Posted on 02/07/2006 11:41:51 AM PST by Daralundy
We are told that blogs are the future, and since I plan on spending considerable time in the future I very much want to like the chatty Internet websites. But I don't.
In fact, I find them disturbing. And that was before I tracked quite a number of them through the election. Now I am beginning to think that if blogs are the future, meaningful public debate is history.
What scares me is the extremism so common in the political blogosphere. The tone of absolute certainty. The disdain for anyone who thinks differently. The refusal to acknowledge the existence of uncomfortable facts. The minds encased in the hard amber of ideology.
Last November, on what was once October Revolution Day, I stood outside Red Square in Moscow with a group of grey and wrinkled Communists who shook their bony fists at bored police officers and shouted, "The victory of socialism is assured!"
I didn't realize it at the time but the old Bolshies were blogging without computers.
Yes, there is value in the medium. As bloggers say -- over and over and over again -- the great thing about blogs is that they democratize the media.
Mass communication was once something only done by a lucky few. Like, um, me. But today, anyone with a computer and a couple of bucks can publish anything and distribute it around the world. In theory, that's a magnificent thing. More voices, more ideas, more perspectives should produce a richer public dialogue. Certainly there are corners of the Internet, including a few blogs, that are delivering on that promise.
But the explosion of voices on the Internet also made it possible for people to obtain all their news, analysis and opinions exclusively from like-minded sources. Liberal or Conservative.
(Excerpt) Read more at canada.com ...
Bingo!
Yeah, yeah, Mr. Reporter... you're totally disinterested, right? Not like YOUR rice bowl is being upset!
Only leftists could be this terrified of free speech.
Well, then stop going to Daily Kos, Moveon.org, DemocraticUnderground, the DNC home page and other such sites.
I don't know about you all, but I really enjoy reinforcing extreme views....Just like the NY Times and The Washington Post...The Boston Globe...The Los Angeles Times...The Baltimore Sun...The Miami Herald...ad nauseum. How cheerful it is to be in such good company! To paraphrase Groucho: "They may sound like idiots, and they may look like idiots, but don't let that fool you. They really are idiots."
Cheers.
I am so sick of deconstruction posing as analysis.
Actually the writer of this article is taking on all sides here of blogsphere here. To be fair the honest outrage that should be felt has pretty much been turned into an anti moslem fest here. Every thread it seems has a few post of "bomb mecca" in it. If I was a Muslim in the USA looking around to what party I might want to join . FR would not have been a great place to find info on it this week I am ashamed to say.
Well I guess the only solution is to have an international board overlook everything posted on the web.
This isn't about censorship - it's about respecting other cultures...
(/sarcasm)
One of the things I like most about FR is that no one can get away with posting lies and inuendo without being called to task very quickly. It seems that on FR there are (at least) two sides to every story (opinion), but the assembled contributors always bring out the facts, with references and substantiation.
Well thats def true. THis is not the AMEN corner that other liberal sites are.
It's the new emphasis on the need to aquire critical thinking skills that scares the hell out of hacks like this. This new information paradigm requires it, and guys like this are left as little more than welfare bureaucrats in a fully employed society.
I'm sure a slave owner would be fairly put off reading a site from a nation that disdains slavery, too.
So what's your point?
If I want my news from a totally liberal source I can buy the L.A. Times (I don't but I could).
Welcome to Free Republic.
"The minds encased in the hard amber of ideology."
A good candidate for pseuds corner!
What an asinine statement!
The only way it makes sense is if we translate that to mean "it does not agree with my perception of things" --- clearly, a DU approach to "meaningful public debate".
I have no problem identifying and ignoring moonbat blogs and, I assume, neither does any intelligent, educated and informed person. At least not for the body of knowlege we all are assumed to possess that enables us to participate in informed public debate in the first place.
A non-issue.
It your fault she does not like it.
Anyone else see the logic here.
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