Jesse Hirsh engages in a captivating dialogue with Susan Macaulay, exploring the complex relationship between social media and local community engagement. The conversation kicks off with a discussion on the role of social media in modern politics, particularly in light of recent political shifts and the influence of figures like Mark Carney. Susan shares her personal experiences with platforms like Facebook, reflecting on the evolution of these sites from tools for connection to sources of frustration, particularly as algorithms increasingly dictate what content is visible. The duo delves deep into the implications of this shift, arguing that while social media can foster community ties, it can also breed division and misinformation, particularly during tumultuous political periods. They highlight how local groups on Facebook have become new arenas for political discourse, albeit often marked by incivility and misunderstanding.
As the conversation unfolds, Susan presents her poetic reflections on the nature of online interactions, emphasizing the need for civility and constructive discourse. The discussion shifts towards the future of social media and its potential to either enhance or hinder community connections. Jesse and Susan ponder the paradox of social media as both a facilitator of community engagement and a source of cognitive overload, questioning what it means to be a part of a digital community in an era marked by information saturation. Ultimately, the episode serves as a thought-provoking examination of the interplay between technology, democracy, and personal agency in shaping the future of community interaction.
Takeaways:
Links referenced in this episode:
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Hi, I'm Jesse Hirsch, and welcome to Metaviews, recorded live in front of an automated audience.
Jesse Hirsch 00:00:11
And today I think we're in for a treat, partly because of our topic, quitting social media, but also our guest, who I can firmly say is the first neighbor, metaphorically, that I've been able to have on the show.
Jesse Hirsch 00:00:27
Susan, I say neighbor only because the guest I just recorded with shortly before you was in Madrid.
Jesse Hirsch 00:00:35
So geographically speaking, even though you're not technically my neighbor, we live in the same town.
Jesse Hirsch 00:00:43
So by Internet means, we are technically neighbors.
Jesse Hirsch 00:00:47
And as you may know, I like to start every episode of Metaviews by talking about the news, partly because Metaviews publishes a daily newsletter on the future of authority.
Jesse Hirsch 00:01:00
And today we were talking about the presidential pardons that Trump just issued and kind of the significance of that, looking at authority and kind of wondering about the puzzle of why he would pardon such kind of heinous threats to the Democratic apparatus.
Jesse Hirsch 00:01:19
But our real purpose of the news segment, Susan, is to give our guests a chance to share some news.
Jesse Hirsch 00:01:26
This could be personal news, this could be local news, this could be world news.
Jesse Hirsch 00:01:31
The goal on an intuitive level is to sort of ask, what have you been thinking about?
Jesse Hirsch 00:01:36
What are you looking at?
Jesse Hirsch 00:01:37
What's had your attention in the sense of, what do you think our audience should be paying attention to in the context of the news and current affairs?
Susan 00:01:48
Well, I've been preoccupied this week with the declaration by Mark Carney to run for the leadership of the.
Susan 00:02:00
Of the Liberal Party.
Susan 00:02:02
And I think that anyone's a better option than the other option.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:10
Yes, Yes.
Susan 00:02:13
I don't want to name any names, but I think you know who I'm talking about.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:17
We could.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:17
I call him PP Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:19
Because, yeah, it's both insulting, but you're not reinforcing his kind of name brand.
Susan 00:02:26
Yeah.
Susan 00:02:26
The guy that speaks in slogans.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:30
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:31
I don't mind saying, just comes across as mean.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:34
Right.
Susan 00:02:35
Like, in fact, I wrote that.
Susan 00:02:37
I just wrote that on my Facebook page.
Susan 00:02:40
Somebody said something to me, it's going to be our next PM And I said, yeah, he's hateful.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:45
Yes, he's hateful.
Susan 00:02:47
He's manipulative and he's mean.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:50
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:51
And I've heard.
Jesse Hirsch 00:02:53
So we had Rick Salutin on the show just a couple of days ago, and he kind of was saying the same thing as you.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:00
He felt that federal politics is exciting again, that it feels like we're coming to a point where nothing's certain and we might even have policy debates.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:10
But at the same Time.
Susan 00:03:12
God forbid.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:13
Exactly.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:14
Let's not get our hopes up, though.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:17
I suspect we could be disappointed.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:20
But he wanted to almost compare PP with Brian Moroney.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:24
And where I feel that falls a little short is at least Brian Mulroney.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:29
You could sort of say that he had the best interests of the country.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:32
You might have disagreed with his policies, but he kind of liked people versus pp.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:37
Just comes across as mean and hateful.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:40
Go ahead.
Susan 00:03:40
Yeah, Mulroney had gravitas.
Jesse Hirsch 00:03:43
Yeah, yeah.
Susan 00:03:45
No, he had presence.
Susan 00:03:47
He had that deep voice, you know, that voice.
Susan 00:03:51
And.
Susan 00:03:52
Yeah, no, he, I was just looking at somebody at.
Susan 00:03:58
Who was it?
Susan 00:03:59
Somebody put up a, a comparison of disapproval ratings because you know how important that is.
Susan 00:04:12
And you know, Trudeau's was, I think his approval was something like, I don't know, 20, 20 something percent.
Susan 00:04:22
And then they was compared to Harper, which at the end of his thing was around, I don't know, whatever it was.
Susan 00:04:32
But Mulroney's was 12.
Susan 00:04:35
Yeah, 12% approval.
Susan 00:04:41
And I mean, you can't get much worse than that.
Susan 00:04:44
That's head.
Susan 00:04:45
That's headed towards zero now.
Jesse Hirsch 00:04:46
And not to get too sidetracked in history, but people put a lot of blame or guilt on Kim Campbell for the electoral result, but Mulroney, it was his legacy that the election was kind of on.
Jesse Hirsch 00:05:01
She unfortunately didn't get enough chance to govern and develop her own legacy.
Jesse Hirsch 00:05:06
So she was kind of running under the kind of Mulroney shadow, and she gets the blame.
Jesse Hirsch 00:05:12
And people like Alan Gregg get the blame for that electoral devastation.
Jesse Hirsch 00:05:16
When, to your point, I think it was a vote against Mulroney.
Jesse Hirsch 00:05:20
People were like, we want something new.
Jesse Hirsch 00:05:21
We want something fresh.
Susan 00:05:23
Yeah.
Susan 00:05:24
Which is, you know, interesting because we kind of find ourselves in a very similar situation, isn't it?
Susan 00:05:30
He left without.
Susan 00:05:32
There wasn't much time for getting to know the candidate.
Susan 00:05:37
There wasn't enough time for her to really get her hands into the, you know, her fingers into the dirt and.
Susan 00:05:46
But we're kind of, kind of in the same place.
Jesse Hirsch 00:05:49
Yeah.
Susan 00:05:50
Trudeau, in my view, should have resigned months ago, and now we've got this race on our hands.
Susan 00:06:00
I'm, like I said, I'm, I'm pro Carney.
Susan 00:06:03
I think he's the best one for the job.
Susan 00:06:05
I don't think anyone else, any of the other candidates can beat.
Susan 00:06:09
PP don't have a chance.
Susan 00:06:11
I mean, maybe we can get a minority.
Susan 00:06:16
We can get him in a minority position.
Susan 00:06:20
That's, that would be the target.
Susan 00:06:22
I, I would think from, from my standpoint, I mean, if, if we, if the Liberals won again.
Susan 00:06:27
And I'm, I'm not even a Liberal.
Susan 00:06:29
No, I'm saying.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:30
Yeah, yeah, you're just anti pp.
Susan 00:06:34
Exactly.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:36
Yeah, no kidding.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:37
And, and to your point, had Trudeau resigned months, if not a year earlier, Christa Freeland might have had a chance to differentiate herself.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:46
And she does not now.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:47
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:48
She like Kim Campbell, she would run under Trudeau's shadow and it would give her no chance.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:55
Although paradoxically, because I also really like that Mark Carney is in the race.
Jesse Hirsch 00:06:59
I think he completely changes the discourse and the debate.
Jesse Hirsch 00:07:04
But where pp, I think is very vulnerable is the foreign interference part.
