The newspaper is dying, hooray for democracy revisited
By Andrew Potter - Tuesday, April 20, 2010 - 28 Comments
There’s lots of blog chatter today about David Brooks’ latest column, reporting on a…
There’s lots of blog chatter today about David Brooks’ latest column, reporting on a new study that debunks the myth of group polarization on the net. It’s a good column, reporting good news, namely, that Cass Sunstein’s fears that the death of newspapers and other mainstream media would have a negative impact on democracy have been greatly oversold. Forgive me, though, for not being as surprised as some people about this, since, well, since I told you so. Here’s what I wrote for Maclean’s in April 2008:
Nothing about how people consume media online suggests they are looking for confirmation of pre-existing biases. In fact, we have every reason to believe that as people migrate online, it will be to seek out sources of information that they perceive to be unbiased, and which give them news they can’t get anywhere else. The newspaper may be dying, but our democracy will be healthier for it.
Here’s Brooks today:
Gentzkow and Shapiro found that the Internet is actually more ideologically integrated than old-fashioned forms of face-to-face association — like meeting people at work, at church or through community groups. You’re more likely to overlap with political opponents online than in your own neighborhood.
This study suggests that Internet users are a bunch of ideological Jack Kerouacs. They’re not burrowing down into comforting nests. They’re cruising far and wide looking for adventure, information, combat and arousal.
Here’s the full column on this I wrote for the magazine:
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UPDATED: First, they came for that Galloway fellow …
By kadyomalley - Friday, July 24, 2009 at 11:22 AM - 108 Comments
.. and now this:
KEENE, NH (July 24, 2009) – Jason Talley and Pete Eyre of the Motorhome Diaries were denied entry into Canada while attempting to cross the border yesterday. Border officials cited an incident that occurred in Mississippi (in May 2009) where the crew was arrested and detained without cause.
The Motorhome Diaries is the story of two friends – Jason and Pete – who took to the road in the spring of 2009 to search for freedom in the Americas, chronicling their adventures as they travel throughout the continent. Both are united by one goal – the desire to increase individual freedom and decrease the influence of government in their lives.
The original itinerary included visits to Montreal, Windsor, and Toronto to meet with liberty-minded Canadians and share their message of peace and freedom.
During the crew’s attempted border entry, border agents and the K-9 patrol searched their recreational vehicle. They were filming as they neared the checkpoint, but border agents deleted the video and informed them that if they continued to film, record, or take pictures they would be arrested. Various items were confiscated from the vehicle, including computers and literature.
Border agents justified the seizure by claiming they were looking for “pornography or heinous propaganda.” When asked for a definition of “heinous propaganda” or the applicable statute, the crew was told it was available online. However, agents could not produce the statue. [...]
Well, technically, I guess in this case, “they” — the Canada Border Service Agency, in this case — didn’t exactly come for the Motorhome Diarists, since they’re the ones who showed up at the border. But other than that — well, that, and the absence of any outburst of self-backpattery by certain citizenship and immigration ministers for having saved Canadians from the scourge of dangerous speech — this has an eerily Gallowayesque feel to it and seems — from what ITQ can see, at least — similarly senseless.
