Echo Chamber Persuasive Essay

Across the United States, we have witnessed numerous acts of political acts of violence occur in our country within the past year. For example, Charlottesville, where protesters and their opposition clash within the confines of the city streets It is an extremely violent time, but in the age of the Internet, where everyone can converse freely, why is it that people of differing political ideologies have grown to detest each other? Ironically, people have instead established groups where they only speak to people of similar ideologies. This is essentially an echo chamber, and it has become harmful towards our current political climate and has contributed towards the political divide we see today. It has made people more intolerant of people

An echo chamber is a place where your sounds are constantly reflected back or “echoed” to you. In context, this means that your political ideas are reflected back from your friends or supporters. The best example of an echo chamber is in the article “Red, Blue, and Divided” by the New York Times which follows the Facebook feeds of two women from opposing political parties, Marjorie Hahn, a Republican, and Meredith Dodson, a Democrat. Hahn’s feed consists of her friends posting images such as a “supposed Democrat defecating on a Trump sign” or comments like “Run these vile Liberal dirtbags down!!!”. Meanwhile, Dodson has posts full of people sharing their feelings towards living under a Trump administration, as one person types, “As a woman and a Latina I’m feeling lost and afraid.” and another posting, “This morning, I started mentally planning how I would react if someone were to refer to me as the N word. It has already happened to 3 of my friends.” In both of their feeds, their friends are aligned with the same political leaning as they are, without people of the other side posting. However, to truly understand how toxic the concept of an echo chamber has on political discourse, we must look