Exercises for Elections
Larry Mills-Gahl
Here in the US we are well into another election season. It almost sounds
silly to say 'election season' because it is difficult to tell when politicians
are not campaigning. A Senator from California
needs to raise $10,000 per day (every day including weekends) for the entire
six year term ["Money Politics and the First Amendment"
Cato Institute].
Before you dismiss this as just another rant against money in
politics, please bear with me for another moment or two.
My focus is on the type and depth of communication in the context of political
campaigns. This is not a polemic about the ridiculous and insulting rhetoric
that candidates offer to us and the assertions that are flimsy at best
and often completely unsupported.
I am writing about our
responsibility for the current state of public disourse and our role in
evolving the depth of discussion beyond the sound bite.
If that doesn't grab you, then you can think of this as an essay on
weight-lifting.
A professional campaign is
designed to reduce every issue to blue or red (which
I suppose is the partisan equivalent of black and white) because they only have
fifteen or thrity seconds at a time to talk to voters. The science of playing
to our attention span is well developed in advertising and media in general.
We are given only the amount that we can digest in thirty seconds. The message
is rarely more complex than can be expressed in one or two sentences. Depth
of understanding is rarely, if ever, considered in deciding how to deliver
the message.
The science of
giving us a smaller and more easily digested, highly produced nugget is
what drives advertising and campaigning and news programs and sitcoms to the point
where it is sometimes difficult to tell where the advertising ends and news begins.
Our shorttening attention span is a studied and well documented
fact.*
The problem is that we treat short attention span by giving people less to focus on.
That is like strengthening
muscles by lifting less weight or lifting the same weight fewer times. (Ok, perhaps this isn't
an article on weight-lifting but it is a pretty good analogy.)
We are told to grab the audience, give them audio, video, color, motion ...
all of this in support of shorter and shallower messages.
This is institutionalized on television by the 30 second news story and in business
by the PowerPoint presentation (
The Cognitive Style of PowerPoint by Edward Tufte)
Of course, I wouldn't be writing this if I didn't have a way to solve this problem and make
us all better looking and rich.
The magic solution** to the problem short attention span and
crappy public debate and candidates that we know nothing about
is to use hyperlinks.
You probably think I believe that technology and the Internet can
solve all of our problems because I work at an Internet company. I believe any tool
can be used well or poorly and the Internet is no exception. I am also aware that
non-linear writing and reading (following hyperlinks within a story) contributes
to shortenning attention spans. In the situation I'm describing though, I think that
embedded links are very helpful. Links can provide further explanation of a word
or concept that you don't understand. More importantly, links can provide backup for
your position and meaningful references to source material. Footnotes provide that in
books, but it takes a great deal of effort to follow the reference in a footnote. Links
are easier like adding one pound to the weight being lifted instead of adding seventy.
that you don't understand
How does that relate to the election at hand?
I want you to require depth from their candidates. I'm not suggesting
that we all sit down and watch documentaries with the excitement of a C-SPAN
roll call, but I do want you
to be able to dig into a candidates policy and history in areas that interest
you.
It is easy for campaigns to provide depth
and it is easy for us to follow it.
Do not accept the assertions of any politician when they will
not provide their research and supporting material. (ok, ok, don't get
ridiculous on me... I'm not asking for state secrets, just honest
numbers on the economy, jobs, education, ...)
I used to say "Follow the money." (and I still say that), but that's like adding eighty pounds
to your bench-press.
By adding only a few pounds (following supporting links) you can get a better
idea about the truth behind a candidates assertions.
What do you do if there are no links and no background or support
for the candidates assertions? RUN FOR YOUR LIFE!!!!
Seriously. If a candidate (or politician or pundit or prognosticator)
will not provide an explanation of why they
are doing what they are doing, get rid of them quick.
That is their job.
They represent us. They get their power from us. Make sure they are using
it responsibly.
Ok, so it is a bit idealistic to think that by following links will reform politics
and remind politicians where their power comes from, but following links (and
requiring depth in your candidates positions) adds transparency to the process
and that is good.
As a reward for making it all the way through this rant, I want to give you something. Hmmm...
what could I give you... LINKS (ok, you saw that coming).
Here are some useful links in the time between unsupported assertions from candidates
and the time they start to treat us with the respect we deserve.
* You see how easy it is to assert something as "well studied and documented fact" without any
support whatsoever?. On television, you'd have to wander off into a half hour of mind-numbing
statistics and risk losing the point of the article. That is also a danger on the web, but
at least on the web, you can come back to the links later or open them in another window
to view the supporting material as it suits you best.
The other danger is that I would just reference myself as an authority to give you the
illusion of depth, but I'd never do that to you... right? Here is some of the well documented
and studied material about attention span
** There is no such thing as a magic bullet. There is no magic solution. Anybody that tells you
there is, is lying. You may want to read on, however, to see if there is anything useful
or reasonable in the proposal so that you don't miss a good idea just because someone was
overzealous in selling it.
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