Sociologyspeaking topic
Crisis narratives like the friendship recession survive even when newer data contradicts them. Why do we prefer believing things are getting worse?
— X/Twitter discourse
practice with this topic
Set the timer (5-30 min), take 20 seconds of prep if you like, start talking. Jot your thoughts onto the sticky-note board.
similar topics
- Adorno's concept of pseudo-individuality: do the styles, songs, and tastes we think make us different actually come from the same mold? Has individuality become an illusion?
- The male loneliness epidemic is real to some and a myth to others, and each side has statistics. Whose job is it to fix men's friendships?
- Relationship tests like the bird test tell you to check whether your partner looks up when you point at the sky. Why are we outsourcing judgment about our own relationships to viral formulas?
- Marcuse's one-dimensional man: as comfort and consumption keep us content, are we forgetting how to think critically? Could comfort itself be a tool of domestication?
- Foucault's panopticon: why does a prisoner who never knows whether he is being watched start disciplining himself? Is the possibility of surveillance a more powerful tool of control than surveillance itself?