out made her a household name.
Like, AOC should be, (with no disrespect) basically a nobody in politics, she is a 1.2 term representative. But republicans wanted a villain and boy did they make one.
Beyond that, I kinda also think a critical bit in this is to understand that the headlines are not realistically a way to judge the actions of a politician because the politician is not the one actually writing them. Her job is to do her job and feed the marketing team the needed clips within. For the most part her daily life is reading memos and bills and voting. The PR team works like a marketing organization and they want to win in the same way AMD and Intel want to win, it's that simple. Hit the right notes while doing your job of working on the busywork of the job. It's mostly how Trump won 2016. Politics is marketing-based, not results-based.
Not to "both sides" it, but... well, both sides do this in their reporting. Sometimes they also "own" or "destroy" someone. I don't think it's partisan. That kind of language gets clicks, so everyone's optimized for it.
Sure, "rips" and "knocks" have been replaced with "slams" etc but it's the exact same tactic that has been used for at least a while.
It would be interesting to see how far back this media behavior goes, which outlets are most culpable, and which "side of the aisle" these articles are mainly targeting, because I genuinely don't know.
Hot-damn, you just put your finger on why the whole thing is such a turn-off. It's just a big, lame, shallow show. Bags of hot air blowing at each other, for the clickbait value. And whether it's a media outlet characterizing something as "slamming" for the clicks, or the person speaking in a "slammy" way for the same reason, hardly makes a difference. The former dutifully serves the latter and the latter feeds the former. They're both just manipulating you. Or maybe, at best, someone through their Twitter account might be trying to display "who they are" (LOL!) by virtue of what they oppose, which seems like it would never work, and it doesn't. Not for that purpose. Look at the big picture and it's incredibly sad. Though almost laughably so if you zoom far enough out.
I noticed it a while ago with this particular verb too. And ever since, it made me simply have an aversion to articles with these titles, and the news sources that use them.
I wonder if there is a point of diminishing returns - engagement goes down on clickbait titles.
The funny thing is I've recently noticed the exact same phenomenon on conservative media. A few days ago there were 4 posts at the top of r/conservative about liberals being 'slammed' for something or the other (for the record I am an independent and watch that subreddit to better understand the issues that interest conservatives).
Not specific to one faction. It's a local maximum, so all sides will adopt this strategy unless the environment or rules change.
My 2¢ on why "slam" specifically:
1. It's a super short word, which matters in headlines and tweets. I think this is also why headlines will "quote" a word or two (the quotes are magic symbol to ward against libel).
2. Our monkey brains are aroused by violence and tribal warfare, even when that violence is described second-hand and is figurative.
Aggressive verbs are certainly inflammatory, and certainly increases clicks and engagement (at the cost of societal cohesion and individual contentment).
Mark my words—future headlines will be even more outrageous as we become inured to (and accepting of) the current patterns:
"AOC Jr 'eviscerates' Will Clinton over proposed lunar sale to China."
"Don Trump VI 'rapes' UN Fusion Program's budget to pay for July 4 parade."
Where was this trend started? In my mind it was Nigel Farage in Europe that successfully exploited this strategy first, but most of these trends tend to come from the US. Who started this in the US?
There’s a lot of commentary here on news reporting and social media but I really don’t think that this is a problem unique to our time. The end effect of virality is herd mentality, which then creates populism past a certain threshold, and we’ve certainly had populist leaders in history before.
Foxnews are experts at this language. Their front page is full of “slams”, “rips”, “fires back”, “scold” or “hits”. If this is your main news source it will make you think that the world is just one big conflict.
Of course. Virality is a mob action… you always get a visceral reaction from the mob being against something.
If you’re running for local office, what gets more attention when you troll social media?
Talking about policy to improve storm sewers or claiming that your opponent is a communist who wants to kill children? What gets more attention?
In my hometown, a guy got on the non-partisan school board on a platform of being pro-gun, and against his “woke” opponent, who was accused of hating veterans.
It doesn't strike me as particularly new, politicians in days of yore were pretty durned hard on each other. and usually better read than the current crop.
My favorite variation of all this is the micro variety.
. Find a social media maven with a zillion followers
. Say something horrid to them
. Get them to respond
. Huzzah! Instant fame or at least a few followers for yourself.
I subscribe to both DNC and RNC mailing lists and it's typical to see things like "Trump Rally BACKFIRES" and "The Radical Left is trying to destroy America". I try to laugh it off thinking people can't be dumb enough to buy into this, but then I'm gripped by the terrifying reality that actually yes, they are.
Dunking on opponents really wouldn't be all that bad if there was some actual debate progressing, where ideas could be tested and improved, but that seems to have stagnated to a large degree.
I suspect that there are varying amounts of return on effort, and that their strategists have learned that in a two party ONLY system, with low voter turnout regularly, that just agitating those already on your side to do something, in any way that happens, is more return on effort than convincing people or other variations.
There are feedback effects within their decision making that dampen and then eliminate new ideas, which reinforces "return to the party line" and opposite of "take our group in a new direction with this idea" ; anti-evolution basically..
