Speaker 1: Welcome to Odd Lots. I'm Tracy Alloway, Executive editor at
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Markets, and I'm Joe wasn't all Managing editor at
Speaker 1: Bloomberg Markets. All right, so Joe, this week we have
Speaker 1: something a little bit different for our listeners. It's not
Speaker 1: entirely markets related, but I think it has a lot
Speaker 1: to do with what is going on in markets right now,
Speaker 1: if that makes any sense, Keep going, okay, alright, So
Speaker 1: this week's episode is actually inspired by a conversation I
Speaker 1: had when I was in London earlier this month. It
Speaker 1: was shortly after the Brexit referendum, which shocked a lot
Speaker 1: of people. The decision by the UK populace to leave
Speaker 1: the EU came as a shock to a lot of people,
Speaker 1: including myself, if I'm a honest. So what happened is
Speaker 1: I was in London. I was talking to someone that
Speaker 1: you actually know, but who shall remain unnamed, someone I
Speaker 1: respect a lot. And this person said they had actually
Speaker 1: voted to leave the EU and it was the last
Speaker 1: person I ever would have thought would vote to leave.
Speaker 1: But then as we started talking, h this person listed
Speaker 1: all the reasons they thought leaving was a good decision,
Speaker 1: including a long drawn out argument about the death of neoliberalism, UM,
Speaker 1: and I realized, you know, my instinctive reaction to hearing
Speaker 1: someone saying that they want to vote to leave is uh,
Speaker 1: you know, incredulity, I guess, And maybe maybe it shouldn't be.
Speaker 1: Everyone has valid reasons, right absolutely, And before we go
Speaker 1: on you further, I'm just hoping that as soon as
Speaker 1: the recording stops on this podcast, you tell me who
Speaker 1: this person is. But I think this is an incredibly
Speaker 1: important topic because I think that when it comes to
Speaker 1: the briggs At referendum, when it comes to politics in
Speaker 1: the US, it's pretty clear that um and elsewhere the world,
Speaker 1: it's pretty clear that people separate themselves into these ideological bubbles.
Speaker 1: And not only do they not know or can imagine
Speaker 1: how someone sees something opposite, they don't even experience the
Speaker 1: They seem to make almost no attempt to understand the
Speaker 1: other side's point of view. And I think this is
Speaker 1: pretty long term ramifications for the media, for democracy, for
Speaker 1: the economy, and probably also for markets. Given how many
Speaker 1: people in the Briggsit referendum, we're completely stunned by the
Speaker 1: results exactly. That's the perfect segue alright, So here with
Speaker 1: us today to talk about why the other side of
Speaker 1: the argument is not necessarily dumb. Is Sean Blanda. He
Speaker 1: is editor in chief of You, which is a publication
Speaker 1: that's dedicated to providing the missing curriculum for creative careers.
Speaker 1: But he is also the author of a really good
Speaker 1: Medium post on this topic that kind of enunciates a
Speaker 1: lot of the ideas that we are discussing right now. Sean,
Speaker 1: Welcome to the program. Very slight to be here. Thank
Speaker 1: you for having me. Well. Sean, you wrote a a
Speaker 1: post on medium about the other side not always being wrong,
Speaker 1: and of course that other side can mean a lot
Speaker 1: of different things. But for many people working in finance
Speaker 1: and the major cities or technology, the other side either
Speaker 1: means the Brexit referendum, or it means voting for Trump
Speaker 1: or something else. So what did you mean in this
Speaker 1: post and why did you write it. I'm a very
Speaker 1: active Twitter user, and a news event would happen, I
Speaker 1: would see coalescing of viewpoints, and then you know, the
Speaker 1: opposition viewpoints starts to filter into that bubble, and then
Speaker 1: I would see it immediately mocked like it was an antibody,
Speaker 1: and I thought things cannot be this simple, and this
Speaker 1: is right. This is right before Brexit, where when this happened,
Speaker 1: and the notion that the other side had something to
Speaker 1: say was not even crossing people's mind. So one thing
Speaker 1: I did is I followed people that I disagreed with
Speaker 1: on Twitter, and I found that things would come up
Speaker 1: and it would change my mind. As an example, the
Speaker 1: recent debate around gun control. Um, you know, as has
Speaker 1: been well documented, there were four gun control bills put
Speaker 1: on the floor of the House. People were arguing about it,
Speaker 1: and initially I was on one side of that, which is, yes,
Speaker 1: let's let's heavily regulate guns through this no fly list.
