> In the past, at least in my 3rd world country, people were much more interesting in politics, health, education, etc.
I've been thinking about this too, but I can't help but wonder if the higher interest in "politics, health, education, etc." wasn't just mindless distraction in disguise. I grew up in a developing nation where it appeared that people were more engaged with these sorts of things, but it every discussion could be appended with '...but hey, that's the way it is'.
There are periods in time where a society is more engaged as a whole, and there are subsections of society that are, among other things politically engaged. Of course. But I truly wonder how different all that 'reading the papers and discussing politics' actually is from 'looking at funny political memes and reading short blog entries on what's wrong with the world'.
> Just see how nobody besides IT people and the media cares about the NSA scandal.
That is a good point. But have we historically really done much better in this regard (other than some 'flare-ups' like the sixties)?
It's my opinion (not completely fundamented) that people engage more on aspects that they can change in some way. If they have no hope of changing anything in politics, for example, it feels no better than watching sports, so people flock to the later.
There were quite a lot of examples (all over the world) lately of people protesting about politics that couldn't even decide what they wanted.
I've been thinking about this too, but I can't help but wonder if the higher interest in "politics, health, education, etc." wasn't just mindless distraction in disguise. I grew up in a developing nation where it appeared that people were more engaged with these sorts of things, but it every discussion could be appended with '...but hey, that's the way it is'.
There are periods in time where a society is more engaged as a whole, and there are subsections of society that are, among other things politically engaged. Of course. But I truly wonder how different all that 'reading the papers and discussing politics' actually is from 'looking at funny political memes and reading short blog entries on what's wrong with the world'.
> Just see how nobody besides IT people and the media cares about the NSA scandal.
That is a good point. But have we historically really done much better in this regard (other than some 'flare-ups' like the sixties)?