Jesse Hirsch 00:07:09
This is this scandal, right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:07:11
With India and idea that the PP hasn't got national security clearance.
Susan 00:07:16
Yeah, I'm not getting that.
Susan 00:07:17
Can you explain that to me?
Jesse Hirsch 00:07:19
It's, it's, it's, it's, it, it doesn't have a lot of substance, but the argument is that the, the Conservative Party, both from India and China, has benefited from external interference, specifically targeting the diasporas in Canada and trying to skew them towards conservatives.
Jesse Hirsch 00:07:40
And again, I think they're trying to embellish like Canada is a country of diasporas and as a result we are naturally gonna have inter border disputes, dialogues, discourse.
Susan 00:07:55
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:07:56
But here's the caveat, and I'm bringing this more as a joke than an actual implication.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:03
I think Mark Carney is the benefit of foreign interference in the form of Jon Stewart.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:08
Cuz Jon Stewart basically announced Mark Carney's campaign.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:12
There's no one better.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:13
You could have had to announce it and promote it.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:17
And I mean the Tories aren't smart enough to make this argument.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:20
But you could say that it's a little bit of foreign interference the way that Trump is trying to interfere in our domestic politics.
Susan 00:08:29
I thought that was a real coup.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:32
It was brilliant.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:33
And I think it was Jon Stewart as much as it was the Carney campaign.
Jesse Hirsch 00:08:37
I think Stewart is a genuine fan and he just decided, I would love to have Mark Carney on the global stage.
Susan 00:08:45
Yeah, he's brilliant.
Susan 00:08:46
He's brilliant that Jon Stewart.
Susan 00:08:48
He is so well read and well informed and clever and incisive.
Susan 00:08:55
He's witty, he's a great actor.
Susan 00:08:58
His comedic timing is charts.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:02
I think as a sign of the tragedy of our society is that he would never consider political office versus he would win.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:12
He would win.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:13
He would be a senator, no problem.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:15
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:15
And as a senator, wow.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:17
The impact that he would have on the spectacle and showbiz side of politics.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:21
Right now we're still on the news So I have to segue to our second segment just so that we keep the show going.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:29
But our second segment called WTF or what's the Future?
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:35
Kind of reinforces that we are a future centric podcast.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:39
We really try to keep our eyes on the horizon.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:42
And so this is where we ask our guest, when you look to the future, it could be short term future, could be long term future.
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:51
What do you see?
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:53
What is it that you think our audience needs to be looking at or paying attention to?
Jesse Hirsch 00:09:58
When again, looking at the event horizon?
Susan 00:10:01
You know, it's funny because had you asked me that question two weeks ago, I probably would have had a completely different answer.
Susan 00:10:09
But I've been thinking, you do we talked or mentioned or you mentioned getting off social media.
Susan 00:10:16
I've been on, I've been on Facebook since pretty much day one.
Susan 00:10:23
And one of my pages, AmazingWomenRock.com I had a website, I had the page, right?
Susan 00:10:31
And that page was one of the first 10,000 business pages on Facebook.
Susan 00:10:39
I don't know how many pages there are now, but it's got to be millions.
Susan 00:10:46
And so I've, I've been there from the start.
Susan 00:10:49
And I was on Twitter, I was, you know, Reddit wasn't there, Instagram wasn't there.
Susan 00:10:57
What are some of the other ones?
Susan 00:10:59
Doesn't matter.
Susan 00:10:59
None of them were there.
Susan 00:11:00
It was Facebook and later Twitter.
Jesse Hirsch 00:11:03
I was going to say, do you remember when Facebook, the status always had an is, so it'd be Susan Is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:11:10
And then you'd have to craft your statement based on the word is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:11:15
And then they removed the is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:11:17
But I looked back at one time at my archive and I kept wondering, wait, well, there's a word missing here.
Jesse Hirsch 00:11:22
And it's because the original Facebook status was like, Jesse is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:11:26
And then you'd write whatever the is was too.
Susan 00:11:29
Funny.
Susan 00:11:31
Anyway, I've gone through that whole thing, you know, and I've gone through frustrations with Facebook running it, running a page, like from the very start.
Susan 00:11:40
And there's less and less users have less and less control.
Susan 00:11:47
And Facebook has obviously more and more and it's becoming a bit ott, you know, it's, you can't.
Susan 00:11:59
So now on my page, all of a sudden, my own posts, I have a new page now.
Susan 00:12:06
You know, I've got, I've had maybe six altogether.
Susan 00:12:10
And they're removing my posts from my own page, telling me it's spam.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:18
I mean, that's gotta be a false positive.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:21
That's gotta be the algorithm just being stupid, right?
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:26
I don't know with Facebook, again, the extent to which they've automated stupidity on multiple levels.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:34
One can never underestimate.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:36
Because I've walked away.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:39
I still have my Facebook, but I've often walked away from it for years.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:43
For the exact reason that you're describing.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:46
Because it feels like a moving target.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:48
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:12:48
Like the rules are constantly changing.
Susan 00:12:51
Exactly.
Susan 00:12:52
So the other day I went to Messenger, Somebody sent me a photo, and I saw it on my phone first.
Susan 00:13:00
And then I.
Susan 00:13:01
Because I don't like to work on my phone.
Susan 00:13:03
It's too small.
Susan 00:13:04
And so I use my laptop more.
Susan 00:13:07
And I went to my laptop to look at the photo, but I couldn't see it anymore because it was a one view only.
Susan 00:13:18
One view only.
Susan 00:13:19
And it said right there on the thing, you know, you can only look at this photo.
Susan 00:13:23
And so now you have the option.
Susan 00:13:24
If you're sending a photo to somebody, you have the option of having them view it only once.
Susan 00:13:32
And.
Susan 00:13:33
And then it's deleted.
Susan 00:13:34
You know, it's over.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:35
It's not deleted, though.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:37
That's the paradox.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:37
That goes to your point.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:39
Yeah, that goes to your point of how the user has less control.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:42
They give you the illusion that the other user only gets to see it once, but Facebook has it forever.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:52
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:53
And that is a bit of a.
Susan 00:13:54
Paradox in some virtual vault somewhere.
Jesse Hirsch 00:13:59
But to bring us back to where we started, this ostensibly is about the future.
Jesse Hirsch 00:14:03
So are you entertaining a future without Facebook?
Jesse Hirsch 00:14:06
Has the frustration reached that point?
Susan 00:14:09
It kind of is.
Susan 00:14:12
I'm thinking, so I'm a writer, so, you know, I want to keep writing.
Susan 00:14:18
And unlike some people, I'm like, unlike some artists, it's important for me for my work to be seen.
Susan 00:14:25
You know, it's important for my words to be read.
Susan 00:14:28
And I'm considering now going to substack as an option.
Susan 00:14:35
But I haven't had much experience with substack.
Susan 00:14:39
I see a lot of people using it.
Susan 00:14:41
I have my own blog, so it's how to.
Susan 00:14:45
Like I used.
Susan 00:14:46
Used to use.
Susan 00:14:47
And I still do use Facebook to drive people to my blog and whether substack will enable me to do that or not.
Susan 00:14:57
And.
Susan 00:14:58
And then you have to start all over again and building your audience.
Susan 00:15:02
And so I don't know.
Susan 00:15:05
Are you on substack?
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:06
I mean, give me a pause before we get to the.
Susan 00:15:11
That's my website.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:12
That's the website.
Susan 00:15:13
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:14
And I will answer your substack question, but let me just briefly bring up your website, because I was absolutely.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:23
I don't want to say overwhelmed, but that is correct.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:26
I was blown away.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:27
I was impressed when I looked at the site map and just how many amazing women you've got on the site.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:35
It was really impressive.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:37
So this is the.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:38
Hey, everybody, go check out amazingwomenrock.com.
Jesse Hirsch 00:15:43
susan, over the years, has really built a phenomenal resource that is well worth going down the rabbit hole and checking out some of the stuff that's been put up there.
