Why the Internet Is Bad for Democracy (2005)

40 pointsposted a month ago
by tguvot
(dl.acm.org)

20 Comments

polalavik

a month ago

I think a deeper dive on this is The Revolt of the Public by Martin Gurri [1] which argues, in short, that people have been enabled by the internet (which he calls the infosphere) and that mobilization via the internet has created extreme turbulence for systems of authority (which are still needed despite their existing issues). The people enabled by the internet have no way to rule, and in many examples do not wish to rule, but only want to dismantle the status quo without any meaningful replacement or solution leaving everyone in a vacuum of nihilism which is highly corrosive to liberal democracy.

[1] https://press.stripe.com/the-revolt-of-the-public

esyir

a month ago

I'd say that the internet has also strongly lowered the barriers to external propaganda and influence, which is another major factor here. When you've got a huge swarm of "people" with no stake, or even a negative stake in your country, that's a naturally destabilizing factor

spencerflem

a month ago

I genuinely don’t get how anyone could feel anything other than nihilism with regards to American democracy

tim333

a month ago

As someone slightly older I remember when it worked quite well.

AndrewKemendo

a month ago

But that was always the case for first nations and black Americans.

There has literally never been a good time in America for either group.

Mountain_Skies

a month ago

Yes, it's shocking how common the belief is now that democracy means a person's preferred candidate always wins. Anyone else winning is the death of democracy. The mental gymnastics some people will go through to promote this view can border on mania.

IlikeKitties

a month ago

I'll add European gerontocracy to that list. Nihilism becomes the obvious and only solution.

barishnamazov

a month ago

The author missed the mark on the financial barriers to entry. He predicted that the shift from text to broadband/multimedia would make politics "more expensive" and raise entry barriers because video is costly to produce.

In reality, the cost of video production dropped to near-zero (smartphones, TikTok, YouTube). However, he was right about the outcome. The "entry barrier" isn't the cost of the camera, it's the cost of the algorithmic optimization and the "strategies to draw attention" in an information glut. The rich didn't win because video is expensive; they won because virality is gameable with resources. Credits where due, he indeed called out this potential for "international manipulation of domestic politics" well before the major scandals of the 2016 era.

iamnothere

a month ago

The rich won in America before the Revolution. The Revolution was led by rich men who wanted to set their own tax policy, workhouses and vagrancy laws were used to control the poor in early America, union busting and violent strike breaking began in the late 1800s, inequality has soared since the 70s. The only time you could say that the rich were really on the back foot was from the Great Depression to the end of the gold standard, after which we entered the era of unlimited currency expansion (currency which somehow always finds its way into the pockets of rich men). Media in the 90s was controlled by a handful of companies who consolidated further as soon as the government stopped enforcing rules about concentration.

In other words, the present day is just business as usual.

I am against this growing notion that the internet is creating a unique situation where the average person is more oppressed than ever. It enables both good and bad things, and yes we really need to pay attention to the bad things. But it’s still a tool that can be used for engagement in the democratic process, for speech, for small scale commerce, and for communication.

This needs to be stated because those who oppose the good aspects of the internet are fully prepared to hijack anti-internet sentiment in the name of protecting the public. “Locking down” the internet will do nothing to improve the situation of ordinary people. Quite the opposite in fact.

rickydroll

a month ago

The internet discourse is like handing a megaphone to an angry drunk.

iamnothere

a month ago

If you read history, this is simply public discourse in general. (Often literally.)

If you’re opposed to the difficult and often irrational voices of the public, you’re in fact opposed to democracy.

petermcneeley

a month ago

What about the difficult and often irrational voices of the elite?

zrn900

a month ago

This implies that not having internet was good for democracy before that. Internet was not proliferated in 2003 when the Iraq War happened. Was there democracy then... When Vietnam happened, was it democracy...

wussboy

a month ago

I strongly support this message

yunnpp

a month ago

Very good paper, no nonsense and straight to the point(s). These sort of topics need way more visibility and discussion in democracies, especially today.

intalentive

a month ago

The text does not really support the title. It argues: “The Internet is not necessarily good for democracy, as optimists claim. It’s more likely to be a mixed bag that presents new challenges.”

This is a good early example of the “populism is bad for democracy” genre of Ivy League handwringing, with titles like “The People Vs. Democracy”. It’s almost amusing to see how uncomfortable the ruling class is with peer-to-peer discourse unmediated by Fact Checkers, Debunkers, and other Adults In The Room.

AuthAuth

a month ago

I'm not the ruling class but im getting uncomfortable with "peer-to-peer discourse unmediated by Fact Checkers, Debunkers, and other Adults In The Room". Have you seen the popular formats of discussion? The are insane even with fact checkers and adults in the room trying to steer the conversation.

iamnothere

a month ago

This is the norm throughout history and will continue to be the norm in democracies with free speech. You should read more about partisan papers in the time of yellow journalism, or town hall meetings before the radio era.

People are often obnoxious, irrational, absurd, and they may even flat out lie. Shocking! Advocating for this mess to be kept from view is advocating for further obscuring the reality of the situation.

I grew up in a time when the TV only presented a polished, curated, “civilized” view of the world. It’s why most Americans didn’t know anything about US interventions in Latin America, about the effects of offshoring and trade liberalization, and about the false justifications for the Iraq War. (Yet even in the late 20th century, conspiracy talk was rampant—it’s not a new phenomenon nor was it created by the internet.)