Are We Reaching A Turning Point In The Politics Of Outrage?

According to Betteridge’s law of headlines, the answer is “No.” But it appears that there a growing number of pundits who agree with me about the negative utility of political outrage.

Earlier this month Slate published a beautiful recap of 2014 as “The Year of Outrage.” (hat/tip @NickSacco55) A giant grid depicts their dutiful tracking of what they considered the most outrage-inducing story of every single day of the year, It’s stunning to look back at all the outrages I forgot about or never knew about in the first place. It’s interesting to ponder how many of the ephemeral outrages I avoided with my blogging hiatus.

It’s illuminating to see the stupid outrages side-by-side with the serious ones.

Throughout the piece(s), there’s a mournful tone about how the silly outrages distracted from the genuinely important issues (which naturally are the ones featuring the greatest crimes against Slate’s writer’s progressive political positions). Their conclusion is relevant for pundits of all stripes:

it’s fascinating to look at how our collective responses skipped from the serious to the picayune without much modulation in pitch.

When everything is outrageous, nothing is.

But it’s not just liberals who are questioning the long-term value of our obsession with outrage. Mollie Hemingway took on those trying to tie the NYPD police murders to Democratic politicians, reminding us of a similar Palin-blame game and asking if we can all “try to see the best in each other’s arguments.” An Atlantic feature on Erick Erickson noted that the Red State hero has been questioning the anger that made him famous:

In August, he wrote, “I increasingly find conflict between my faith and some conservative discourse.” He cited the right-wing furor over undocumented minors, Ebola, and the protests in Ferguson, Missouri…

He told me about a man who had come up to him to rant about immigrants ruining schools and neighborhoods. “I’m like, ‘Why are you so angry?’ ” He thinks conservatives suffer from a persecution complex…

Most of our modern political groups do. I’m encouraged to see more pundits recognizing the problems of outrage. Perhaps the movement will continue to grow, though I suspect the demand remains too strong for such things. Nash equilibria do not tolerate vacuums. Even if Red State manages to fend off the temptations to keep peddling its own outrage, will that just send more readers to the Matt Walshes of the world? Or can leaders like Erickson help bring down the demand curve while shutting off the supply?

2 thoughts on “Are We Reaching A Turning Point In The Politics Of Outrage?”

  1. Have you seen Scott Alexander’s post “Toxoplasma of Rage”? I won’t say I agree with everything he says, but he does make some interesting points on the topic. He also has a follow-up post called “Nobody is Perfect, Everything is Commensurable.”

    Speaking only for myself, I pulled away from a lot of politics this year, and the outrage was a part of that decision. Outrage takes energy, and partisan outrage seems to take the most with the least to show for it.

    One of Scott Alexander’s images was of everyone shouting at the TV before social media. For decades, our media market was structured to promote outrage because it increased viewers with few ill effects. But now, social media allows that outrage to live on past the evening news, and we’ve yet to learn how to deal with that. But I think we are learning, and there will come a time when we look back on the Outrageous Years and laugh at how seriously we took ourselves.

  2. Have you seen Scott Alexander’s post “Toxoplasma of Rage”? I won’t say I agree with everything he says, but he does make some interesting points on the topic. He also has a follow-up post called “Nobody is Perfect, Everything is Commensurable.”

    Speaking only for myself, I pulled away from a lot of politics this year, and the outrage was a part of that decision. Outrage takes energy, and partisan outrage seems to take the most with the least to show for it.

    One of Scott Alexander’s images was of everyone shouting at the TV before social media. For decades, our media market was structured to promote outrage because it increased viewers with few ill effects. But now, social media allows that outrage to live on past the evening news, and we’ve yet to learn how to deal with that. But I think we are learning, and there will come a time when we look back on the Outrageous Years and laugh at how seriously we took ourselves.

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