Susan 00:15:56
Yeah, but that site has over 2,000 pages, all of it written by me.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:05
Yeah, that is, again, impressive, especially to your point where I have both been curious and I would say, careless over the last couple of decades on the Internet, I often just start something new.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:21
So I'm always.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:22
There's all these starts exactly right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:25
There is a little bit of that.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:26
I'm definitely an ADHD autistic person, but I wish that some of the projects I'd started in the 90s I kept going until now because it is an accomplishment to have all of that knowledge organized in such a manner.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:42
And that's where Substack, I think, is an interesting.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:45
Not digression, but tangent for us to take.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:50
Because like Facebook, it is a bit of a puzzle.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:52
On the one hand, what it offers is discovery.
Jesse Hirsch 00:16:57
So it does allow you to connect to new readers.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:00
It does allow you to promote your writing and get your writing out to a new audience.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:06
And that, to me, is very appealing.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:09
I first used substack kind of right before and in the early parts of the pandemic, I did a daily substack for I think, just less.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:18
Just shy of two years, perhaps.
Susan 00:17:20
Really?
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:21
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:22
And I, to my earlier point about the squirrels, I deleted it all.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:26
I just wiped it out.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:28
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:28
And it was because I wrote a lot about the pandemic.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:31
I wrote about COVID I was translating the kind of medical knowledge.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:36
And then at a certain point, I just decided that we had lost that shout out to Biden giving a pardon to Dr.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:44
Fauci, because I suspect had he not given that pardon to Dr.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:48
Fauci, his life would be kind of difficult right now.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:53
I just felt.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:54
I kind of sensed what's happening now.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:56
And I decided I didn't want to be on the wrong side of history.
Jesse Hirsch 00:17:58
There were better people than me who were cataloging that information.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:02
And I was content to, as someone who has 25 years, 30 years of Internet history, to brush that aside.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:10
And it was at the time when the Nazis were starting to become part of Substack, and Substack was going through this really interesting governance issue that everyone was about two years ago, which is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:22
Should we have Nazis on our platform.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:24
And Substack said, yes.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:26
And that's where I said, okay, well, fuck you, Substack.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:29
I'm gone.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:31
And I went to a platform called Beehive and it's Beehive with two I's.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:37
So B, E, E, H, I, I, V.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:41
And I do encourage you as a writer to check it out.
Susan 00:18:44
Okay.
Jesse Hirsch 00:18:45
Beehive does not offer the same kind of discovery as Substack, but it's far more focused on writers like yourself who fundamentally want to bring people back to their website or back to their blog or back to a digital property they own.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:01
Versus Substack really wants to be a walled garden.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:05
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:06
They really kind of make it hard to get your content, to get your readers.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:11
They're now hosting podcasts and videos, but again, they want to keep everyone within Substack and they use.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:20
They use all of them.
Susan 00:19:23
That's the problem with Facebook, right?
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:25
Yes.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:25
And they are.
Susan 00:19:26
Content is no longer your content.
Susan 00:19:29
If you write stuff on Facebook, it just goes down your feed and never to be found again.
Susan 00:19:37
You can't find it, you can't search it.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:40
Substack's a little better that way.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:42
And they do allow you to export.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:44
So you can, for example, constantly export it and import it into WordPress or import it into some other standalone.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:52
But the design of Substack is very much like Facebook.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:56
They want to keep you within that walled garden.
Jesse Hirsch 00:19:58
Now I'm back on Substack as of December because you can't.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:05
Like the Nazis are everywhere.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:06
I can't say, oh, I can't use that because the Nazis are using it.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:10
And similarly, the discovery aspect of Substack.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:14
Yeah, right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:14
As Elon Musk demonstrated.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:16
So I don't know if I've answered your question.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:19
Feel free to ask any follow up.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:21
But it'll be a struggle for you to get the audience and the attention you get on Substack off of Substack.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:29
That's certainly what I'm struggling with at the moment.
Susan 00:20:31
Oh yeah.
Susan 00:20:33
It's kind of the same with Facebook.
Susan 00:20:35
It's ultimately, I think it's better to have your own contact list.
Jesse Hirsch 00:20:41
Yes.
Susan 00:20:41
Which is what I used to have.
Susan 00:20:43
And I think that when I, if and when I decide to move completely from Facebook back to my blog, like to stop my.
Susan 00:20:53
So I have a number of Facebook pages at the minute.
Susan 00:20:56
I have my own personal page and then I have my Amazing Susan page, which is mostly devoted to motorcycling, so.
Susan 00:21:07
And my blog isn't motorcycling.
Susan 00:21:11
There's opinion and you know, other stuff there.
Susan 00:21:15
But I think I'm gonna ask my audience on Facebook to subscribe to my blog and then just stop doing Facebook because I'm tired.
Susan 00:21:23
I, you know, why do I want to get my post taken off as spam and Mike?
Susan 00:21:29
Like, that's ridiculous.
Jesse Hirsch 00:21:31
It's insulting, quite frankly.
Susan 00:21:33
Yeah.
Susan 00:21:34
And also, I had seven Twitter accounts.
Susan 00:21:40
I haven't been active on Twitter for quite some time now, but I had.
Susan 00:21:44
And two of my accounts, the one for Amazing Women Rock and I had another.
Susan 00:21:49
I have another site called she Quotes also has hundreds of pages on it.
Susan 00:21:54
All memes.
Susan 00:21:55
I was doing memes before anyone else ever thought.
Jesse Hirsch 00:22:02
Right on.
Jesse Hirsch 00:22:04
Anyway, have you looked at Blue Sky?
Susan 00:22:08
I'm going to, yeah.
Susan 00:22:10
Because.
Susan 00:22:10
Because I went to log into Facebook the other day, so two of my accounts were stolen.
Susan 00:22:17
Amazing Women Rock.
Susan 00:22:19
They were hacked.
Susan 00:22:19
They were stolen.
Jesse Hirsch 00:22:20
Your Facebook accounts you made or your Twitter accounts?
Susan 00:22:22
No Twitter accounts.
Susan 00:22:24
Amazing Women Rock and she Quotes were both stolen.
Susan 00:22:28
And so I sent a.
Susan 00:22:31
A complaint to Twitter.
Susan 00:22:33
This was like, I don't know, five or six months ago.
Susan 00:22:37
And got no reply.
Susan 00:22:38
And then a couple of days ago, I wanted to see.
Susan 00:22:43
Actually, I wanted to see if Mark Carney's.
Susan 00:22:45
I had seen a screenshot saying that Mark Carney's account had been suspended on Twitter.
Susan 00:22:57
So I wanted to check it out.
Susan 00:22:58
I always check stuff first before I post anything, but I couldn't log in.
Susan 00:23:04
And not only that, I could, but all my accounts were listed.
Susan 00:23:08
I had like eight, seven or eight Twitter accounts.
Susan 00:23:11
They're all listed down the side.
Susan 00:23:13
And it's telling me, you know, put in your email address, put in your password.
Susan 00:23:19
And I have a system that I use for the passwords.
Susan 00:23:22
And so I'm putting the passwords in every time.
Susan 00:23:24
It told me that the email address is invalid, the password address is invalid, and then it says, you know, give us your.
Susan 00:23:33
Your.
Susan 00:23:34
We'll email you a link and.
Susan 00:23:36
And then they email the link and you hit the link and.
Susan 00:23:39
No, it's not.
Susan 00:23:40
I mean, it was just a nightmare.
Jesse Hirsch 00:23:43
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:23:44
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:23:44
And that is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:23:45
That's why I'm calling it X now.
Jesse Hirsch 00:23:47
Because they don't deserve the legacy name of Twitter.
Jesse Hirsch 00:23:50
It has become such a monster.
Jesse Hirsch 00:23:52
And to your point, in December, when I started, when I sort of said, you know, our political moment demands activity, it demands, you know, media participation, media creation.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:04
So I started playing with X again after.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:06
After ignoring it, and it's been a waste of time, like, and.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:11
And I say this in the sense that it's clearly a pay to play platform that if you don't pay for the blue check and the monthly thing, your content will be actively suppressed.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:21
You're not going to reach your quote unquote audience.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:23
You're not going to reach your followers.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:24
There's absolutely no point in posting.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:27
And, and right up until this week, I was still just throwing stuff out there, just, you know, to see what it gets.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:33
And today I was kind of like, you know what?
