In the debate over what restrictions should be placed on tech platforms in regards to permitted speech, both sides are in favor of technical solutions rather than the much-more-difficult cultural and societal ones.

What I mean is that there is much effort placed into controlling who gets to say what when and under what conditions, as if this could correct any of our problems when there is little if any effort into examining what caused such polarization, such anomie, such disconnection from society in the first place.

It’s as if the house fell down around and us and we blamed the mouse chewing on the floorboards for the problem. Sure, it was probably contributory to some small extent but it’s just a scapemouse — far larger issues caused the actual collapse. This focusing on tech platforms rather than society’s ills is just another method of distraction and of avoiding the actual issues. Ban this person, run that person off of Twitter with a mob attack, deny this person’s right to speech with an algorithm, and all our problems will somehow solve themselves.

I can tell you that is not going to work out as planned.