[+] [-] hhs|4 years ago|reply
"Understanding the factors that make social media posts go “viral” online can help to create better social media environments. While social media platforms are not fully transparent about how their algorithmic ranking system works, Facebook announced in a post titled “Bringing People Closer Together” that it was changing its algorithm ranking system to value “deeper” forms of engagement, such as reactions and comments (68). Ironically, posts about the political out-group were particularly effective at generating comments and reactions (particularly the “angry” reaction, the most popular reaction across our studies). In other words, these algorithmic changes made under the guise of bringing people closer together may have helped prioritize posts including out-group animosity." [0]
[0]: https://www.pnas.org/content/118/26/e2024292118
[+] [-] platz|4 years ago|reply
X can get everyone to agree in principle that Q is bad, but no one will pay any attention to it.
And Y can get everyone to pay attention to Q, but a lot of people who would otherwise oppose it will switch to supporting it just because they’re so mad at the way it’s being publicized.
At least Y got them to pay attention! They’re traveling up an incentive gradient that rewards them for doing so, even if it destroys their credibility.
[+] [-] hackeraccount|4 years ago|reply
Neither of those will convince anyone of anything but it makes people who already agree really happy and it drives those people who disagree up a wall.
[+] [-] hndirect|4 years ago|reply
Twitter and Facebook are not shy about having a hand in the conversation. If anything they reward polarizing content, and they've shown interest in censoring wrongthink, but do they have any interest in turning down the temperature?
> these platforms will continue to be swamped by political animosity that risks spilling into real-world turmoil.
It's more than a risk, it's been spilling into real-world turmoil for years.
[+] [-] chobytes|4 years ago|reply
Ive grown out of the behavior but its definitely left me very cynical about politics.
[+] [-] trentnix|4 years ago|reply
And if your first impulse is to think well yeah because the other side blah blah, you're part of the problem too.
[+] [-] lifeisstillgood|4 years ago|reply
Can I get that on a TShirt please ?
(And yes, was it Nietscheze who says politicians are just sales people for their manifestos?)
[+] [-] wyager|4 years ago|reply
Midwit: politics is actually about making good decisions for society
Topwit: politics is like a gang fight
[+] [-] munificent|4 years ago|reply
I suppose in practice there are enough shibboleths in each political camp that readers will still be able to tell which side is their tribe, but it would be interesting to see.
[+] [-] Consultant32452|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Barrin92|4 years ago|reply
Politics is a world of rap battles and gang fights. It's war by other means. That's the fundamental essence of anything political. The boring, ugly people are the wonks who actually think politics is about 'good policy consensus' and have been spending a little too much time on Laputa.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laputa#Inhabitants
[+] [-] nerfhammer|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] _meqs|4 years ago|reply
Then, if we shift our focus further left, we see Bernie Sanders, who is just not all that socialist because he's really working within the neoliberal framework that his years of politics conditioned him to work in. Further left than that, well, there are no anarchists or communists in politics.
I could make the case that this is here (and bad) bc neoliberalism will slide towards fascism if we give equal weight to everyone's ideas, but that does feel like I'm sinking further into divisions, and it presupposes that my positive opinions about the far left are actually supported by facts, regardless of any ground truth. But really, it wouldn't be an issue if we had more variety in ideology: discussion would be more varied and more thorough, we'd all question our own ideology's assumptions just a bit more, and overall it would be easier to engage in someone else's ideas if you knew they weren't coming from the same baseline as you.
Neoliberalism is not a neutral or balanced ideology: let's have more communists, socialists, anarchists, libertarians, hell, maybe a few fascists or stalinists could do some good.
[+] [-] klyrs|4 years ago|reply
Serious question though. Is this merely a neologism used to describe a phenomenon that was old before Cicero lost his head?
[+] [-] dukeofdoom|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] JumpCrisscross|4 years ago|reply
In my experience, this is one of those tropes. Yes, people will harmonize on their explanations and positions on certain debates. That's human nature. Watch a family describe one of its members and you'll see the same phenomenon.
If you go out and talk to voters about what matters to them, however, one tends to find a diversity of topics.
[+] [-] username90|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] rhino369|4 years ago|reply
Reality is a lot more complicated. Even if we agreed on the facts, we don't agree on conclusions based on those facts. Or even what the right result should be. For example, there is a big factual dispute over whether the border is having a "crisis." But the earnest dispute is really just whether the US should allow illegal immigrants to come here or not.
I think the biggest problem is we avoid grappling with our fundamental disagreements and we don't honestly engage with what the other side is arguing. Both sides have basically labeled opinions they disagree with as, at best uniformed/ignorant, and at worst, evil (racist, communist, bigoted, depraved). Nobody is really trying to convince the other side. They are just trying to whip up a frenzy on their side and shame the other side into shutting up.
I've voted for both parties in the past (W Bush & Obama), but I don't think I could have a real political discussion with someone I meet at party without being attacked personally and viciously. And I know I can't post political views on social media without some psychopath trying to get me fired.