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:35
No, I'm not gonna bother.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:37
It's not worth my time at all.
Susan 00:24:39
No, no, no, no.
Jesse Hirsch 00:24:41
All right.
Susan 00:24:42
Yeah.
Susan 00:24:42
So.
Susan 00:24:44
And the problem is that lots of people, that's where their community is.
Susan 00:24:52
You know, you talked about community with John and especially during COVID like that was I, I'm here alone in my house.
Susan 00:25:05
You couldn't go anywhere.
Susan 00:25:08
That Facebook kind of kept me sane, you know.
Jesse Hirsch 00:25:11
Yeah, yeah.
Susan 00:25:12
Being connected with people through online kept me sane.
Jesse Hirsch 00:25:18
Well, and let, let's use that actually as an opportunity.
Jesse Hirsch 00:25:21
Not, not changing subjects at all, but remembering that I have a structure to this show and we've been talking about the future all that time.
Jesse Hirsch 00:25:28
But let us segue into our feature conversation because I want to talk about Facebook and I want to talk about it in the context of our local community, to everyone who doesn't live in our community.
Jesse Hirsch 00:25:40
I call it Almonte, and I love the Spanish pronunciation, but of course it's Almont here locally.
Jesse Hirsch 00:25:47
And you and I, because our grandfathers were not born here, you and I fundamentally are newcomers, no matter how long we've actually lived here.
Jesse Hirsch 00:25:58
And what I think a lot of people in cities don't understand is how powerful the Facebook local group in small communities has become.
Jesse Hirsch 00:26:09
And many analysts often point out that the reason Facebook continues to survive today is because of the anchor that they have in a lot of North American small communities.
Jesse Hirsch 00:26:20
Because the Facebook group is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:26:23
Is such a touch point and not even of like minded people, often quite the opposite.
Susan 00:26:28
Oh my God.
Jesse Hirsch 00:26:30
So I'm curious both in the context of the pandemic, because it was a really interesting touch point for our physical community who were using the local Facebook community as a way to disagree, to articulate, to connect in addition to the more sane groups that we belong to that could provide more of that social.
Susan 00:26:53
Contact, which are those, Jesse?
Jesse Hirsch 00:26:55
Fair enough, I was being aspirational.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:00
But I'm curious to hear your thoughts on the evolving nature of the Facebook local.
Susan 00:27:06
Well, you know, we had that page Friends in Mississippi Mills, Friends of Mississippi.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:13
Mills, which was kind of the original.
Susan 00:27:16
That was the original one.
Susan 00:27:17
And then that the, the creator of that page finally I don't know how long ago it was now.
Susan 00:27:27
Eight months maybe.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:29
Seems about right.
Susan 00:27:30
Nine months.
Susan 00:27:31
Gave.
Susan 00:27:32
Just shut the page down because he was tired.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:37
I have to imagine he caught a lot of flack.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:41
A lot of flack from everybody.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:43
Like not just people from one side of the spectrum or the other.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:48
But that's power.
Susan 00:27:49
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:50
Those in power get a lot of heat.
Susan 00:27:53
Yeah, but it's tiresome.
Jesse Hirsch 00:27:55
Yes, it is.
Susan 00:27:56
And it's tiresome for the.
Susan 00:27:58
For the users as well, coincidentally.
Susan 00:28:01
Shall I read you a little poem?
Susan 00:28:02
I wrote exactly about that?
Susan 00:28:04
Okay, so this, this is called the lowest common denominator.
Susan 00:28:09
It's about threads.
Susan 00:28:11
Not threads, the new threads.
Susan 00:28:13
It's about, you know, how things go in a thread.
Susan 00:28:18
One asks a question, the other replies with insults and slander that are hard on my eyes.
Susan 00:28:25
You answer, just like I've come to expect.
Susan 00:28:27
No doubt you are playing with just half a deck, you moron.
Susan 00:28:32
You fool.
Susan 00:28:33
The first one shoots back.
Susan 00:28:34
There's no proof of your truth and your brain's got a crack.
Susan 00:28:39
The other can't let that statement stand.
Susan 00:28:41
So he types out a comment, a terse reprimand.
Susan 00:28:45
How dare you accuse me, you nitwit.
Susan 00:28:47
You hack.
Susan 00:28:48
When it's clear as a crystal.
Susan 00:28:50
You're the one with the lack.
Susan 00:28:52
Back and forth, forth and back, round in circles they go, as down sinks the thread till it's lower than low.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:02
That was fantastic.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:03
Absolutely fantastic and a very astute expression or observation of the culture that exists in these groups.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:15
But I'm curious, I feel, to bring us back to the quitting social media.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:20
I kind of feel that those the original friends of and the new kind of friends in.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:28
And I do actually monitor some of the right wing splinter groups that claim to offer the unfiltered version.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:39
Honestly, that has kept me on Facebook.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:42
There were parts of the pandemic where, and I agree, like the digital community side I was finding elsewhere.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:48
I mean, I was finding it on Twitch and Discord and all sorts of other media.
Susan 00:29:53
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:29:54
But I feel even today that I can't quit Facebook because there's a lot of gossip, innuendo, nonsense, but also local intelligence that flows through that group.
Susan 00:30:08
There is like, you can put a post on there that says looking for whatever and people will answer you.
Susan 00:30:16
And it's like way faster than having to shop around and you get recommendations, you get a direct line to whoever it is that you need or want or whatever it is that you need or want.
Susan 00:30:30
And then there's events and all of that stuff.
Susan 00:30:34
Yeah, it's Important.
Jesse Hirsch 00:30:37
And I'm curious, your kind of strategy, because you engage at a level that I, quite frankly, don't have the courage.
Jesse Hirsch 00:30:47
I.
Jesse Hirsch 00:30:47
I will troll.
Jesse Hirsch 00:30:48
I'll sometimes ask people, especially some of the real wingnuts.
Jesse Hirsch 00:30:54
I'll ask them sincere questions to try to get them to unpack the logic they clearly don't have, versus you engage much more earnestly.
Jesse Hirsch 00:31:03
And I think there's a lot of community members who appreciate it, who are looking for that common sense amid some of the nonsense.
Jesse Hirsch 00:31:12
But I'm curious, are you doing it spontaneously as a writer?
Jesse Hirsch 00:31:15
Are you doing it out of a sense of community responsibility?
Jesse Hirsch 00:31:19
Do you have fun doing it?
Jesse Hirsch 00:31:20
Because clearly there's some stress that comes with it as well.
Susan 00:31:24
Well, in answer to those questions, I would say yes.
Susan 00:31:33
Well, I've been in a few circumstances where I've gotten into very heated discussions.
Susan 00:31:41
I wouldn't even call them discussions.
Susan 00:31:42
More like the poem I've just read.
Jesse Hirsch 00:31:45
Yes.
Susan 00:31:46
And then I just.
Susan 00:31:48
I said to myself, this isn't.
Susan 00:31:50
Why am I doing this?
Susan 00:31:52
There's no point.
Susan 00:31:55
And I think people need to be civil.
Susan 00:31:59
You know, we've lost civility.
Susan 00:32:02
We've lost reasonable discourse.
Susan 00:32:07
There's no logic out there.
Susan 00:32:09
People leap in with whatever tick tock garbage that they've assimilated.
Susan 00:32:17
And.
Susan 00:32:17
And it's some.
Susan 00:32:19
A lot of it makes no sense.
Susan 00:32:21
So I just try and be chill.
Jesse Hirsch 00:32:25
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:32:28
It's almost an attempt at a meditative exercise with the ultimate incendiary distraction there in front of you.
Susan 00:32:36
Yes, yes.
Susan 00:32:39
You have a way with words.
Jesse Hirsch 00:32:40
Well, okay, speaking of which, then allow me to throw a curveball at you.
Jesse Hirsch 00:32:45
And this is a curveball which I haven't really had the opportunity to throw at people, partly because I don't think that they've had your anthropological experience in Facebook groups.
