Because internet didn’t existed back then to congregate and enable people to say whatever they want.
Before you could be that stupid, but probably would be the only one in your neighborhood so any stupid thoughts would be kept to yourself until you eventually move on, but now if you think earth is shaped like a half eaten donnut, you bet your ass you will find a community of other weirdos with that same belief and they will feed themselves more stupidness and become louder and louder.
Honestly I’m one example myself, when I was a teenager back in the 90s/2000s I really liked those Japanese emo style music(Visual kei), but since no one else around me had ever heard about it and no one was interested on it I had no one to talk about it, then I just moved on, but if it was today I have no idea what kind of creepy teen I would have become, honestly for me it was a blessing haha
The internet gives stupid people a platform. Before social media someone had to have a certain level of competence to work their way up to a position where they could influence large numbers of people. Some would slip through, but it did a pretty good job of filtering them out, and once they were found to be stupid, it was usually pretty easy to cut off their outlet to the masses. Maybe in the past a really motivated crazy person might put out a newsletter, or get on cable access, or start a pirate radio broadcast… but most of that is one way. And there was the occasional cult leader who would get people together, but the kool-aid normally solved that problem in the end.
Today, any idiot with an internet connection can blast things out to millions or even billions of people. Then we have social media companies looking for how to keep people engaged. They can profile people who are easy targets for this crazy stuff and show it to them, and it’s good for the company, because these types of people get hooked and become very engaged in the site when talking about their bull shit.
So a platform with nearly 0 barrier to entry, coupled with free marketing from the social media algorithm, and a platform where they can feed off each other and organize… it’s no wonder it’s grown out of control.
People have always been stupid, but not like this. Not what we have going on today
Because internet didn’t existed back then to congregate and enable people to say whatever they want.
Before you could be that stupid, but probably would be the only one in your neighborhood so any stupid thoughts would be kept to yourself until you eventually move on, but now if you think earth is shaped like a half eaten donnut, you bet your ass you will find a community of other weirdos with that same belief and they will feed themselves more stupidness and become louder and louder.
Honestly I’m one example myself, when I was a teenager back in the 90s/2000s I really liked those Japanese emo style music(Visual kei), but since no one else around me had ever heard about it and no one was interested on it I had no one to talk about it, then I just moved on, but if it was today I have no idea what kind of creepy teen I would have become, honestly for me it was a blessing haha
The internet gives stupid people a platform. Before social media someone had to have a certain level of competence to work their way up to a position where they could influence large numbers of people. Some would slip through, but it did a pretty good job of filtering them out, and once they were found to be stupid, it was usually pretty easy to cut off their outlet to the masses. Maybe in the past a really motivated crazy person might put out a newsletter, or get on cable access, or start a pirate radio broadcast… but most of that is one way. And there was the occasional cult leader who would get people together, but the kool-aid normally solved that problem in the end.
Today, any idiot with an internet connection can blast things out to millions or even billions of people. Then we have social media companies looking for how to keep people engaged. They can profile people who are easy targets for this crazy stuff and show it to them, and it’s good for the company, because these types of people get hooked and become very engaged in the site when talking about their bull shit.
So a platform with nearly 0 barrier to entry, coupled with free marketing from the social media algorithm, and a platform where they can feed off each other and organize… it’s no wonder it’s grown out of control.