(Note: Leaders, please supplement this Ingredient with updated information regarding how modern communication tools are playing on the worst of human instincts) 

• Discuss the following quotations from the article:  “Why the Past 10 Years of American Life Have Been so Uniquely Stupid,” by Dr. Jonathan Haidt

• “Recent academic studies suggest that social media is indeed corrosive to trust in governments, news media, and people and institutions in general.”

• “When our public square is governed by mob dynamics… we get a society that ignores context and proportionality…”

• “Being online did not make most people more aggressive or hostile; rather, it allowed a small number of aggressive people to attack a much larger set of victims.”

• “Twitter can overpower all the newspapers in the country, so truth cannot achieve widespread adherence.”

• ‘firehose of falsehood’ tactic pioneered by Russian disinformation programs keeps Americans confused, disoriented, and angry … artificial intelligence is close to enabling the limitless spread of highly believable disinformation.” 

• “We are immersed in an Information World War in which terrorists and ideological extremists sow discord and erode our shared reality”.

• “Research showed that posts that trigger emotions – especially anger at out-groups – are the most likely to be shared.”

• “Social scientists have identified at least three major forces that collectively bind together successful democracies: social capital (extensive social networks with high levels of trust), strong institutions, and shared stories. Social media has weakened all three.”

• “[Social media users] became more adept at putting on performances and managing their personal brand – activities… that do not deepen friendships in the way that a private phone conversation will.”

• “One of the engineers at Twitter who had worked on the ‘Retweet’ button later revealed that he regretted his contribution because it had made Twitter a nastier place …

• “It was just this kind of twitchy and explosive spread of anger that James Madison had tried to protect us from as he was drafting the U.S. Constitution … [He] knew that democracy had an Achilles’ heel because it depended on the collective judgment of the people, and democratic communities are subject to ‘the turbulency and weakness of unruly passions.’ … The tech companies that enhanced virality … brought us deep into Madison’s nightmare.”

(Participant Cards)

• Misinformation is being spread across the internet like wildfire. 

• The Internet, for the first time, puts a microphone in the hands of those who wish to do us harm and enables them to do just that.

• The extremism on the internet is bait for people to overreact and counter-react with extremist views of their own.

Resources:

• Jonathan Haidt, The Atlantic, “Why The Last Ten Years of American Life has been so Stupid!” 

• Article, Richard Gingras at www.gettingalong.com

• Book, Chaos Machine, Max Fischer

• “Trust Me Documentary” www.trustmedocumentary.com , re media literacy, deep fakes, risks of misinformation