Why So Many Internet Activists Don't Change Any Minds
By David Cain
/ raptitude.com
On Facebook I quietly unsubscribe from friends who regularly make
angry issue-related posts, even if they’re right. I don’t want to be
pummeled by “truth,” no matter how true it is.
I understand why they do it. I’ve done it. Ignorance — of
overfishing, of puppy mills, of normalized sexism, of what vaccines can
and can’t do — can be genuinely dangerous, and wanting to reduce this
ignorance is understandable.
Some are able to do it carefully and diplomatically, and I have learned a lot from these people.
But most internet activists let contempt seep into the message. It
becomes about making others wrong instead of trying to help them be
right. Just visit virtually any issue-related message board. It’s
adversarial. It’s normal to blame people for their ignorance.
Ignorance, if that’s what it really is, isn’t something people can
fairly be blamed for. We don’t choose what not to grasp, what not to
have been taught, what not to have understood the significance of.
