[p2p-research] Jimmy Wales against on-line culture of violence

[Ryan Lanham]

On Fri, Jan 1, 2010 at 8:26 AM, Andy Robinson <ldxar1 at gmail.com> wrote:

> But the danger is, who decides what counts as "uncivil"?
>
> These standards often vary culturally, subculturally, along lines of
> psychological difference, etc.
>

I agree with most of Andy's post, and I think these are critical issues.
They also permeate through societies, especially small and local ones where
"blackballing" and other means of censorship are regularly applied.  Nearly
all small social groups apply heavy handed norming to appearance, culture,
ways of being, etc.

There is basically one high level bifurcation.  The split is between those
who believe the individual is best protected and those who believe the
society is best protected.  There are ills associated with both approaches.
Invariably, stable systems combine some combination.  At present, most of
the world leans toward social protection (e.g. China, Japan, much of
post-modern Europe).  Some leans toward individual protection (U.S., UK,
France, Australia).   Very wealthy and very poor countries both tend toward
social protection strategies.  Normally wealthy ones tend toward the
individual.

Once a path is chosen, there is a path-dependency of moral and political
reasoning that occurs until some sea change in the basic worldview.  n that
sense, history matters.  Sea changes tend to be rare...following
catastrophic government failures, for instance.  People who find themselves
in a system where they are basically at odds with the main local tenets are
particularly at risk.  This is particularly true at local levels.  In an
individualistic system, someone who is oriented toward social protections
will find their threats coming from iconoclasts or similar disruptive
influences.  In a social system, the individual will feel constrained and
channeled toward losses of liberty and self-expression.  Chinese newly
arrived in the US worry intensely about crime.  Americans in China fear the
heavy hand of the state.

To my mind the best solution is relatively freedom of movement.  Most
nations now allow relatively liberal internal resettlement so that people
can find their own local balances.  This then pushes problems to a national
level where consensus and national norms are difficult.  Consequently, most
large systems that were predicated on some sort of cultural or military
empire find stability and consistency to be their biggest issues (India,
Canada, Brazil, Russia, the US).  What one tends to see in those places is
an emphasis on cultural hegemony.  People must adhere to a way of being that
is very normative, complex and difficult to fully explain, but that is yet
pervasive and identity defining.  I find Canadians abroad to be intensely
interested in "Canadianness" far more than even Americans.  Australians are
similar.  Their national traits are heightened by being outside their
normative structures.  This is not true of Norwegians, Austrians or
Pakistanis.  Those more social and protective cultures tend to shed
individualists who seek external affiliations...not core orthodox members.
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