Jesse Hirsch 00:32:59
And I say this because I find there's two types of people.
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:02
There's the people who avoid it entirely.
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:05
They're just like, there's no way I'm gonna wade into that.
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:08
And then there's the folks who have been driven insane by the nature of these groups.
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:14
You are a rare individual who has been in the social media weeds for pretty much its entire history, and you still have common sense and what appears to be sanity, although we'll get to the dementia shortly.
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:29
What if I were to pose to you the abstract but metaphorically accurate argument that our parliament is now on Facebook?
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:40
That our town council, from a participatory perspective, is Friends in Mississippi Mills?
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:48
And while Friends in Mississippi Mills does not have the electoral power to set Our council and mayor.
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:55
It sure seems to be where town debates happen.
Jesse Hirsch 00:33:59
And while you are someone who has taken the effort to go to town council and take notes and share those notes in the previous Facebook group, what do you think of my.
Jesse Hirsch 00:34:10
Sorry, go ahead.
Susan 00:34:11
You know what happened after.
Susan 00:34:14
After Covid.
Susan 00:34:19
So the Facebook.
Susan 00:34:21
The council meetings were held online.
Susan 00:34:23
They were streamed.
Susan 00:34:25
And then when Covid was over, I went back to the council meetings and I went to one and I started to do what I had done before, which was to follow along the council meeting and put the updates in the feed on the Facebook page.
Susan 00:34:48
Excuse me, but what happened after Covid?
Susan 00:34:51
Facebook, as we talked about earlier, changed so that the.
Susan 00:34:56
The updates didn't appear.
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:01
Yes.
Susan 00:35:02
Buried sequentially.
Susan 00:35:04
Yeah.
Susan 00:35:04
There would be one and then.
Susan 00:35:06
And then they would post another one and until like the next day.
Susan 00:35:10
And so that was the end of that.
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:14
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:16
But again, indulge me in this metaphor.
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:19
To what extent, And I'll reframe it in even more incendiary language, given our discussion today.
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:27
To what extent is Facebook taking over the democratic franchise?
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:31
To what extent is the decisions made in a community no longer happening in the town council, but happening in the Facebook group, which does not have democratic mechanisms?
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:41
To Tracy, the original owner, moderator of Friends of Mississippi Mills, he was never elected, and I think that's why he quit, because he had all the stress, none of the power, none of the benefits.
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:57
Indulge me in this.
Jesse Hirsch 00:35:58
Do you think my metaphor is there?
Jesse Hirsch 00:36:00
Do you see a parallel?
Jesse Hirsch 00:36:01
Or do you think I'm smoking way too much cannabis?
Susan 00:36:06
Yes.
Jesse Hirsch 00:36:07
They're not mutually exclusive.
Jesse Hirsch 00:36:08
I will acknowledge that.
Susan 00:36:15
I think that the.
Susan 00:36:19
I think social media has an inordinate power over the political process and that that power is increasing.
Susan 00:36:34
I mean, look at.
Susan 00:36:35
And, well, who is standing up there with Trump?
Susan 00:36:40
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:36:41
Given the Nazi salute.
Jesse Hirsch 00:36:42
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:36:43
And to your point, at the inauguration, all the heads of social media instead of governors and elected officials.
Susan 00:36:49
Yeah.
Susan 00:36:50
And so that is going to quiet the voice.
Susan 00:36:57
I think people will become more afraid.
Susan 00:36:59
And, you know, already you post something that.
Susan 00:37:04
I don't know.
Susan 00:37:05
I've been kicked off.
Susan 00:37:06
I've been, what, put in Facebook, Facebook jail at least a dozen times, and I've had posts removed.
Susan 00:37:14
It's getting worse.
Jesse Hirsch 00:37:16
Yeah, yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:37:17
Although the current moderator, he.
Jesse Hirsch 00:37:19
He does seem to welcome politics the way that in friends of Friends of, rather than friends in friends of, they didn't want any controversy, any debates, but now it seems like there is more opportunity for debates and for political disagreement, albeit it's still kind of uncivil yeah.
Susan 00:37:39
But Facebook can just.
Susan 00:37:41
In a group sometimes.
Susan 00:37:43
Facebook takes down the posts.
Jesse Hirsch 00:37:46
Yes.
Susan 00:37:46
It's not the moderators that take down the post.
Susan 00:37:49
It's Facebook or it's, you know, whatever algorithm.
Jesse Hirsch 00:37:53
The automatic mechanisms.
Susan 00:37:55
Yeah, the Autumn whatever is automatic.
Susan 00:37:57
Yeah.
Susan 00:37:57
They look at the.
Susan 00:37:58
They read the page or they read the picture, they.
Susan 00:38:01
Whatever they do, and then bang, it's gone.
Susan 00:38:03
And then you have no recourse.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:04
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:05
And.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:06
And maybe I wonder if that'll change now that Zuckerberg has embraced this kind of libertarian ethos of, you know, but what that entails.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:15
Because your point is it's all automatic.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:18
So we don't know what the logic is.
Susan 00:38:20
No, we don't know what the logic is.
Susan 00:38:22
Like, sometimes I wonder why my posts have been taken off.
Susan 00:38:26
But you can't quest.
Susan 00:38:27
There's no questioning.
Susan 00:38:28
Yeah, you can't question.
Susan 00:38:30
There's no person there.
Susan 00:38:32
It's just AI.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:35
Yeah, well, not even AI, because AI suggests it's intelligent.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:38
And that's why in this case, I use the word automatic, because it makes mistakes.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:43
So.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:44
So pervasively.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:46
Speaking of which, I do want to talk about dementia because I feel it is both appropriate in the context of social media as well as appropriate in the context of contemporary politics.
Jesse Hirsch 00:38:55
But before we go there, allow me still on this subject of kind of local democracy and local social media, while I wasn't born there, I spent most of my formative life in Toronto, and certainly my political outlook was heavily shaped by my life in Toronto, and therefore my concept of politicians and municipal politics really reflects.
Jesse Hirsch 00:39:23
Rob Ford, Toronto.
Jesse Hirsch 00:39:26
Oh, my goodness.
Jesse Hirsch 00:39:27
As absurd as that might be, I'm curious what your thoughts of our local politicians and our local politics.
Jesse Hirsch 00:39:37
Partly because you have taken the time to hang out at town council and because you are the kind of curious person who pays attention to these things, I think more so than our other neighbors.
Jesse Hirsch 00:39:49
So I'm curious what your thoughts are on both the people who comprise our local politicians, but the culture of local politics here.
Susan 00:40:01
Well, I think it's improved since the last council.
Susan 00:40:06
And I think our mayor, Krista Lowery, is absolutely fabulous.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:13
She certainly developed a profile, you know, provincially amongst other mayors.
Susan 00:40:18
Yeah, she just won an award.
Susan 00:40:20
I can't remember what it is now.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:22
Some something distinguished service, you know.
Susan 00:40:25
Yeah, something like that.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:27
At the Rural Ontario Municipal association conference.
Susan 00:40:32
How clever are you?
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:35
It's one of my.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:36
And I'm getting to this in a bit.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:38
One of my ambitions in life would to be a speaker at Roma.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:42
I would love the power and privilege of addressing all those rural Mayors, So I pay attention to these circuits.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:48
But you were saying.
Jesse Hirsch 00:40:49
Yes, our mayor.
Susan 00:40:51
The mayor is fabulous.
Susan 00:40:52
And I think the councillors are also fabulous.
Susan 00:40:57
I mean, it's not an easy job.
Susan 00:41:00
And I think I have another poem about that.
Susan 00:41:04
Maybe we don't have time.
Susan 00:41:05
I don't know.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:06
No, you take a moment to find the poem and I'll share a quick anecdote.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:10
I live in Ramsey, the Ramsey Ward.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:13
And the counselor who was defeated in the last municipal election was an anti vaxxer, right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:20
And a full out kind of COVID conspiracist.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:25
So I'm glad that she was defeated.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:28
I really, you know, her and Randy Hillier brought a lot of shame to me politically that they were my elected representatives.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:36
So I'm glad that they were defeated.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:38
But as you look for this poem, I bring this up because, you know, Susan, you're exactly the kind of person I would love to have on town council.
