Shrinking Circles and Broadening Hearts and Minds
Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American Community warned us about how disconnected from one another we had become. After-work bowling leagues and many other forms of social interaction that brought people from various backgrounds together were losing popularity, Robert Putnam argued 20 years ago-and this bode poorly for the fabric of society.
Now COVID-19 forces us literally bowl alone. When a Boston casino recently reopened, social games such as roulette were gone and Plexiglass enveloped the slot machine players. Reopened classrooms and workplaces will actively discourage in-person conversation too: desks will face away from each other and technology will be omnipresent.
As we consciously shrink our circles to avoid the physical or psychological harm in the outside world, we must also be conscious of how we organize our new social environments. As we discuss the most prominent issues that face our communities today, we must be sure to save room for dissenting opinion. Otherwise, we risk stifling the very conversations needed to begin healing and reconstructing our broken communities.
When we work at home or in spaces that deter contact, we no longer encounter people whose experiences are very different from ours. Instead we interact primarily with our closest colleagues in digital workspaces and our closest friends in social networks and neighborhoods. Sharing common gripes about the “new normal” and displaying our pets and children on screen can reinforce existing social ties. But what does it mean when we connect more deeply with a narrower set of individuals? The potential negative effects of our shrinking physical circles are being replicated in our digital lives as well.
As racial, ideological, and class divides continue to deepen, we find ourselves retreating even more as we limit interaction with others in our physical environments. Our new work environments at home provide us shelter, protection, and a digital window into global convulsions. In our cocoons, we echo each other. Through the rise of movements such as Black Lives Matter and Blue Lives Matter, conversations seem to fortify social bonds, but only with the already like-minded. And we reinforce mental algorithms that viscerally force us away from anyone who disagrees with us, including neighbors, friends, and family. This is even more urgent when considering we are already separated from the rest of the world as a result of COVID-19.
Unfortunately, this is not new. In the 2004 book, The Big Sort, journalist Bill Bishop warned of worsening segregation in American communities. Since 1974, Bishop argued, city and neighborhood communities had grown ever more homogeneous. However, Bishop had not yet witnessed arguably the most dangerous of social trends. By 2004, social media was only in its infancy, with sites like Friendster and MySpace having just recently emerged. Fast forward a decade and our social circles had become astonishingly disparate. A 2014 survey by the Public Religion Research Institute asked respondents to name seven people they discussed important issues with. The study revealed that 83% of Black Americans’ friends were Black; for Whites it was 91%. Growing technological connectedness has not solved the problem of our increasingly segregated and lonely lives.
Transformative inventions, designed to make our lives easier, keep us ever more effectively away from others. Uber removed interactions with fellow commuters, or at least the acknowledgment of their existence. Instacart food delivery eliminated shopping and chatting with cashiers. Airbnb replaced crowded hotel lobbies. Out of convenience emerged isolation.
With convenience came exigence: getting what we want when and how we want it, be it on UberEats, Tinder, or Amazon. In addition to food, sex, and objects that help us cover up emotional pain, we seek comfort and validation more than difference in our social interactions. To that end, we curate our social environments to validate the idea that we are in fact right regarding the most important social issues of today. Social media is playing a larger role in this trend than ever before, and some think large media companies should be doing more to intervene.
As we think about our shrinking circles and the consequences of their homogeneity, we should consider what social psychology tells us about group polarization -that individuals with the same values who convene to discuss their ideas often receive validation that only makes them more deeply entrenched in their existing beliefs. This is not to say that we should not discuss our ideas with like-minded, trusted people within our networks. However, those we choose to engage in conversation, and how we approach those conversations, may determine how our collective opinions around social issues will evolve over time.
What can we do to ensure that working from home, social isolation, and COVID-19 do not further accelerate the collapse of the American community by keeping individuals from different backgrounds physically and psychologically apart?
1. Reflect on our contribution. How do we react to what we fear? How can we actively counter our protection mechanisms, such as finding solace among those most like us? How are we masking ourselves from consenting opinion as we seek comfort in our time of crisis? Our advice is to turn curiosity into opportunity for connection. Ask questions, open up to others, and listen. Most of us carry some firm understanding of what we think is right. It can be liberating to accept that hearts and minds will not change in one interaction and that long-term bonds with those from different backgrounds build bridges across communities. Seek opportunities to build bonds with people outside of our ideological preferences; this lays a foundation for us to engage in tough conversations once we have built trust. Can you volunteer or pursue hobbies that connect you to others, perhaps online tutoring or joining voices in an online choir?
2. Lower your virtual noise. Unfocused frustration can generate noise that stifles important conversations. We need to both create spaces where people can let out their frustration as well as spaces where that commentary is directed towards productive solutions. Despite the perils of social media, it is a nearly intractable part of our lives today. Which platforms can best offer what we need? Facebook might be a great place to lower the noise and communicate only with those we already know and love; Twitter and LinkedIn might serve more as platforms for conversations with those who hold different ideas. Finding the right community when we need it may be the key to maintaining mental clarity and peace during this time of crisis.
3. Create heterogeneous spaces online where we can “play.” Perhaps we should re-write our social scripts altogether and create new ways to connect. Universities might curate online campus communities with the goal of connecting students who might have never met, seeking similarities beyond our apparent differences. How can managers and companies contribute similarly? Perhaps randomly pair employees working from home into buddy systems and when we get back to the office, redesign institutional spaces for different types of connections.
4. Curate your digital environment by inviting different perspectives and people. Consider the cost of being part of “cancel” culture. The “if you are not with me you are against me” mode of social engagement silences loyal skeptics who challenge us to refine our ideas. Former President Obama said it best, “ that’s not activism.” However, if we expect to build sustainable support networks using social media in the era of increased isolation, we have real adjustments to make. Try to find a peaceful, supportive space online for genuine connection while preserving some space in your digital life for dissenting opinions. This might mean deleting or unfollowing that old “friend” who takes a contrarian stance to everything you say from your friends’ group on Facebook but continuing to follow them or other reasonable skeptics of your way of thinking on Twitter or LinkedIn. In these spaces you might invite the kind of constructive feedback that grows your understanding of opposing views and perhaps gain the support and respect of your peers.
We can either come out of social distancing better-more connected with different viewpoints- or worse, meaning more polarized than ever before. It’s tough to know exactly where the lines will be drawn if we don’t take action against the trends in our communities, but the past has shown us that they will likely follow differences in age, class, race, gender, sexual identity, and ideology more broadly. As we work to coexist, we need to face some key questions: What can we do to weave these lines into a tapestry? What is our role in combating social and emotional climate change? And if we wish to thoughtfully connect with others during this period of isolation, whom should we invite to those conversations?
Thank you for reading and your interest! Please send us ideas and feedback,
Mel Martin and Carin-Isabel Knoop
Originally published at https://www.linkedin.com.
