Having free-flow information is good. Having free-flow misinformation is bad. Disinformation on the other hand has useful purposes. Where we went wrong was when we as a society became contrarians for the sake of being contrarians. If you were born from 1996 to 2002 you know this from the early days of Twitter.
Let’s take the anti-vax movement. As it’s the easiest to explain. At one point many people were anti-vax not because of their fears, but more so due to the fact that it’s an “us vs them” mentality. So any information people were getting that was out of the norm they believed. Why was this? It came down to the fact that the conspiracy net took off way before corporations like google and Twitter censored them. Basically, people were getting addicted to information without understanding what they were consuming. This has deteriorated society on levels unfathomable.
Contrarianism is what destroyed our chances of having a good start to the information age.
We as a society must know when to combat contrarianism. Just because someone in power is saying something does not mean it’s a lie. But since people watch too much TV it makes sense for them to have that mindset.
Contrarianism has become a vile movement. A movement that must be combated. Having contrarian viewpoints does not mean you are right. In the same way, having establishment viewpoints does mean you are always wrong.
On things that matter you must combat contrarianism. Why would you want to disrupt something that is truthful just for people to be “contrarian” and believe a lie?
This article was short on purpose. Contrarianism is vile and you cannot regulate it. What you can do is teach the younger audience on how to be skeptical without being a full-blown denier.