Jesse Hirsch 00:41:46
Because while you are correct that our mayor from a policy perspective is quite competent, I don't feel we have anyone in the town council who is media savvy, who understands how to communicate in a manner that counters the conspiracies, that counters the kind of far right who do have an anchor in our community.
Jesse Hirsch 00:42:13
And our mayor does great work, but she's the kind of person who thinks that the great work should speak for itself.
Jesse Hirsch 00:42:20
She is also fortunate to be part of the families who are the legacy of this community.
Jesse Hirsch 00:42:25
And that's a boost.
Jesse Hirsch 00:42:26
But I would love to see someone like yourself run for counsel, partly because we need better communicators in our public office.
Jesse Hirsch 00:42:34
Speaking of which, you got that poem cued up?
Susan 00:42:37
Yeah, I do.
Jesse Hirsch 00:42:40
Please.
Susan 00:42:41
Thanks for that vote of confidence, but I think not.
Jesse Hirsch 00:42:45
Yes, yes.
Susan 00:42:46
This is.
Susan 00:42:47
This is called rebuttal.
Susan 00:42:50
And I wrote this in response to complaints.
Susan 00:42:54
You know, everybody complains about everything all the time.
Susan 00:42:59
I'm glad I live in Almont.
Susan 00:43:01
There's so much here to do.
Susan 00:43:03
It doesn't matter if you're old or totally brand new.
Susan 00:43:07
The town is cute and quaint.
Susan 00:43:09
You see, it really is terrific.
Susan 00:43:11
Don't listen to the folks who say hey, this or that's horrific.
Susan 00:43:16
We have music, arts and plays, cycling, parks and rivers, shops and food and other stuff.
Susan 00:43:23
Get out there and just give her.
Susan 00:43:26
Our council works both long and hard.
Susan 00:43:29
Still citizens complain the traffic's bad and I'm so sad and they should stop the rain.
Susan 00:43:36
Some folks think it's a right to bitch they want to have their say because of taxes municipality, we all are forced to pay the Flowers suck, the roads are fucked the whole damn thing's a mess.
Susan 00:43:50
Get off your butts.
Susan 00:43:51
Do something now.
Susan 00:43:52
We need a full course.
Susan 00:43:56
We need a full course.
Susan 00:43:57
Press.
Susan 00:43:59
I prefer to be constructive and volunteer my time or take a poke at those who whinge with poetry that rhymes Is every little thing just right and always to my liking?
Susan 00:44:11
Oh, no, it's not.
Susan 00:44:11
Of course it's not but that's no cause for striking I feel so lucky to be here where abundance is on offer I'm grateful for the things we have unlike unhappy scoffers Even if the world were perfect a bunch would find it faulty they'd rant and rave from beyond the grave Their hellish voices salty.
Jesse Hirsch 00:44:37
Right on.
Jesse Hirsch 00:44:38
Fantastic.
Jesse Hirsch 00:44:39
And it is not ironic that you listened to the episode I had with John Wolfstone, because it was like this one, I was able to use my sound effects, which in developing a muscle memory of podcasting, I haven't got to yet.
Jesse Hirsch 00:44:55
And I do dare you to post this interview once it's published to the Facebook group to see if anyone realizes that we're talking about them and whether they wanna react.
Jesse Hirsch 00:45:06
To which I'd say anyone local is welco to appear on the podcast and provide a dissenting view or a different perspective on either the role of Facebook in local communities or why the future is rural.
Jesse Hirsch 00:45:20
But before we conclude this fantastic conversation, I did kind of want to pick your brain, no pun intended, about dementia.
Jesse Hirsch 00:45:29
And I say this partly because cognitive decline is something that I've been kind of conscious of my entire life because of my parents work.
Jesse Hirsch 00:45:38
My dad is a geriatrician and has worked in geriatrics his entire life.
Jesse Hirsch 00:45:45
But I also feel that we, especially given the current president of the United States, we're sort of in a demented society.
Jesse Hirsch 00:45:53
And I say this in the sense that fascism tries to erase history as part of its use of power.
Jesse Hirsch 00:46:01
So while we can get into specifics, I'm curious, Susan, as a poet, as a writer, whether you will again indulge me in this metaphor.
Jesse Hirsch 00:46:08
To what extent do you think dementia is not just an individual cognitive decline, but as something that could be ascribed to our culture and our moment in history?
Susan 00:46:19
Oh, well, there's an interesting question.
Susan 00:46:24
I've never asked myself that before.
Susan 00:46:27
I.
Susan 00:46:28
I think that the new pres.
Susan 00:46:33
Down south is.
Susan 00:46:36
Well, the previous one was definitely declining, for sure about it.
Susan 00:46:43
You can see the look of his face.
Jesse Hirsch 00:46:46
We've actually learned that the staff who worked around him in the White House was hiding it for months, that they were going out of Their way to really cover up and make it secret.
Jesse Hirsch 00:46:57
It was an open secret in the White House, and it very much hurt Kamala Harris's chances.
Susan 00:47:04
Yeah, yeah, he should have resigned way before.
Susan 00:47:06
But anyway, again, you know, same pattern.
Susan 00:47:10
And the new guy, in my opinion, has a cluster B personality disorder.
Susan 00:47:18
He's.
Susan 00:47:19
He's, you know, a combination of narcissistic personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder, which is sometimes called psychopathy or sociopathy.
Susan 00:47:32
And, you know, he's.
Susan 00:47:33
He's a mixed bag of that.
Susan 00:47:38
And, you know, I guess you could say.
Susan 00:47:41
And I.
Susan 00:47:42
He probably has.
Susan 00:47:43
He's probably getting mild cognitive decline now, from what I see.
Susan 00:47:48
My observation.
Susan 00:47:51
And, you know, you're.
Susan 00:47:53
To your point, it can be a little bit contagious in a.
Susan 00:48:00
Not in a physical sense, but in a mental sense.
Susan 00:48:03
People kind of go, it's a cult.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:09
And we're seeing that in our Facebook group.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:12
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:12
We're seeing.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:13
You know, you earlier used the word nonsense, and I've been sort of framing logic that there's a certain dementia to these arguments, not necessarily to the individuals presenting them.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:25
And that's why I say it on a cultural level.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:29
It feels that there is a complete disconnect.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:34
I think as a society, it's hard for us to wrap our heads around because we're used to political discourse being rational and reasonable.
Jesse Hirsch 00:48:43
And to your point, the cult seems to be having their own internal meaning their own internal logic, which seems to depend upon a certain break from reality.
Susan 00:48:55
Well, interestingly, that brings us kind of full circle back to social media, doesn't it?
Susan 00:49:01
Because.
Susan 00:49:02
And.
Susan 00:49:02
And AI comes into it as well, I think.
Susan 00:49:05
I was at.
Susan 00:49:06
Wasn't I at some thing that you did.
Susan 00:49:08
Was that about AI?
Jesse Hirsch 00:49:09
Yeah.
Susan 00:49:11
Yeah.
Susan 00:49:12
So.
Susan 00:49:14
Because you can't tell anymore fact from fiction, like I'm very.
Susan 00:49:20
I try to be as thorough as possible in something.
Susan 00:49:23
Post.
Susan 00:49:24
Somebody posts something.
Susan 00:49:26
I go and try and find the source so that I.
Susan 00:49:30
I know if it's either, you know, real or semi real or if it's just complete garbage like the.
Susan 00:49:37
The.
Susan 00:49:39
There was.
Susan 00:49:40
I don't know if you saw the.
Susan 00:49:41
The limo thing, but when Mark Carney did his.
Susan 00:49:44
His announcement in Edmonton, and so they.
Susan 00:49:49
There was a picture of this limo pulling up.
Susan 00:49:52
Look at Bacarney, you know, what's he doing?
Susan 00:49:56
Well, it turns out it was a complete setup.
Jesse Hirsch 00:49:59
Yeah.
Susan 00:50:02
Somebody ordered the limo there to pick somebody up.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:06
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:08
I mean, we're at a level of dirty tactics.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:11
In which point about AI.
