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X and other platforms peddle sensationalist slop meant to provoke outrage, not inform users.
And legacy media beats us over the head with story after story about how polarized we are.
The culmination of all of this breeds misanthropy.
Most people, however, are not anything like the media depicts them to be. Americans are, on the whole, pleasant and affable.
In the Washington Examiner, Samuel J. Abrams writes that we "underestimate other people’s willingness to engage with us."
Because we assume - often wrongly - that others would be disinterested in connection, we avoid social encounters entirely.
The fact of the matter, though, is that people are yearning for social connection. Even small talk is better than no talk.
But, as Abrams writes, by hearing so much about how angry and divided Americans are, we may be inadvertently talking "ourselves out of making connections."
From the piece:
Think about how often we hear that Americans are divided, angry, suspicious, and unwilling to engage with people who are different from them. Online conflict goes viral, and the negativity is amplified and compounded. I wonder what happens when we hear these messages often enough. Are we being primed to cocoon and disconnect from others? Do many Americans stop trying to engage with others because we have already convinced ourselves that nobody wants to talk?
Don't get me wrong, I've contributed to this narrative, too. I've opined, for example, that, if we don't rebuild our civic fabric soon, we might become a low-trust society like Southern Italy.
Such pieces, however, are not meant to encourage people to "cocoon" themselves in their apartments and avoid social contact. On the contrary, they're meant to spur people to action.
But Abrams is right: consuming endless negative media must have an adverse impact on human social behavior. It's black-pilling us.
Rejecting the black pill entails - not reading another op-ed, unless it's one of mine, of course - but actually doing.
If you encounter real people - not Internet avatars - at social events, bars, cafes, or wherever, you'll find that they're mostly, though not 100% of the time, open to conversation. Bars are often the best place to try this, as alcohol famously acts as a social lubricant.
As Abrams writes, we "need the confidence and gumption to walk across a room, extend a hand in greeting and friendship, and introduce ourselves."
