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About The Observer. (La Grande, Or.) 1968-current | View Entire Issue (Aug. 25, 2020)
Opinion 4A Tuesday, August 25, 2020 My Voice Science begins to explain why we act the way we do uman beings are wired to belong. We are social animals. This is obvious. But the depth and impact of this fact is not obvious and is only now being teased out by science, and it explains a lot. Children form groups or cliques almost immedi- ately (as shown in, for example, the famous Robbers Cave Study). Adults form groups over JOEL RICE almost nothing LA GRANDE (even the color of napkin they are given). Humans in the same group frequently dress alike, have similar political beliefs, buy similar vehicles. They respond very differently to people in their group than they do to people outside their group. Members of opposing groups tend to get very angry at each other if they disagree. Members of social groups tend to socialize almost exclusively with each other. One unfortunate aspect of groups is that members of groups think they are in general better, smarter or more capable than members of other groups. “Those” are the “stupid people” who believe “x.” Group members even believe they are the one group exempt from group thinking. Different parts of the brain light up in response to faces, opinions and countless other things of those “in our group” as opposed to those “out of our group.” We are largely unconscious of our bias toward outsiders and rationalize our opinions. In the past men ratio- nalized not allowing women to vote or own property as natural. They were not consciously aware of any problem with this. Slave owners likely believed they were doing what was natural. They were not aware of their horrible bias. It is stunning to read sermons of pastors in the South before the Civil War using the Bible to defend slavery. The Nazis believed what they were doing was completely natural. We all swim in highly irrational “group think” like fish swim in water — and, like water to the fish, we just don’t see it. No matter where scientists and travelers have gone in the world they have found this same tendency to form groups with a core feature being an opposition to or struggle with another group. There is no in-group without an out-group. Humans and their forbearers evolved first in small hunter-gatherer groups of between 30 and 300 people. They lived like this for 1-2 million years with little change in their tools or technology. Agriculture began 10,000-12,000 years ago. Agricultural civili- zations began around 5,000-6,000 years ago. Money or coinage developed around 2,500-3,000 years ago. With the development of coinage, then technology, the complexity of societies exploded. Evolution of humans occurs at a very slow process. Over the 1-2 million years that the human lineage were hunter-gatherers there was time for the brain to adapt to its environment, and likely much of the way we are “hard wired” has to do with evolutionary pres- sures during that time period. Over the 6,000 years of large society development there has not been time for significant evolutionary change in the way the brain is hard wired. Members of small hunter-gatherer tribes had facial recognition of all members of the tribe and knew most of them well. Trustworthiness of tribe members was well understood by all tribesmen. Successful hunters shared their meat. There was tremendous social cohe- sion and comradery much like a military squad or platoon. As societies became more complex our hunt- er-gatherer brains kept things simple. Did you vote for Trump? Are you a Seahawks fan? Are you a Dem- ocrat? Are you for gun control? Do you do yoga? Do you keep your lawn nice? This is how the hunter-gatherer brain keeps track of tribal membership. Starting with very small dif- ferences, through interaction, individuals begin to develop group norms, roles and attitudes, which define the group and are internalized to influence behavior. We develop bright lines of “us vs. them.” And we do not see the random, irrational basis of this group formation, a random artifact of our evolutionary past no longer helpful. About the Author Joel Rice of La Grande is a psychiatrist and oper- ates addiction recovery and mental health clinics in La Grande and Pendleton. H Other Views Why an anti-trust safe harbor is the answer the news business needs ews consumption is growing exponentially, but for the past decade, the revenue to news publishers has been on a decline. This is, in large part, because of the unbal- anced relationship between news pub- lishers and tech platforms. But that N DAVID CHAVERN NEWS MEDIA ALLIANCE relationship could be changing thanks to the bipartisan introduction of the Journalism Competition and Preserva- tion Act. U.S. House Resolution 2054 was introduced by House Antitrust Sub- committee Chairman David Cicil- line, D-Rhode Island, and former House Judiciary Committee Ranking Member Doug Collins, R-Georgia. A bipartisan companion Senate bill, S. 1700, was also introduced by Sen. John Neely Kennedy, R-Louisiana, member of the Senate Judiciary Com- mittee; and Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minnesota, ranking member of the Senate Antitrust Subcommittee. The bill, which would provide news publishers a safe harbor to col- lectively negotiate with platforms such as Google and Facebook, could help news producers receive the fair distri- Speak out! Do you have a point you’d like to make or an issue you feel strongly about? Submit a letter to the editor or a guest column. Our contact information is below. bution and monetization terms we’ve long been fighting to get from the duopoly. Because of their market domi- nance — and access to billions of users — the major tech platforms set the rules for news publishers and determine how journalism is dis- played, prioritized and monetized. They also capture the vast majority of all digital advertising dollars because of their unique ability to col- lect consumer data across the web. All of this has degraded the rela- tionship between news readers and publishers and rewarded low quality “clickbait” over quality informa- tion from real journalists. It has also greatly reduced the financial ability of publishers to invest in newsrooms at a time when our society most needs great, substantive reporting. It is simply not possible for any individual news publisher to change the basic terms offered by the online behemoths. They are simply much too big and much too influential. However, there is power in num- bers, which is what we need in order to have a fighting chance. The anti- trust safe harbor bill would provide a four-year window for news pub- lishers to collectively negotiate for fair terms that would flow earned subscription and advertising dollars back to the publishers, while pro- tecting and preserving Americans’ right to access quality news. Param- eters included in the bill ensure that these negotiations would strictly benefit Americans and news pub- lishers at-large, not just one or a few publishers. The JCPA has until the end of the year to pass the 116th Congress, and we need our representatives to act now to support journalism’s future. If passed, this bill would allow our industry to more fully con- trol our product by allowing market forces, not two companies, to deter- mine how and for what price our content is offered. It would allow everyone from small local publica- tions to major online publishers the opportunity to receive a return on their investment and therefore sus- tain quality journalism, which is nec- essary for an informed democracy and civic society. About the Author David Chavern is president and CEO of the News Media Alliance. Contact your public officials U.S. PRESIDENT U.S. REPRESENTATIVE Donald Trump The White House 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW Washington, DC 20500 Comments: 202-456-1111 Greg Walden 185 Rayburn House Office Building Washington, DC 20515 202-225-6730 La Grande office: 541-624-2400 U.S. SENATORS Ron Wyden 221 Dirksen Senate Office Bldg. Washington, DC 20510 202-224-5244 La Grande office: 541-962-7691 Jeff Merkley 313 Hart Senate Office Building Washington, DC 20510 202-224-3753 Pendleton office: 541-278-1129