Everyone is addicted to anger.
[+] [-] Layke1123|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] anm89|4 years ago|reply
They don't eat, sleep, debate, propose, or discuss. They just slam 24/7.
I googled her to verify the spelling on her name and the first headline was:
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams the lack of diversity in an all-white group of lawmakers who drafted a bipartisan infrastructure deal"
[+] [-] agloeregrets|4 years ago|reply
Republicans slamming her day-in and day-out made her a household name.
Like, AOC should be, (with no disrespect) basically a nobody in politics, she is a 1.2 term representative. But republicans wanted a villain and boy did they make one.
Beyond that, I kinda also think a critical bit in this is to understand that the headlines are not realistically a way to judge the actions of a politician because the politician is not the one actually writing them. Her job is to do her job and feed the marketing team the needed clips within. For the most part her daily life is reading memos and bills and voting. The PR team works like a marketing organization and they want to win in the same way AMD and Intel want to win, it's that simple. Hit the right notes while doing your job of working on the busywork of the job. It's mostly how Trump won 2016. Politics is marketing-based, not results-based.
[+] [-] handrous|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 0-_-0|4 years ago|reply
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez slams": About 73,300 results
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez eats": About 109 results
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez sleeps": 1 result
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez debates": About 173 results
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez proposes": About 5,880 results
"Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez discusses": About 1,150 results
Damn, you were right! Also surprised that AOC never sleeps.
[+] [-] bigbob2|4 years ago|reply
Article found from simple Google News archive search of "Pelosi" from 2004-2006: http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/01/28/tauzin.pelosi/inde... Same thing but "Bill Frist" instead: https://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/10/12/edwards.stem.cell...
Sure, "rips" and "knocks" have been replaced with "slams" etc but it's the exact same tactic that has been used for at least a while.
It would be interesting to see how far back this media behavior goes, which outlets are most culpable, and which "side of the aisle" these articles are mainly targeting, because I genuinely don't know.
[+] [-] RicoElectrico|4 years ago|reply
So both sides can be full of shit - and public discourse suffers.
https://natemat.pl/103155,korwin-masakruje-czyli-o-polityczn...
[+] [-] rdiddly|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] CyanBird|4 years ago|reply
Why are you attributing what they say, to what the media says they said?
AOC didn't write that headline, a news editor did, for the explicit purpose of making you put attention to it
[+] [-] chapium|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] david422|4 years ago|reply
I wonder if there is a point of diminishing returns - engagement goes down on clickbait titles.
Probably not since they are still doing it.
[+] [-] jonnycomputer|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] rm999|4 years ago|reply
Here's some recent 'slams' on that subreddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/Conservative/search/?q=slam&sort=re...
[+] [-] Layke1123|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] mLuby|4 years ago|reply
My 2¢ on why "slam" specifically:
1. It's a super short word, which matters in headlines and tweets. I think this is also why headlines will "quote" a word or two (the quotes are magic symbol to ward against libel).
2. Our monkey brains are aroused by violence and tribal warfare, even when that violence is described second-hand and is figurative.
Aggressive verbs are certainly inflammatory, and certainly increases clicks and engagement (at the cost of societal cohesion and individual contentment).
Mark my words—future headlines will be even more outrageous as we become inured to (and accepting of) the current patterns:
[+] [-] mjburgess|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tengbretson|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] cinntaile|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] 3grdlurker|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jahewson|4 years ago|reply
I don’t think that word means what you think it means.
[+] [-] spaetzleesser|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] jonnycomputer|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] techbio|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Spooky23|4 years ago|reply
If you’re running for local office, what gets more attention when you troll social media?
Talking about policy to improve storm sewers or claiming that your opponent is a communist who wants to kill children? What gets more attention?
In my hometown, a guy got on the non-partisan school board on a platform of being pro-gun, and against his “woke” opponent, who was accused of hating veterans.
[+] [-] kingsuper20|4 years ago|reply
My favorite variation of all this is the micro variety.
. Find a social media maven with a zillion followers
. Say something horrid to them
. Get them to respond
. Huzzah! Instant fame or at least a few followers for yourself.
. Wash rinse repeat.
[+] [-] aliasEli|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dinkleberg|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] programmarchy|4 years ago|reply
I subscribe to both DNC and RNC mailing lists and it's typical to see things like "Trump Rally BACKFIRES" and "The Radical Left is trying to destroy America". I try to laugh it off thinking people can't be dumb enough to buy into this, but then I'm gripped by the terrifying reality that actually yes, they are.
Dunking on opponents really wouldn't be all that bad if there was some actual debate progressing, where ideas could be tested and improved, but that seems to have stagnated to a large degree.
[+] [-] mistrial9|4 years ago|reply
There are feedback effects within their decision making that dampen and then eliminate new ideas, which reinforces "return to the party line" and opposite of "take our group in a new direction with this idea" ; anti-evolution basically..
[+] [-] lotsofpulp|4 years ago|reply