38
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
this post was submitted on 09 Aug 2023
38 points (71.1% liked)
Technology
35218 readers
563 users here now
This is the official technology community of Lemmy.ml for all news related to creation and use of technology, and to facilitate civil, meaningful discussion around it.
Ask in DM before posting product reviews or ads. All such posts otherwise are subject to removal.
Rules:
1: All Lemmy rules apply
2: Do not post low effort posts
3: NEVER post naziped*gore stuff
4: Always post article URLs or their archived version URLs as sources, NOT screenshots. Help the blind users.
5: personal rants of Big Tech CEOs like Elon Musk are unwelcome (does not include posts about their companies affecting wide range of people)
6: no advertisement posts unless verified as legitimate and non-exploitative/non-consumerist
7: crypto related posts, unless essential, are disallowed
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
You make some good points, but you're also overstating the power of captology to the point of sounding paranoid tbh. Pretending that someone who's aware of it, how it works and its goals is still completely powerless to resist is some misanthropic bullshit that gives some people (aware "consoomers" 🙄) far too little credit and others (the people developing captology and other disgustingly manipulative marketing strategies) far too much.
Is gaslighting and other propaganda, whether by human or technology, much more effective than most people know or are willing to admit? Definitely. Is it the Borg, though? Absolutely not.
"A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool." - Shakespeare
You Are Not Immune to Propaganda. You are not immune to ideology. You are not immune to manipulation. Being aware that propaganda exists—nor even knowing what it generally looks like and who generally uses it for what general purpose—will not stop every last bit of it from ever working on you—anymore than being aware of ideology will stop you from having one, anymore than being aware of manipulation and abuse will save you from ever being manipulated and abused.
That is not misanthropy, that is acknowledgement that we are imperfect and occasionally need to let our guards down so we're not stressed and alienated 24/7. If anything it's incredibly awe-inspiring that we, as a species, are so smart that we can develop abstract systems that outsmart us. If anything, it's misanthropic to be so disgusted by vulnerability and imperfection that one finds acknowledgement of such detestable.
Captology isn't the Borg, sure, because it's not one single group with one unified goal using it. It's everyone who vies for your attention/support and benefits from having it; specifically, it's the techniques they employ to get your engagement. Many will only use a little, consciously or not, to get you engaged because theirs is already a cause worth caring about; many more will use a lot, unreflectively—not considering the long-term impact nor moral implications—because it's just the mainstream design trends of the time.
E.g. i am trying to persuade you of something right now, using a computer to communicate my views. Am I using Computers As Persuasive Technology? If you agree with the adage "The Medium is The Message," then using lemmy necessarily has some impact on the way we communicate and behave online; by that token, the same can be said of the hardware and networks we're taking for granted.
This must be true to some degree, because i'm not talking to you as I would someone in person, I'm typing this all out; i have already augmented my behavior to fit the medium. What other ways has this tech molded my behavior without me giving it a second thought?
Just because i don't consider it evil or wrong doesn't make it not manipulation, not propaganda, not ideology, not captology.