Speaker 1: And then someone posited, how's that no fly list mandated? Who?
Speaker 1: What judicial oversight? And I was like, oh, I would
Speaker 1: not have thought of that if I was not following
Speaker 1: together side. I this this thing is more complex than
Speaker 1: I thought. The other side is not just a bunch
Speaker 1: of buffoons that don't agree with me. They have nuanced
Speaker 1: political views as well, and I've seen that born out
Speaker 1: again and again, and Exit is the latest example of that.
Speaker 1: So when we talk about opinions sort of coalescing on
Speaker 1: either side, why do you think that happens? Is it
Speaker 1: just human nature, like it's in our nature to cluster
Speaker 1: around people who are similar to us and you know,
Speaker 1: maybe socioeconomic status and also their opinions. Yes, and I
Speaker 1: think in the past it was harder to do that
Speaker 1: because we didn't pick and choose are the media we
Speaker 1: consumed and less of the people we hung out with.
Speaker 1: I mean, especially for kind of the young media savvy
Speaker 1: person who's very transient. You can pick your friends and
Speaker 1: pick the news you you view, and you can summarily
Speaker 1: reject whole outlets and just kind of stick to things
Speaker 1: that appeal to you. And at first that doesn't have
Speaker 1: such a bad impact, but as years and years go on,
Speaker 1: you are totally divorced from some people's realities. And you
Speaker 1: saw this in Brexit, where people felt, you know, left
Speaker 1: behind by some of the economic prosperity that some other
Speaker 1: people have enjoyed. And if you were amongst and surrounded
Speaker 1: by only people who have enjoyed that, you could not
Speaker 1: even fathom why someone would want to change the situation
Speaker 1: as it is, Um, what do you think this? So
Speaker 1: I've certainly noticed the same phenomenon. I mean, you know,
Speaker 1: I'm on Facebook like everyone else, and I watched the
Speaker 1: instant reactions to things. And I watched the sort of
Speaker 1: widespread dismay among my social circles that the idea that
Speaker 1: um the UK would vote to leave the EU. What
Speaker 1: is it? Worries me because I think like long term
Speaker 1: about democracy and I for what it's worth. I don't
Speaker 1: think it's just, you know, I don't think it's just
Speaker 1: the elites are the sort of sort of like Chelismpaul
Speaker 1: and elites, because you witness like the same sort of
Speaker 1: like um uh, sort of snyde caricatures of the other
Speaker 1: side by the other side. The fact that we use
Speaker 1: the word elites and right can laugh it off is
Speaker 1: one example of that exactly. But what do you think this? Ultimately?
Speaker 1: I worry about, like what does it do for democracy
Speaker 1: if people can wall themselves into these worlds in which
Speaker 1: no competing ideas can enter the debate. I think you lose,
Speaker 1: You lose empathy for the people around you in a
Speaker 1: way that you can't even fathom. And I think the
Speaker 1: way there's I think we all have issues that are
Speaker 1: controversial in which when you see it affect you or
Speaker 1: someone around you, it can change your mind. And that
Speaker 1: can be something like your dad doesn't have healthcare, and
Speaker 1: what does that mean? What does the struggle you go through.
Speaker 1: Or one of your friends is unfairly arrested and jailed,
Speaker 1: what does that mean to and you explore the judicial
Speaker 1: process for the first time and you go, oh my god,
Speaker 1: this group of people had a point or I see
Speaker 1: it through their lens now, and now I think the
Speaker 1: only way that happens to us is when it directly
Speaker 1: happens to us, and we're stopping to take people's word
Speaker 1: for for it sometimes and assuming that their intention is
Speaker 1: malice or at worst stupidity. That that then you only
Speaker 1: enforce policy positions, follow news that reinforces your worldview because
Speaker 1: you just can't even imagine what it's like not to
Speaker 1: have your worldview. And what's worse is you don't even
Speaker 1: know there is another worldview. You feel like you're in
Speaker 1: the supermajority and there's these fringe nut wackos that are
Speaker 1: in the minority, and who are they? They're ridiculous. I'm
Speaker 1: the smart one. So we've sort of touched on this,
Speaker 1: but how much does social media actually play into this dynamic?
