AGREEING to DISAGREE

Have we become more disagreeable in the 21st century? Has social media made it harder to change people’s minds?

We have been getting more “disagreeable” for centuries as our societies have become steadily more egalitarian, diverse and disputatious. But the internet and social media have accelerated these trends at warp speed. They give every one of us the power to say what we think instantaneously and globally, and they bring us into contact with many more opinions and controversies in the course of an average day than we have ever faced before. We live in a world that is primed for heated disagreements and neither our culture nor our evolution has prepared us for it.

Have we become more willing to state our case because our societies are generally less top-down? Does this mean respect has to be harder earned?

Some have moved at different