Susan 00:50:12
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:13
And actually I did.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:16
It's a terrible habit.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:17
I'm Trying to break it.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:18
I did open X today, and all the ads were like, fake news about Jagmeet Singh, fake news about Carney, fake news about other politicians.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:30
And when you say that, you look up stuff.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:32
When you say that, you vet the information that's there.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:35
That is obviously a reflection of your literacy.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:39
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:39
And as a writer, you have an advanced level of literacy because you're practicing your craft pretty much your entire life.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:47
Unfortunately, that literacy is not as widespread as we need it.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:51
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:52
And people are not putting that effort in to verify the information they get, which isn't hard.
Jesse Hirsch 00:50:58
Like, in the world we live in, it's actually quite easy to verify the accuracy of the stuff you get.
Jesse Hirsch 00:51:03
It takes effort, but not a lot.
Susan 00:51:07
No, no.
Susan 00:51:09
And yeah, that.
Susan 00:51:11
And perhaps that contributes to a dementia like condition, a decline of the community brain, if you will, or the social brain, the part that's meant to be leading in the thinking process.
Susan 00:51:32
There's no thinking process happening anymore.
Susan 00:51:34
It's just absent.
Susan 00:51:37
Which is kind of what happens with cognitive decline, isn't it?
Jesse Hirsch 00:51:42
Well, so go ahead.
Susan 00:51:45
So I, I don't think your.
Susan 00:51:47
Your metaphor or your is is off.
Susan 00:51:51
Let me put it that way.
Susan 00:51:52
I think it could.
Susan 00:51:54
An argument could be made for that.
Jesse Hirsch 00:51:56
Well, and your point about no thought is.
Jesse Hirsch 00:51:59
Is really my position on AI, that, you know, artificial intelligence is a very powerful tool, but it does not think.
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:07
It requires the thinking to be done by the user.
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:10
And unfortunately, not everyone understands that.
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:13
So they're not really making the most of AI.
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:16
And I, as part of this podcast, I'm interviewing, you know, lots of AI people just to pick their brains, but also to try to poke holes in some of their arguments.
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:25
Because a lot of the future of work stuff is all about how AI is going to take our jobs, to which I'm always kind of rebutting.
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:33
Well, what about elder care and what about the larger care industry?
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:38
This is something that I think, even though we grossly undervalue it in our society, ludicrously so, but that elder care and care labor in general is something that the demand is going to continue to grow rapidly, and unfortunately, the supply is not there.
Jesse Hirsch 00:52:59
But this is where I kind of want you to be.
Jesse Hirsch 00:53:01
A little political, maybe even a little aspirational.
Jesse Hirsch 00:53:05
What would it take to change that?
Jesse Hirsch 00:53:07
If we are an aging society, if part of aging is cognitive decline, what do we have to do to rectify, if not completely transform, our understanding of elder care, our understanding of care labor in general, so that as you and I continue to age, as we do start to see the signs of cognitive decline.
Jesse Hirsch 00:53:29
We have some hope that we will be able to live in a society where community.
Jesse Hirsch 00:53:33
To go back to John Wolfstone's point is something that we can see that we can look forward to rather than the current situation where we have reason to be concerned.
Susan 00:53:45
Oh, big reason to be concerned.
Susan 00:53:49
You know, there's.
Susan 00:53:49
There are a bunch of problems and looking at the cause, we.
Susan 00:53:55
So I don't know.
Susan 00:53:58
150, 200 years ago our life expectancy was 40.
Jesse Hirsch 00:54:03
Yeah.
Susan 00:54:05
And now it's 70, 80.
Susan 00:54:10
We're not.
Susan 00:54:11
And.
Susan 00:54:11
And everything hasn't caught up.
Susan 00:54:13
No.
Susan 00:54:14
The nursing home.
Susan 00:54:14
The history of the nursing home is.
Susan 00:54:16
Is.
Susan 00:54:17
Comes from poor houses.
Susan 00:54:20
That's.
Susan 00:54:20
That's the history.
Susan 00:54:22
Or that's like way back when.
Susan 00:54:26
But.
Susan 00:54:27
And there's not enough people.
Susan 00:54:29
There's a.
Susan 00:54:30
I've got a.
Susan 00:54:31
I've got a diagram.
Susan 00:54:32
I'll send it to you.
Susan 00:54:33
It's a.
Susan 00:54:34
I did the causes of the breakdown of elder care and it hasn't changed much.
Susan 00:54:42
There's, you know, staffing.
Susan 00:54:43
There's not enough staff.
Susan 00:54:45
There's.
Susan 00:54:45
The staff isn't trained properly.
Susan 00:54:48
There's not enough funding.
Susan 00:54:51
There's the profit side.
Susan 00:54:52
You know, people want to make money.
Susan 00:54:54
That doesn't really work.
Susan 00:54:56
Yeah, they make money.
Jesse Hirsch 00:54:58
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:54:59
But not.
Jesse Hirsch 00:54:59
The care is not there.
Susan 00:55:01
The care sucks.
Jesse Hirsch 00:55:02
Yeah.
Susan 00:55:03
There's the understanding of what is required to properly care for.
Susan 00:55:09
For elderly people and then there's the, the desire on behalf of society to people who are older, seen often as disposable.
Susan 00:55:20
So it's really complicated.
Susan 00:55:25
It's just not one thing.
Susan 00:55:26
It's this whole web of stuff as is usually everything.
Susan 00:55:30
Right.
Susan 00:55:30
You can't just pick out, oh, this is the thing that we need to fix and it's all going to be okay.
Susan 00:55:36
It's not like that.
Susan 00:55:37
It's.
Susan 00:55:37
It's multifaceted and.
Susan 00:55:43
And then there's maid.
Jesse Hirsch 00:55:47
Which is a whole other issue.
Jesse Hirsch 00:55:49
And for our non Canadian, non listening maid stands for medically assisted intentional death.
Susan 00:55:56
Is that no medical assistance in dying.
Jesse Hirsch 00:55:59
Medical assistance in dying.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:01
But it's an option for people who are experiencing disability, people who are having a difficult time aging as kind of a way to choose death as an option.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:13
But from a policy perspective it's still very problematic.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:16
Sorry, go ahead.
Susan 00:56:17
You have to be.
Susan 00:56:19
Death should be imminent within six months or something like that.
Susan 00:56:25
I think the rule is now and they're trying to change it.
Susan 00:56:29
And the problem with dementia, of course, is that once you're at that point, then you don't have the Capacity to make that decision.
Susan 00:56:41
And so they're trying to change it so that people can decide in advance.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:49
Yes, yes.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:51
The whole notion of the living will, which for anyone listening right now, you might think, well, I don't have any assets.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:57
I don't need a will.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:58
You've got a brain.
Jesse Hirsch 00:56:59
And that's kind of the role of a living will.
Susan 00:57:03
Yeah.
Jesse Hirsch 00:57:06
So ironically, we should have you back to talk about this subject in particular, because where I think we had a lot of fun unpacking and playing with social media, I think this is worthy of its own episode because there are a lot of threads for us to pull, especially from a mediview's angle, both on the future and anticipating the future, but also on the policy sides to this.
Jesse Hirsch 00:57:31
There are a few things that you sort of said there that I also kind of at some point want to unpack.
Jesse Hirsch 00:57:37
One is the whole healthcare and staffing.
Jesse Hirsch 00:57:39
Because one of the other recurring threads in our local Facebook group is there are clearly staff of our local hospital system who are unhappy with management, and they keep posting comments that are alluding to this.
Jesse Hirsch 00:57:53
And I keep.
Jesse Hirsch 00:57:55
As a recovering journalist, I keep wanting to pull those threads and be like, oh, really, what's going on here?
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:01
What's happening?
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:03
In the same way that we are an aging community.
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:07
And so I think this conversation we're having now about elder care, about whether people who are aging are discarded in a society, society, or to, I suspect, our own mutual ambition, quite the opposite.
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:21
That we return to a society where us elders are revered for our wisdom and everyone wants to listen to our podcasts and read our blogs again, aspirational, but good.
