Archive for the 'society' Tag

Does Tolerance Require Ironic Consequences?

As has been made evident by numerous incidents in our world’s history, it can be difficult for members of society to peacefully tolerate viewpoints that are extremely different or at odds with their own, regardless of the provisions that society has made for free speech and thought.

In Murder in Amsterdam, Ian Buruma suggests that second generation immigrants become isolated and thus make extreme alliances because of an alienation from both Dutch culture and that of their parents. I have trouble accepting this line of thought. Conflicting cultures won’t necessarily result in a resort to extremism, though that is a definite possibility in the case of deliberate rejection by one’s peers. Beyond simply promoting assimilation, I think this issue is more a question of how we tolerate and respond to other cultures.

The question of how we should tolerate, like most interesting questions, brings up many more:

  • Should we be tolerant of concepts we know are incorrect? There is significant evidence backing the existence of global warming and evolution, yet our society continues to cultivate the unscientific opposing viewpoints. Maintaining this marketplace of ideas is critical in supporting free speech and general progress.
  • How do we compromise between the need to promote plurality of ideas versus the need to protect potentially dangerous information? The rapid production of knowledge and the Internet’s infinite capacity for storing it allows easy access of practically any idea to anyone (unless they’re in certain countries). If that information happens to be sensitive, offensive, or dangerous, what do we do?
  • Can we be tolerant of intolerant opinions? When extremists promote ideas of prejudice and or violence towards others, how should government arbitrate?
  • If the stakes change, can (and should) we violate our ideals of freedom in exchange for other protections? The USA PATRIOT Act comes to mind.

Thoughts? Answers?

April 30, 2007 | no comments | tags: , , ,

The Informational City

In Understanding Amsterdam, Manuel Castells discusses the change of urban structure in response to the advancement information technology, claiming that “the coming of a technological revolution centered on information technologies, the formation of a global economy, the transition to a new society, that [...] replaces the industrial society as the framework of social institutions.”

Seattle is probably a good example of a city currently undergoing that shift. As a city that began with the goal of becoming a great trading port, and rose to that status through an economy focused on lumber and shipbuilding, it has become a place where people “come for the jobs at cutting-edge companies such as Microsoft and Amgen” and thus the best-educated city in the United States.

As Castells outlines, this change has significant consequences on the urban structure of a city. Corporations such as Microsoft are well suited creating their own world in the suburbs, given that they need relatively little face-to-face business interaction with entities in Seattle. At the same time, many of the well-paid employees at these companies are moving downtown, leading to the rapid development of condos, coffeeshops, and restaurants.

If this shift to an “informational city” is in fact reshaping the urban and suburban areas of our cities to serve the wants and needs of the upper middle class, our society needs to answer the question of how it will serve those who aren’t educated and/or rich.

April 18, 2007 | no comments | tags: , , , ,

Questioning the Internet’s Social Implications

A large component of the trip to Amsterdam consists of social research in the region. We will be working with the Virtual Knowledge Studio, which is a relatively new Dutch think tank concerned with the evolving use of technology in research.

I’m particularly interested in how technology usage patterns differ in various regions of the world. For instance, the use of mobile phones differs greatly between most continents. These differences are especially evident when looking at their use in various regions of the developing world. While we’re not surprised to see a twelve-year-old carrying her own pink RAZR, it’s common for multiple families to share a phone and even a single email address in many parts of the world. Other ideas contrary to our usage patterns, such as airtime rental have created new markets for trade elsewhere and are allowing rural areas to connect with the rest of the world.

Ideas

The very advances in connectivity that are brought through new developments in communication technology carry the potential of modifying the way societies operate. People’s online behavior generally mirrors and extends their offline concerns, as is visible at any community website or forum. Online social networks have struggled with appealing to more than a small subset of the global population, as these concerns vary greatly between regions. For this very reason, Google’s Orkut has seen great success in developing regions such as Brazil and India, while Facebook is ingrained in the everyday lives of American college students.

Leading off of this issue is the fact that people have begun spending a significant amount of their social energy in online interactions – this means that people no longer have a need to connect with their neighbors for social stimulation. I suppose that this could make it more difficult for a tolerant society like ours or Amsterdam’s to promote assimilation and intercultural understanding, as individuals would be less likely to interact with others who have differing interests and value systems if they can find people similar to themselves online.

Questions

  • How do cultural differences in interpersonal interaction affect the way people use and expect technology to function?
  • Has the Internet’s emergence reduced cultural tolerance in Amsterdam due to the ease of long-distance communication?

Evidence

In order to study the effects of technology, it would be necessary to first determine the usage patterns applied in a region. These could be determined through surveys and interviews of end-users, as well as discussions with people who teach the use of technology, such as librarians. Interviews of the general population could be used to determine what is expected of technology, and how it is used on a day-to-day basis. To answer the second question, the above methods could be extended to gauge the general sentiment regarding Internet use and its consequences.

April 2, 2007 | 4 comments | tags: , , , , ,

Apple has announced that EMI’s entire catalog will be available without DRM on the iTunes Music Store, at a 30-cent premium over the currently available copy-protected music files. Is this the beginning of a new future for online music sales? (via BoingBoing)

April 2, 2007 | no comments | tags: , , ,

Tolerance and Submission

In preparation for my study abroad journey to Amsterdam this summer, I will be posting on topics relevant to the trip, specifically looking at Dutch culture and pragmatic tolerance. This marks the first post in a series of what I hope to be many.

A viewing of Submission, a short film written by Ayaan Hirsi Ali and directed by Theo van Gogh, evokes many responses. The film, while not very artistically stimulating, details the story of a young Muslim woman who was married by her parents through arranged marriage to a man she felt no attachment to. She elaborates, in an inquisitive prayer to Allah, explaining how she had loved in secret prior to the marriage, and is now subject to beatings by her husband and rape by her uncle. While attributing her tolerance to the trust required by Islam, she cannot help but feel alone – upon seeking help from her parents, she is told not to challenge the honor of her relatives.

Critics of this film challenge it as provocative, polarizing, insulting, and misrepresentative of Islam. In fact, Theo van Gogh was murdered months after Submission’s release in 2004, and a letter pinned to his body expressed anger at Hirsi Ali’s views against Islam. While this film is surely clear in its feelings regarding the trust called for by the Qur’an, the film transcends Islam, highlighting the problem of domestic abuse and cultural excuses for oppressive societal structures – these are visible throughout society, and are not problems faced only in the Islamic world.

On the other hand, Andrew Stuttaford at the National Review attributes this murder to the Dutch’s tolerant practices:

Mass immigration, of course, played a part in creating the social pathologies that cost Van Gogh his life, but its effects were exacerbated by official Holland’s embrace of multiculturalism, a dogma that made integration impossible and alienation a certainty.

I don’t believe that tolerance carries the certain result of a polarized society. In order for a society to cultivate and be tolerant of a plurality of ideas, it must recognize the point at which one’s personal freedoms are encroached by another and intervene to allow for that system of pragmatic tolerance to thrive.

March 28, 2007 | no comments | tags: , , , ,