Speaker 1: Because you know, we all use Twitter, we all use Facebook,
Speaker 1: we all have our sort of personally curated selection of
Speaker 1: news nowadays, and a lot of it comes to us
Speaker 1: through our friends and our contacts. Does that end up
Speaker 1: hardening the lines between different opinions different groups? I would say,
Speaker 1: if you let it. Because one thing is, you know,
Speaker 1: we live in New York City. I don't know anyone
Speaker 1: who I'm not related to that lives in a rural area.
Speaker 1: So social media is great because I can seek out
Speaker 1: people who live in areas not like New York City
Speaker 1: and see the things that they care about, the things
Speaker 1: they're struggling with. So it's good. But I can very
Speaker 1: easily say this person is a nut job. I'm going
Speaker 1: to block them, like we literally have the word block
Speaker 1: and mute. I think one thing, you know, it's worth
Speaker 1: pointing out that I think these this phenomenon is not
Speaker 1: as simple as there's the cosmopolitan elites and everyone who else.
Speaker 1: I I used to live in Vermont and so almost
Speaker 1: all of my high school friends are lots of them
Speaker 1: were huge Bernie Sanders supporters. And what I noticed during
Speaker 1: the campaign. I mean, obviously they were vociferously pro Sanders
Speaker 1: and many of them very anti Hillary. But what I noticed,
Speaker 1: not just dad, was they had like basically convinced themselves
Speaker 1: that he was winning for much of the race. There's
Speaker 1: a lot of Bernie math skets and things like that,
Speaker 1: Bernie math and so it wasn't just that they only
Speaker 1: they saw, you know, they the ideological arguments, but that
Speaker 1: actual reality of what was happening with votes that were
Speaker 1: counted were numbers. They had a completely different perspective on
Speaker 1: than what was getting through the mainstream media. And I
Speaker 1: think a lot of reporters cover politics, We'll say they like,
Speaker 1: you know, got a lot of anger from the Berneu
Speaker 1: Sanders supporters because they thought they were just lying or
Speaker 1: making it up the various numbers. Yeah right, you you
Speaker 1: build your own reality. And then this is a this
Speaker 1: is a side effect of the skepticism where you're you
Speaker 1: think the media is against people like me. Everyone's against
Speaker 1: people like me, because everyone I know like me feels
Speaker 1: this way, So there must be something here. You saw
Speaker 1: something similar in their run up to the twelve election,
Speaker 1: where there was a lot of people that were convinced
Speaker 1: m Ronnie is gonna win in a landslide becauseveryone they
Speaker 1: knew was yeah, yeah, right, And and they pick and
Speaker 1: choose the news they had and that's obviously not what happened,
Speaker 1: So I agree. I I think I used the the
Speaker 1: Cosmopolitan not Cosmopolitan, because I'm simply acknowledging how I came
Speaker 1: to it, which is through my filter bubble. I lived
Speaker 1: in New York before years. Previously, I lived in Philadelphia
Speaker 1: for seven years, so for my entire adult life, I've
Speaker 1: been part of a large city. But I agree with
Speaker 1: you entirely well. We saw an example of this alternate
Speaker 1: reality dynamic earlier this month when Andrea led some of
Speaker 1: the former Conservative Party leader candidate basically said that Sterling
Speaker 1: had performed absolutely fine in the aftermath of Brexit, and
Speaker 1: anyone um with access to a Bloomberg terminal or basic
Speaker 1: finance data could see that that really wasn't true. Do people,
Speaker 1: I mean, what what do we actually do when this happens?
Speaker 1: Is there any way to fact check these things? Do
Speaker 1: people care about fact checking anymore? I mean, I think
Speaker 1: the answers no. But I think that was the most
Speaker 1: common response to the piece was what happens when they're
Speaker 1: actually wrong? Like what happens when I'm trying to give
Speaker 1: into a draining outside and it's really not I can
Speaker 1: I can empirically say that, and to that, I would say,
Speaker 1: you know, I think it's helpful to figure out why
Speaker 1: a person is motivated to get to that conclusion and
Speaker 1: then attack that motivation rather than the misfect. Why does
Speaker 1: that particular person what what what reason do they have? What?
