That’s about right. That’s been the story for a couple of thousand
years or so. Go back to the oldest recorded texts and see what
happens to people who didn’t march in the parade...like Socrates. Or
take the intellectuals described in the Bible (where they’re called
“prophets”).
There were two types of prophets. One type, who flattered the
kings and either led the parade or cheered it from the sidelines,
were honored and respected. (Much later, they were called false
prophets, but not at the time.) Then there were people like Amos,
who incidentally insisted that he was not a prophet or the son of
one, just a poor shepherd.
True prophets like Amos—“dissident intellectuals,” in modern
terminology—offered both elevated moral lessons, which the people
in power weren’t fond of, and geopolitical analyses that usually
turned out to be pretty accurate, which the people in power were
even less fond of. Naturally, the true prophets were despised,
imprisoned, driven into the desert.
The public also hated the true prophets—they didn’t want to hear
the truth either. Not because they were bad people, but for all the
usual reasons—short-term interest, manipulation, dependence on
power.
The magic answer
I often hear the internet proposed as the one great solution to
society’s problems.
The internet should be taken seriously; like other technologies,
it has lots of opportunities and lots of dangers. You can’t ask, Is a
hammer good or bad? In the hands of somebody who’s building a
house, it’s good; in the hands of a torturer, it’s bad. The internet is
the same. But even used for good, it’s obviously not the solution to
everything.
When we do something, do we have to have a clear idea about the