Ignorance is bad. Right?
But is there such a thing as the “informed citizen” in the age of social media?
Is there a moral imperative that requires us to watch national and international events and engage with myriad videos, sounds, dialogues, and moods? How many perspectives do we need to know of an issue to be informed?
Conversations about too much stress from impressions — from countless emails, for example — are a common topic of small talk and as innocuous as conversations about the weather. For the most part, we don’t question the demands of taking in and processing information. We get many emails, the news is updated several times a day, and our feeds on social media change every minute. Knowledge can be researched instantly, and the big and small developments in the world can be followed in real-time.
The imperative of being up to date
We have become accustomed to this requirement of being up-to-date. However, behind our acceptance of this imperative is the ideal of the informed citizen established during the enlightenment. This ideal citizen is aware of their responsibility to society and keeps informed about national and international events. The implicit and arguably correct assumption here is that information is an indispensable prerequisite for making informed decisions. Democracies seem to require that eligible voters be informed to some degree-otherwise they are controllable and subject to the seduction of destructive forces. Uninformed voters do not make enlightened choices.
Access to information was long the preserve of only a few people. It was only through mass media that many people could easily follow and understand world contexts. However, one could argue that a shift has occurred again in recent years — a change towards information overload, disorientation, and an undifferentiable mixing of information, entertainment, and communication.
The question of the reprehensibility of ignorance hardly arises in the context of an average and socially adapted life with access to the Internet. There is instead a practical impossibility to escape certain information. There are too many sources for that, too many indirect and low-influence forces, too easy access to information.
When you know too little
In 2018, the New York Times featured Erik Hagerman in an article that described him as “the man who knew too little.” At the time, Hagerman had deliberately imposed a news blockade on himself in response to the election of Donald Trump. And it was radical: he did not consume any news, he used white noise in coffee shops to avoid unintentionally overhearing news, and imposed on those around him not to confront him with any information. From his point of view, it was only logical: for him, no courses of action had resulted from years of intensive news consumption. He said that it was not worth investing his time in following political developments that were taking place far away from himself and that he could not influence. He had no added value, and he felt much better without news.
Most of the time, his diagnosis applies to many of us. It often feels like we’re participating in politics — but it’s probably mostly just a feeling and not genuinely actionable and shapable. And what’s leftover from the endless stream of tweets we follow every day? Are we changing the world by following the rants and scandalization of others?
Is ignorance a privilege?
Not all people can afford a lockdown like Hagerman’s. Many people are dependent on the results of current political decisions, as was demonstrated, not least during the lockdowns in the COVID crisis. Here, policy guidance and political agreements on offers like short-time work were crucial to many people’s daily lives. And the complete blockade doesn’t seem to make sense either — it makes a living together impossible. So is Hagerman just privileged — he’s in a kind of retirement because he has enough money set aside, and he lives alone on a ranch — and selfish? At least that’s what he’s been called in the media, the “most selfish person in America”. Or is his form of self-care what makes a good human life? In practice, it is utterly inconceivable that all people in a society would put themselves in such a blockade; that would be problematic not only for democracy. But Hagerman shows in a radical and somewhat naive way that one must find a way to “put the news back in its place.”
Hagerman’s retreat is not a solution to the problems posed by information overload. But he does point out the things we need to face. For example, the question of what “informed” means these days? And whether there is still a standard canon of knowledge to which we can refer?
Lost in abundance
Taking part in the constant stream of impressions from news and entertainment does not automatically mean that one can feel like an informed, responsible person. After all, many people also get lost in the abundance of information. The conspiracy theories about COVID-19 have paradigmatically demonstrated this circumstance — many people are no longer accessible in their niches and consider themselves extraordinarily well informed. Moreover, more and more parallel structures are emerging: since there are so many sources and impressions, even people living together in the same household can live in different realities depending on what kind of input they allow (Facebook, traditional national news, foreign news, Youtube, printed magazines). There is little risk of not consuming information. Instead, the question is what kind of information one has. And whether one recognizes that information can also be deliberately obscured with even more information.
A future canon or a horizon?
In the future, we will have to accept that there will no longer be a consistent canon of basic knowledge. We can no longer expect to measure people by their understanding of a particular work — there are too many relevant works and perspectives on the world for that. Too much information and impressions must not distort our horizon on the good life and relevant things. What does it matter if you know the latest SpringerLink publications or your Facebook timeline but can’t interpret overall social contexts?
