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Civility is central to a functioning democracy and peaceful society. George Washington brought that approach to his leadership as a U.S. Founding Father (note his source on civility is in our reference section). There is little doubt that in today's world we see plenty of incivility -- on television and radio talk shows, in newspapers, even in the halls of Congress.
Individually we may be able to do very little to stem that tide of incivility. But we all share some responsibility for it. The shrill talking head on TV doesn't rant unless we listen. The politician doesn't attack unless his poll numbers go up.
Many observers agree that we have seen a significant rise in incivility in the last generation or so in the United States in our political discourse. There are many reasons for that. One is our increasingly interconnected digital world and the information isolation that follows (see the sidebar on the right about "digital hollows").
We can't change society overnight. But if we begin to roll back the tide of incivility online, the ripple effects can be mighty.
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What are Digital Hollows?
Why Civility?
In our modern world, where we face exobytes of information and are at the same time forced to be our own editors, we naturally self-select our sources of information to favor those that reinforce our biases. Factually challenged data may be given more credibility than more accurate data from a source we don't deem as credible.
Eventually we find ourselves in "digital hollows," deep valleys of our own creation where we are cut off from robust, balanced discourse. When the only voices we view as reasonable are in our own valleys, it is easy to react with venom to a viewpoint from another valley.
Read more here in "Digital Hollows: Information Isolation and the Myth of Post-Partisanship" (PDF).
ALERT! Read our call for civility in the San Jose Mercury News!
