A Small Town in the Philippines Banned Gossip
At a small enough level, you can maintain standards of conduct that are civil and fair. Once you reach a certain size, you lose the cohesion and accountability that makes someone feel like they need to be civil. Maybe part of solving that problem is making everyone part of a group where they are accountable and then making that group accountable to a larger group and so on until the largest group is accountable to society as a whole.<p>Some organized crime groups work this way as a way of controlling the incidence of violence, but the bonds between the members is stronger, in some sense than the bonds between casual acquaintances in the groups we form on a day-to-day basis.<p>I was thinking about how Facebook and YouTube are delisting and otherwise punishing creators of “fake news” and while it certainly seems a way of punishing and silencing unpopular thoughts and opinions, I do wonder whether a tightly controlled Facebook is the solution to society’s ills. I see people on Twitter being defamed for their speech or actions and I wonder if that is where we start to get our accountability back at a societal level? Where else do we have a group where everyone can be held accountable?