Tiny Letter #5
Hello Friends,
Welcome to another tiny letter. I send these out periodically as an alternative to communicating via social media. Subscribe or unsubscribe as you please.
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Thai national park was tired of visitors leaving trash, so the government mailed it back to them
Earlier this week, Thailand’s natural resources and environment minister shared a new way of dealing with tourists who leave behind their trash: mailing it back to them.
On his Facebook page, Varawut Silpa-archa posted a photo of a box of trash left at a national park that appeared ready to be mailed back to its original owners along with a note that said, “You forgot something at Khao Yai National Park.”
I do a lot of thinking about the most effective ways to convince people to do things. Persuasion, basically. The United States, owing to its culture of individualism, and attitude of “I'm going to do whatever the f*ck I want, because I want to,” makes it very challenging to change, or even sanction bad behavior. We seem so tentative about it, afraid to call each other out on things that are clearly harmful to others.
I'm a big fan of creative and blunt approaches to communication like that used by this Thai national Park.
All bad news, all the time
As I was going through the set of articles I flagged for inclusion in this newsletter, I realized that nearly all of them are downers. I don't want to rename this newsletter The Downer Times, but this seems to be an ever present theme. I have to imagine it is very, very challenging to be a journalist at this time, because every day brings a new tragedy or realization that another thing is broken.
So let's intersperse some bright spots here, starting with some new music.
I discovered the track “Lejos” by El Mañana on independent radio station KEXP out of Seattle, as part of a Latin/World music mix. It is sung alternately in Spanish and English, and ends strangely abruptly, but I still love it. I hear echoes of U2, Soda Stereo, and perhaps some shoegaze. Currently the group only has three tracks, but I hope they will record a full album.
Abandoning Facebook
We have known about Facebook's horrible misdeeds for many years. New stories come out from time to time, we cringe, and say, oh that is really terrible, but we continue to use them. I'm curious about why. I can't really fault people for staying with the platform, because it has become something akin to a public utility. When choosing a cable/Internet provider, one is lucky to have two or three choices, and often services are overpriced, unreliable, or have terrible customer service. I believe I recall that Comcast has been mentioned as one of the most hated companies.
By design, not by accident, Facebook has hoovered up much of our communication. Many interest groups and support systems, from the trivial (sharing memes) to the critical (networking medical professionals) use it as their home. While there are alternatives, groups that have chosen Facebook as their primary platform for communication are dealing with a huge amount of inertia. Moving 1,000, 5,000, or 50,000 people off to a private forum is no small task. It's also not free, although I think many people have confused free with the monetization of their attention.
If you are on the fence about jettisoning this platform, however, hopefully this latest article will help inform your decision.
Facebook ignored or was slow to act on evidence that fake accounts on its platform have been undermining elections and political affairs around the world, according to an explosive memo sent by a recently fired Facebook employee and obtained by BuzzFeed News.
The 6,600-word memo, written by former Facebook data scientist Sophie Zhang, is filled with concrete examples of heads of government and political parties in Azerbaijan and Honduras using fake accounts or misrepresenting themselves to sway public opinion. In countries including India, Ukraine, Spain, Brazil, Bolivia, and Ecuador, she found evidence of coordinated campaigns of varying sizes to boost or hinder political candidates or outcomes, though she did not always conclude who was behind them.
Whistleblower Says Facebook Ignored Global Political Manipulation
A 6,600-word internal memo from a fired Facebook data scientist details how the social network knew about specific examples of global political manipulation — and failed to act.
Yes, Buzzfeed is known for endless memes and trivia, but apparently they also do hard news.
FILM RECOMMENDATION
Sorry to bother you
This film is a comedy touching on race relations, class warfare, capitalism, meme culture, and it's damn funny. The film stars Lakeith Stanfield as a newly-hired telemarketer struggling to make a living, he is befriended by a veteran of the field, and told to “use his white voice” to better persuade the hapless customers on the other end of the phone. He is very successful at this, and catches the attention of higher ups on the corporate ladder, who start to offer him things that conflict with his values.
I especially appreciate that doesn't try to wrap up everything nicely with a happy ending, and it leaves open questions. It's also not especially predictable. Available on one or more streaming services.
Changing minds of entrenched Tr*mp supporters
(That's right, his name is like a swear word, a bad omen.)
Changing voters’ minds is famously difficult. Recent national campaigns have spent more effort on increasing turnout—getting sympathetic voters to go to the polls—than on winning over new supporters. Political scientists and pollsters have found that as the country grows more negatively polarized, fewer true swing voters are up for grabs.
But the Wisconsin effort, notable for both its approach and its scale, seems to have found some success. From February to May, the advocacy group Opportunity Wisconsin, with help from a progressive advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C., called the Hub Project, managed to do remarkable damage to Trump’s standing with a group of persuadable voters.
The quote speaks for itself. If you have ever argued fruitlessly with a friend or relative entrenched in their beliefs/opinions, you know well how very difficult it is to persuade someone of anything, especially when they have adopted it as part of their identity (perhaps without even knowing).
New climate maps show how screwed we really are
Speaking of persuasion, I didn't require any when it comes to climate change, but these new maps are incredibly disturbing. While scientists have been warning about this for decades, there is something about these maps that hits hard. Essentially, by mid-century, large swaths of this country will be uninhabitable (or at least you won't be able to go outside during certain hours of the day), hard to farm, and prone to wild swings in weather conditions. I don't recommend reviewing these maps while eating lunch.
Of course, showing this to that same friend or relative who is ready to vote for the sociopath for a second time, probably won't be terribly effective.
BOOK RECOMMENDATION
Less, a novel
You are a failed novelist about to turn fifty. A wedding invitation arrives in the mail: your boyfriend of the past nine years now engaged to someone else. You can’t say yes--it would all be too awkward--and you can’t say no--it would look like defeat. On your desk are a series of half-baked literary invitations you’ve received from around the world.
QUESTION: How do you arrange to skip town?
ANSWER: You accept them all.
If you are Arthur Less.
Our protagonist regularly underestimates his abilities, his self-worth, and seems very unsure of how he comes off to others. But people love and celebrate him, as he stumbles through different cities around the world, trying to figure himself out. This book is especially appealing in an era when travel is almost impossible.
Closing quote
So the display of exuberance is critical. “For an adult, the world is constantly trying to clamp down on itself,” he says. “Routine, responsibility, decay of institutions, corruption: this is all the world closing in. Music, when it’s really great, pries that shit back open and lets people back in, it lets light in, and air in, and energy in, and sends people home with that and sends me back to the hotel with it. People carry that with them sometimes for a very long period of time.”
- Bruce Springsteen
Have a favorite book, movie, album, or quote I should share? Send it along.