CRS 490 - 3/16/15

CRS 490 - 3/16/15

Public Sphere - Where discourse takes place

How does the internet affect our political views?

• The Internet allows users to share with like minded others in an echo chamber that continually reaffirms their views with the views of others that, through the non-inclusion of outside voices, re-enforces these original views. Ex: anti-vaccers
• Also allows dissent though through allowing all content a place for view.

Where can we have the most impact; politics or advocacy groups?

- Advocacy groups:  crowdfunding, outreach (good and bad forms of this exist), social program change

http://www.forbes.com/sites/amitchowdhry/2014/07/03/reading-rainbow-closes-kickstarter-crowdfunding-campaign-at-over-5-4-million/

- Politics; "if voting was important politicians wouldn't let us do it" political advances get nowhere

Has technology made us more educated/informed voters?

Depends on how you look at it. We can get lots of information of someone’s political views very quickly with one Google search. I feel that it made me a more informed voter when voting for president in 2012 because it allowed me to find the candidate that I was interested in instead of allowing mainstream content to shape my view of the election. In which case I would have voted for either the two main party candidates. For most people, however, I will admit that they won’t look at the information as deeply as I may have. This means that it has the POTENTIAL to make us more informed voters if we decide for ourselves to seek the information out. It does not mean that it couldn't as easily be used to dumbly look through the same echo chamber politics in the US is prone to using.