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I really dislike the way we overvalue objectivity as if our individual experiences and cultural backgrounds aren& #39;t critically important to the ways in which we gather, understand, and disseminate information regardless of the technical steps we take to remain impartial.
I especially find extreme outsider objectivist approaches completely useless for developing any meaningful understanding of anything.
Think of PETA with a poster showing a chicken, a cow, and a photo of your dog, asking why you& #39;re okay with eating all but your dog. From a purely logical standpoint, this exposes a contradiction.
However, a reasonable person can understand why these things are not the same. I have an emotional connection to my dog. He is a member of my family in a way the other animals are not. They occupy different categories in my mind based on my needs and experiences.
This isn& #39;t an example of me being irrational or illogical, but it shows how my perception and understanding of things is the result of a constructed framework to fit my lived experience, and to remove that framework from analysis is completely nonsensical.
Seeing otherwise very smart people take the PETA approach to analyzing the behaviors and conditions of people is just...baffling to me.
Things that occupy the same space in purely logical analysis (these things are all animals) may not occupy the same space in sociocultural and personal contexts (one of these animals is a beloved pet.)
So when journalists go out of their way to craft both sides narratives that make sense only if completely divorced from critical social and historical contexts, not only is it a woefully incomplete analysis, but it does a disservice to the very things journalism is about.
I have this same frustration with people that are studying extremist groups, conspiracies, QAnon, etc.
So much valuable time is wasted pointing out the logical inconsistencies of these beliefs, and depicting their followers as irrational.
This isn& #39;t to say that fact-checking and such doesn& #39;t have its place, but holy shit people having bad facts or displaying hypocrisy is not the most important thing at work here. No one is a perfect rational being and comparing everyone to such is actually not helpful.
What& #39;s important is we understand the processes by which people construct their own realities, and the factors that influence perception. What& #39;s startling about, say, QAnon, is not that their reality differs from ours, but how MUCH it differs from ours. Like a game of telephone.
We help no one by just pointing out the ways their reality differs from ours. They value their truths as "objective" and "true" just as much as we accept ours. They are also willing to accept contradictions (albeit, to a higher degree) just like we do. (A chicken isn& #39;t my dog).
So I don& #39;t think attempting to establish truth in the context of understanding these things is especially valuable (not necessarily true when reporting on them, mind you). There are bigger, more important forces at work that explain why they are so compelling to so many.
There are lots of useful frameworks for doing this. I& #39;ve seen great analysis likening Q to an ARG, suspension of disbelief in media consumption, faith and religious understandings, etc. etc.
Lots of disciplines have valuable insight here, because we all have a wide range of vocabulary that examines the variety of phenomena that explain why and how people engage with storytelling, reality, and each other.
There is not one right answer to understanding how something like Q works. Even Q is just one example of many types of groups getting attention these days.
Everything in this thread is probably basic stuff that most people I know and interact with already understand. But I& #39;ve seen enough wildly oversimplified and impersonal analysis lately that it bothered me enough to say something.
