 For Persuasion, Sally Satel covered how mental health professionals are increasingly being trained to replace “evidence-driven therapeutics” with practices motivated by a specific political ideology. “Trainees are being taught to see patients not as individuals with unique needs, but as avatars of their gender, race, and ethnic groups. Accordingly, more and more counselors encourage their patients to understand their problems as a consequence of an oppressive society. White patients, for instance, are told that their distress stems from their subjugation of others, while black and minority patients are told that their problems stem from being oppressed.” Read the full article here.  For Fast Company, Connie Lin shared the results of a recent study from Yale which suggested that social media feedback mechanisms may be encouraging users to express “moral outrage.” The study found that users who received more “likes” and “retweets” on their posts expressing outrage were more likely to post the same type of content in the future. “‘People with politically moderate friends and followers are more sensitive to social feedback that reinforces their outrage expressions,’ Molly Crockett, a Yale associate professor, said in a statement. ‘This suggests a mechanism for how moderate groups can become politically radicalized over time . . . [through] feedback loops that exacerbate outrage.’” Read the full article here.  For RealClearInvestigations, John Murawski detailed how the advancement of “race equity,” and the suppression of dissent surrounding the issue, is having a chilling effect on American medical professionals. “Such incidents are noteworthy because of their eerily scripted language of moral outrage and public denunciation, coming from the nation’s highest levels of professional achievement, often on internal issues that would typically be handled with sensitivity and discretion.” Read the full article here.  For The Wenatchee World, Rufus Woods reported on the value of hearing diverse political perspectives. Woods cites Braver Angels as one example of an organization that is providing a platform for cross-partisan discussions and respectful disagreements. “As consumers, we have a choice of either remaining in our bubbles and hearing our own views reverberating in the echo chamber or we can take affirmative steps to broaden our sources of information and seek out thoughtful perspectives on both sides of issues.” Read the full article here.  Heterodox Academy released a new video championing the importance of free expression on college and university campuses. “The questioning of ideas is necessary for the project of truth seeking. Even when the ideas being questioned are our deepest, most cherished, even identity forming ideas and beliefs.” Watch the full video here. |