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:32
Aspirational.
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:33
Yes.
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:34
Yes, yes.
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:36
I'm curious, though, you know, to kind of wrap this conversation up, do you feel that there is an intersection here between what we've been describing at the end here in elder care and where we started in terms of social media?
Jesse Hirsch 00:58:50
Because without disclosing our age, you and I are already past what used to be the life expectancy that you cited.
Susan 00:58:59
Well, past.
Jesse Hirsch 00:59:00
But intellectually, we're both clearly still engaged.
Jesse Hirsch 00:59:03
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 00:59:04
And like a fine wine, I think a brain can really become stronger and more valuable with age.
Jesse Hirsch 00:59:12
So to what extent do you see social media as that kind of aging strategy, as a counter to potential cognitive decline?
Jesse Hirsch 00:59:21
Because if we're having our gray matter continue to connect and flare and do interesting things, that's got to be a positive, no?
Susan 00:59:31
Well, for me, I don't know.
Susan 00:59:34
For me, what I've noticed is, is that social media, the amount, the volume of Information that I am exposed to and trying to manage every day is getting to be beyond my capacity, and it's causing.
Susan 00:59:57
That's causing me to be anxious because I can't.
Susan 01:00:02
I.
Susan 01:00:03
I think I can't handle it like I used to be able to.
Susan 01:00:06
But on the other hand, there's way more information than there was before.
Jesse Hirsch 01:00:10
There's a certain relativity here, I think, worth keeping in mind.
Susan 01:00:14
Yeah.
Susan 01:00:14
And so.
Susan 01:00:18
I don't know.
Susan 01:00:19
I don't know.
Susan 01:00:20
I think we'd probably be better off going out in nature for walks than being online.
Jesse Hirsch 01:00:27
I agree.
Susan 01:00:28
Hours and hours and hours.
Susan 01:00:29
I mean, you're out there in the country in the snow and the dogs and, you know, all of that stuff.
Susan 01:00:34
Good for you.
Susan 01:00:35
Although that's healthier.
Jesse Hirsch 01:00:38
To your point, it's still.
Jesse Hirsch 01:00:39
Even though I have all of this literally as my backyard, sometimes I'll fall into a TikTok hole, right?
Jesse Hirsch 01:00:46
Yes, but.
Jesse Hirsch 01:00:47
But to your point, to bring this kind of to a close, this is why I recommitted to podcasting, because I kind of felt that it still gives me the desire for media.
Jesse Hirsch 01:00:58
It gives me the desire to connect with my world, but it's more conversational.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:04
Right.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:04
Like in you and I having this conversation, on some levels, we're recreating social media.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:09
We're, you know, emulating some of the dopamine hits from having good ideas and, you know, connecting on different levels.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:17
But it feels more human to me in terms of the dialogue and the conversation.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:22
So that's part of why I'm currently trying to commit my.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:25
My screen time.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:27
Well, I'm doing both, though, right?
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:29
Because I do feel that writing exercises a part of our mind that's different than oral, that's different than dialogue.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:38
So I'm trying to do both, but I'm trying to do both more.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:41
As I am the creator, I am the producer, I'm still consuming podcasts.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:46
The thing about farming is podcasts and farming go hand in hand, because when you're out there mucking a stall or moving hay or bringing the goats to the back, I can have the, you know, be listening.
Jesse Hirsch 01:01:59
I can have that kind of combination of physical activity and intellectual stimulation.
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:04
But this is why I'm really enthusiastic about podcasting, and I'm kind of enthusiastic about substack, as problematic as it may be, because it allows me to do both.
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:15
It allows me to kind of engage the world, play with media, but have more intention, have more mindfulness to it, and still spend as much time outside, you know, with my animals and breathing fresh air and Hanging out with the trees.
Susan 01:02:30
That's a bit ironic, Jesse, to say you're being mindful when you're doing the, you know, mucking out the stall with your podcast on.
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:37
But, but that's the paradox, not mindfulness.
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:41
But it is, it's meta mindfulness here on Meta Views.
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:45
Cause I agree, it is.
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:47
And this is where my kind of autistic ADHD mind requires a certain level of stimulation.
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:54
But it's why computer programmers say that they have their best thinking in the shower, right?
Jesse Hirsch 01:02:59
Because they on the one hand have to get away from the screen.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:03
But on the other hand, the shower, the water on their body is giving them a physical stimulation that allows for the mental.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:11
So I think it's complicated.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:13
And maybe that's where we will have you back for the cognition episode where we don't just talk about aging, but we talk about how brains work.
Susan 01:03:23
Some very strong ideas about dementia.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:27
Right on.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:28
Right on.
Susan 01:03:29
That are not kind of mainstream.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:33
Good.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:34
Then this is the place to air them here on metafuse.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:38
Now, Art, we end every episode by asking our guest to give some shout outs.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:46
And we partly do this because, you know, the Internet is all about links.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:50
It's all about kind of connecting people.
Jesse Hirsch 01:03:53
And just like we started with news in the future, is there anyone that you're reading, is there anyone that you've been thinking about that you want our audience to know?
Jesse Hirsch 01:04:04
It's kind of on the spirit of we stand on the shoulders of giants, right?
Jesse Hirsch 01:04:09
As human beings, we are iterating the art and culture that is inspired before us.
Jesse Hirsch 01:04:14
So is there any person or two people, Susan, that you think our audience should know?
Susan 01:04:19
I've been thinking about that since yesterday and I don't want to single anyone out.
Susan 01:04:30
I really, no, I would like to shout out to the Canadian people and how they're responding to a multitude of challenges and mostly with grace, I think mostly with, you know, we're stalwart and, and I think that's important.
Susan 01:05:02
I think we should not bend.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:04
Right on.
Susan 01:05:05
And, and, and I, I really feel that people are kind of embracing that position and.
Susan 01:05:13
So good on us.
Susan 01:05:15
So good on Canada.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:17
Right on.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:19
And you know, to your point, I think Canadians have always struggled with what it means to be Canadian.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:25
And I think we're going to get a real opportunity to have a deep think about that because of course, it's not just a federal election, which I tend to love elections because they are opportunities for us to have these big questions.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:38
But I think we're gonna have an Ontario election too.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:41
So it's you know, a double whammy, double peril, double opportunity to have these big discussions.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:51
So again, more reason to have you back on the show.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:54
Thank you very much, Susan.
Susan 01:05:56
You're so much fun.
Jesse Hirsch 01:05:58
Well, and as a poet, we need to have more poetry on metaview, so thank you again for that.
Jesse Hirsch 01:06:06
And I do encourage you to post this interview.
Jesse Hirsch 01:06:09
I'll email it to you to post it on our local Facebook group because maybe we will provoke more local conversation about these particular issues.
Jesse Hirsch 01:06:18
Susan can be found@amazingwomenrock.com even the website you're saying is not as active as it used to.
Susan 01:06:33
Yeah, yeah, fair enough.
Susan 01:06:36
It used to be.
Susan 01:06:37
But you can go to amazingsusan.com okay.
Jesse Hirsch 01:06:41
Amazingsusan.com is the hub.
Jesse Hirsch 01:06:44
Go ahead.
Susan 01:06:45
And.
Susan 01:06:45
And for people who are in contact with people who live with dementia or care partners, My Alzheimer's story dot com.
Jesse Hirsch 01:06:56
Right on.
Jesse Hirsch 01:06:57
My Alzheimer's story.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:00
And I suspect when we have Susan back, she will either have a sub stack or potentially a blue sky.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:08
So it will be like a sequel of, you know, Amazing Susan reiterating on social media or abstaining from it entirely.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:18
It's like a cliffhanger.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:20
Tune in and find out.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:23
But of course, Meta Views is still available on most socials where you can find us.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:29
This has been another fantastic episode.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:31
I tell you, Susan, we're on a hot streak, which makes me feel that I'm gonna have some terrible episodes coming up.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:38
But we will continue to try nonetheless.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:40
For those tuning in.
Jesse Hirsch 01:07:42
Thank you, and we'll see you soon.
";}