Content Feeding

Admittedly, I have gotten much of my news from social media sites, namely Facebook. Social media platforms have come to serve as "aggregators" of content, places where information from lots of different places is brought together in one "feed". These feeds, whether we are talking about your Facebook newsfeed, a Twitter timeline, or something else, effectively make a distributed network (the Internet) accessible through a personalized portal. How this "personalization" takes place is rather opaque; we don't know (nor could we likely easily "understand") what exactly goes into the algorithms that decides what content we see, and in what order. For many obvious reasons, feeds are convenient. We get to see more of what interests us through a single domain. 

But, it is also not difficult to see how feeds can be dangerous. For example, our personalized Internet experience can very quickly become an echo chamber wherein the content we see only reinforces our current ideas/biases/thoughts, rather than exposing us to new perspectives which could contribute to our overall understanding of things, not to mention general well-being. Many people, with a more sophisticated understanding of what feeds are and how they influence what content we see, choose to still use services like Facebook, but make use of features to exercise some control over what they see in their feed. In this way, they can exercise agency and try to have the best of both worlds — the convenience of aggregated content with an intentional selection of content they believe we want to see, rather than what somebody or something else assigns to them. Still though, we are limited by what we know about or are aware of in trying to take control of our (only partially tamed) feeds. Acknowledging how feeds can reinforce tunnel vision, we consciously take steps to provide feed ourselves information that feeds are unlikely to give us.

As I come to realize more and more how my subjective experience has differed over the years, and likewise how my subjective experience likewise differs from that of other people, more and more so I have come to appreciate the things in my life that have allowed me to see beyond my current understanding of the world and consider insights others have arrived at. The model of the feed is somewhat antithetical to the aim of seeking to see beyond one's current paradigm. Understanding the dangers of The Feed, we can take steps to get input as unlike The Feed as possible. This may mean intentionally having difficult conversations (Sam Harris senpai is a role model to me on this point), reading things we know will make us mad, and trying to make convincing cases for positions we, in our gut, disagree with.

Trying to seek "disruptive" content to our currently held world view naturally involves leaving the comfort of The Feed and asking difficult questions. Seeking to answer these questions will likely involve exposing ourselves to unfamiliar and uncomfortable "input".

Examples: 

• A born-again Christian may compare their experience with that of converts to Islam. Do new converts of all sorts have similar emotional experiences?
• A pre-pharm student may deliberately read/watch content about the evils of "Big Pharma".
• Give metal/country/rap/(insert your least favorite genre) a sympathetic listen; what is it really about this genre that is so distasteful to you? 
• Why do people think my job/major/religion/etc. is useless/terrible/evil? In what sense are they right? Wrong? How can I address their concerns?

Naturally, it is less difficult to give a critical reading to texts we are ideologically opposed to than to do so for texts that seem to be in line with our current views. Likewise, we easily see bad behavior in others, while a higher degree of awareness is needed for many people to see similar faults in themselves. The exercise of exposing ourselves to opposing views through giving ourselves different content trains us to look at more familiar content anew. This is to say, that it is a valuable exercise to turn away from our feeds and find new, provocative content to test our world views. But, this does not mean we should simply abandon content we are familiar with. Rather, we train ourselves to see what we normally read with broader insight.

The same texts can mean very different things to different people. An astute, historically-minded reader may glean much insight form the likes of click-bait articles and truly fake "fake news", reading these sources critically as primary sources of our present era. On the other hand, we can get baited by click bait. We can allow marketing wizardry work its magic on us. Similarly, one could read the Qur'an or the Bible literally as the Word of God, or one could read these same texts critically as a historian or literary scholar.

By making it a routine to depart from our usual mode of thought to entertain new perspectives, not only can we learn more about the world at large, but we can approach what is familiar to us with new eyes and ears. Feeds aren't inherently good or bad, but they do train us to inform ourselves along relatively narrow lines. By taking the time and effort to intentionally venture outside of those lines, we can mitigate some of the "tunnel vision" feeds give to us while stiff benefiting from the many convenient features they offer.