Over the weekend, I was invited by friends to see a play called, The Fever Syndrome, at Hampstead Theatre in north London. The play, written by British playwright Alexis Zegerman, is a brutally real description of a dysfunctional family with the corrosive effects of money. It deals with all sorts of tricky topics that are prone for stirring emotions and arguments. Bottom line, families can be a pretty messy and ugly affair. When I look at the divisiveness around me, these days it seems there’s a lot of venom between old friends and family that has been brought out by recent events. With friends or family like that, who needs enemies, right?
Yesterday’s BBC World News podcast, I listened to an excerpt of the interview of Larissa, 66, a proud woman who lives in a small village in the Donbas region of Ukraine. She described how she had stopped talking with her sister who lived in Donetsk, relatively nearby, because they had very different views on the Russian invasion. Her sister, in fact, supported the Russians, while Larissa was firmly opposed, and had chosen to stay in her village, rather than flee.
In the US, there have been plenty of reports about how politics is dividing up families and tearing apart friendships. In a 2016 PEW Research survey in United States, it showed that 55% of the Democrats surveyed feared the Republican Party while 49% of Republicans feared the Democratic Party. The survey goes on to explain how each considers the other closed-minded. Tapping into fear will certainly impede our ability to cross the divide.
Of these two situations, I am much better able to understand Larissa’s rift with her sister than the “fear” felt by citizens of the same country.
Agree or disagree?
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It strikes me that fear has been one of the driving forces of our current divisiveness. Stoked by media who are desperate for eyeballs and I'd even say with governments who are keen to use fear to subdue its citizens (and make them "behave" as they wish), we're letting our level level brain functions dominate our thoughts and interactions. Some fear is warranted, of course. However, it seems to dominate the air and brain waves these days.
Yes, fear seems to be the driving force in the West, ever since 9/11, which is now a very very long time. Yet fear is not the only one to blame I believe. We seem to have collectively fallen into an ignorance of 'knowing it all', driven by our convictions and opinions which are often based on very shallow processing of information or reflections on ourselves. The 'you're either with us or against us' mentality. As if there is no riches in diverging points of view. Does that resonate?
So very much Lidewij. There's a great play in French "Quisaitout et Grobêta," where the one who "knows it all" is shown up by his less smart counterpart.... There so much more nuance in our world. If we start with the paradigm of good and evil, which is part of our initial education (and typically is filled with good intention), it feels like we have lost our ability to deal with the grey areas (eg context) and a common understanding of what is ethical... ie good or bad.
I heard Margaret Atwood talk recently. Fascinating. Do seek out any videos of her talking about stuff other than her books. She talked about how social media and 'Putin's trolls' are creating mass hysteria. The new form of tabloid, shouty news sells, and we're now all either consumers or producers of shouty news.
First Facebook was the place where loosely connected 'friends' became frenemies on sociopolitical points. Twitter is now the all out minefield. An eggshell leads to a bomb. Now LinkedIn is becoming a space where sharing anything personally (particularly as a women or PoC) leads to pretty nasty trolling and that's with people using their professional identities!
We can't put the genie back in the box. Online communities bring out the wisdom of crowds. And the madness of crowds. We need to learn strategies for how to get along with our new 'frenemies'. Or otherwise how to grow a thicker skin and avoid the cruel words. Perhaps there's a tech solution too for platforms to filter out negative sentiment responses.
In our household, we're fans of Margaret Atwood's work.... Haven't seen so many of her videos, but I did see her discussions about democracy. Have ordered but not read her last book, Burning Questions. I think that the best we can hope for is to find examples of people engaging in more robust (and civil) debate in public -- where the public is hanging out online, but also on platforms that encourage freer conversations. That's one reason why I like Substack.
I agree. The US divisiveness I believe is instigated by the media. Although, no doubt there is lots of extremism when it comes to freedom of choice/views. Apples new update includes an emoji of a pregnant male...does that make any sense? 🙃
It strikes me that fear has been one of the driving forces of our current divisiveness. Stoked by media who are desperate for eyeballs and I'd even say with governments who are keen to use fear to subdue its citizens (and make them "behave" as they wish), we're letting our level level brain functions dominate our thoughts and interactions. Some fear is warranted, of course. However, it seems to dominate the air and brain waves these days.
Yes, fear seems to be the driving force in the West, ever since 9/11, which is now a very very long time. Yet fear is not the only one to blame I believe. We seem to have collectively fallen into an ignorance of 'knowing it all', driven by our convictions and opinions which are often based on very shallow processing of information or reflections on ourselves. The 'you're either with us or against us' mentality. As if there is no riches in diverging points of view. Does that resonate?
So very much Lidewij. There's a great play in French "Quisaitout et Grobêta," where the one who "knows it all" is shown up by his less smart counterpart.... There so much more nuance in our world. If we start with the paradigm of good and evil, which is part of our initial education (and typically is filled with good intention), it feels like we have lost our ability to deal with the grey areas (eg context) and a common understanding of what is ethical... ie good or bad.
Great play dealing with deep issues such as life, death, and new technologies impacting life and death
Thank you Yendi! More than ever before, we're going to need to wade into such topics!
I heard Margaret Atwood talk recently. Fascinating. Do seek out any videos of her talking about stuff other than her books. She talked about how social media and 'Putin's trolls' are creating mass hysteria. The new form of tabloid, shouty news sells, and we're now all either consumers or producers of shouty news.
First Facebook was the place where loosely connected 'friends' became frenemies on sociopolitical points. Twitter is now the all out minefield. An eggshell leads to a bomb. Now LinkedIn is becoming a space where sharing anything personally (particularly as a women or PoC) leads to pretty nasty trolling and that's with people using their professional identities!
We can't put the genie back in the box. Online communities bring out the wisdom of crowds. And the madness of crowds. We need to learn strategies for how to get along with our new 'frenemies'. Or otherwise how to grow a thicker skin and avoid the cruel words. Perhaps there's a tech solution too for platforms to filter out negative sentiment responses.
In our household, we're fans of Margaret Atwood's work.... Haven't seen so many of her videos, but I did see her discussions about democracy. Have ordered but not read her last book, Burning Questions. I think that the best we can hope for is to find examples of people engaging in more robust (and civil) debate in public -- where the public is hanging out online, but also on platforms that encourage freer conversations. That's one reason why I like Substack.
I agree. The US divisiveness I believe is instigated by the media. Although, no doubt there is lots of extremism when it comes to freedom of choice/views. Apples new update includes an emoji of a pregnant male...does that make any sense? 🙃
Reminds me of the expression that life is stranger than fiction.