Young People and Politics

[grumbler]

Anecdotally, even some folks on languish (and we are old) have trouble with reading comprehension...

What does "reading comprehension" mean, again?

[Norgy]

Anecdotally, even some folks on languish (and we are old) have trouble with reading comprehension...

What does "reading comprehension" mean, again?

Probably connected to doing MDMA and LSD behind a shed. Like young people do.

[DGuller]

Anecdotally, even some folks on languish (and we are old) have trouble with reading comprehension...

[Sheilbh]

Rock and roll wasn't pestering you in school,sending continuous notifications. Pulp magazines could be engrossing, but never enough for you to tune out completely your surroundings. Your turntable wasn't engineered to capture your attention, and request constant likes. Your browsing of magazines wasn't producing shiny moving pictures and bright colors that would also distract your comrades. Fads of the past weren't integrated with a device upon which the rest of your life could be hitched. In short, it did not produce what increasingly looks like an addiction.

This year will be the 20th year I have been teaching at the college level. It is enough to remember a time before the prevalence of social media in our everyday life - and certainly in students' everyday life. There is a marked decline in capacity to concentrate among students and to read complex sentences. The only students who once were as jittery as many I have now were those who were anxiously eyeing the clock for a cigarette break.

It doesn't need to be a panic. But to cling to the idea that there is nothing new under the sun is to miss the specificity of our times, and its specific challenges.

Yeah that's the experience of my teacher friend (at high school level) - it is addictive, dependent behaviour.

I also think we talk a lot about the standard political stuff on social media. I was a teenager during the late 90s/00s. There was really brutal and grim images online if you wanted to look for it. Particularly beheading videos, the killing of Daniel Pearl etc. But you needed to look for it.

One thing I have been really struck by with social media in the last year (I think especially on TikTok but I'm not sure) is the sheer volume of horrendous images of human suffering and violence from both Ukraine and Israel. It is not stuff that you need to look for but stuff that you need to look to avoid. Attached to it, often, are lines like "do not look away" - that it is politically and morally worthy to watch this, knowingly and actively, particularly if you are have strong views on it.

I could be wrong, but I imagine that's particularly strong among younger people and I find it alarming. I'm not sure the effect that will have in the long run - but this is the sort of content that, just twenty years ago, was looked at by specialist teams in media organisations who were trained and had resources. That is now not just everywhere but with a moral imperative to not avert your gaze (because because in an age of smartphones the gaze is the most important thing so that is political engagement).

Again, I avoid it. Much like I didn't watch Daniel Pearl's killing - I have no desire to see any of this and I don't think it affects my ability to have or act on views.

I am not sure if Johann Hari is the best of sources, but I found both "Stolen Focus" and "Lost Connections" somewhat enlightening, not just because of the writing, but because he was open about his sources.

"The Age of Surveillance Capitalism" by Zuboff is also worth a read.

I have issues with Hari but totally agree on Zuboff.

It is the other thing and from a purely media perspective I find it kind of disgraceful that advertisers are directing their money away from news because it's too controversial, too negative, for brand safety reasons etc - but are increasing their budgets on, say, TikTok which is full of videos of kids dying from a bomb and was (according to the police) the most widely used social media in the recent riots in the UK. The money is going from the industry that attempts to make sense, to the platforms showing the most extreme content imaginable in the name of brand safety.

[Grey Fox]

How is the impending ban of Tik Tok been received in USA schools?

[Jacob]

Is it happening, is Tik-Tok getting banned in the US?

[Josquius]

They've been talking about that since Trump right?
Weird it never seems to happen.

[Sheilbh]

They've been talking about that since Trump right?
Weird it never seems to happen.

I think it was TikTok will be banned unless it is sold to a US or non-Chinese company...which is a slightly different motivation than we're talking about here

[Grey Fox]

I don't think it will be sold. I expect a ban. Biden signed that law. Can it not be enforced?

[HVC]

I don't think it will be sold. I expect a ban. Biden signed that law. Can it not be enforced?

Guess ISPs would have to ban it?

[Grey Fox]

I don't think it will be sold. I expect a ban. Biden signed that law. Can it not be enforced?

Guess ISPs would have to ban it?

DNS companies too, most are probably based in the USA.

[Josquius]

They've been talking about that since Trump right?
Weird it never seems to happen.

I think it was TikTok will be banned unless it is sold to a US or non-Chinese company...which is a slightly different motivation than we're talking about here

I don't know.
Maybe not with Trump but amongst the smarter people in his circle I do think there's some worry (/desire to take control) that as well as the software vulnerabilities angle, the fundmanetal service itself is designed to destroy people's minds

[Tamas]

https://www.theguardian.com/education/article/2024/aug/15/the-class-of-2024-aced-maths-take-the-a-level-challenge-to-see-how-you-compare

[DGuller]

"Maths"?    Seems like someone didn't ace their grammar test.

[Sheilbh]

And the fastest growing subject is Further Maths