Speaker 1: What reason do Bernie Sanders fans have to believe that
Speaker 1: he's winning? I mean, the obviously the answer is pretty obvious,
Speaker 1: but I think it has a sound gripe in how
Speaker 1: he might be treated by the main the larger media
Speaker 1: outlets at large, right, And that's just the manifestation of that,
Speaker 1: And I think too often we attack the manifestation without
Speaker 1: looking at the core reason. You Know, something I've wondered
Speaker 1: about is is this just going to get worse and
Speaker 1: worse because it doesn't seem like there's an obvious mechanism
Speaker 1: out there to solve it. And you think about the
Speaker 1: speed at which technology is advancing, like virtual reality, it
Speaker 1: seems like or um or payment systems or communication systems
Speaker 1: that can connect the ideologically like minded across the world
Speaker 1: even faster. It seems like there's just more and more
Speaker 1: opportunities proliferating for people to create their own worlds and
Speaker 1: inhabit spaces, whether physical or technological, in which you can
Speaker 1: more more finely tune uh what gets in and the
Speaker 1: other people in them. I think I think we're going
Speaker 1: to develop This is me being extremely optimistic, and people
Speaker 1: listening to this might roll their eyes, but I think
Speaker 1: we're going to develop the muscles as a media consuming
Speaker 1: public to start to recognize that this is happening and
Speaker 1: when this is happening, And I think I think something
Speaker 1: like Brexit is a good wake up call to that
Speaker 1: where I know I had no my media consumption that
Speaker 1: I like, I thought it was a guarantee that the
Speaker 1: answer was remained right. I thought it was guaranteed. So
Speaker 1: when that happens, I'm like, oh, what what am I
Speaker 1: consuming about this? And what media am I consuming and
Speaker 1: actively searching out other Now I know that's kind of
Speaker 1: altruistic and that puts a lot of responsibility on the individual,
Speaker 1: a busy individual that may have other things going on.
Speaker 1: But I I think we're going to develop a muscle
Speaker 1: the similar way we do with I don't know, bad
Speaker 1: content on television, Like we know that if our kids
Speaker 1: are up at ten pm, they might see bad content
Speaker 1: and we should we should police that change the channel.
Speaker 1: I think we're going to find that that that process
Speaker 1: as a society, I hope. So is this the awkward
Speaker 1: teenage phase in our new media consumption? We just have
Speaker 1: to sort of grow into it. Yeah, I mean, and
Speaker 1: you can see it in things we thought were established.
Speaker 1: I mean I just walked here and I saw, you know,
Speaker 1: twenty people walk around with their Pokemon go on their phone, right,
Speaker 1: And and your inclination is to be like, that's ridiculous,
Speaker 1: that's crazy, that's a fat But that kind of shows
Speaker 1: like how nascent the medium is of cameras on phones, right,
Speaker 1: Like we just we just figured out this super great
Speaker 1: game that allows people to talk to each other. You know,
Speaker 1: you mentioned walking outside and seeing that, And I've had
Speaker 1: this thought before. You know, if you're like, if you're
Speaker 1: on the if you're online all day, you see people
Speaker 1: are just like raging at each other and fighting the characture. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then like you sort of step outside and you
Speaker 1: see people going about their business, You're like, oh, maybe
Speaker 1: this is not really Everybody is like yeah, people are polite,
Speaker 1: And I often feel like there's this dichotomy, like people
Speaker 1: get upset at things online that I've never once seen
Speaker 1: someone get upset for in real life and people are
Speaker 1: offline and I see, like people like a level of
Speaker 1: civility and empathy offline and just when I'm going out
Speaker 1: my day to day business and I'm like, actually, maybe
Speaker 1: people aren't that bad, and I'd like, I'd like, God,
Speaker 1: I'd like to think that online we're just going to
Speaker 1: start to realize, you know. I think I think there's
Speaker 1: a group of people that whenever you see something that
Speaker 1: disagrees with you online, you have to be like, I
Speaker 1: have to answer that, I have to set them right.
Speaker 1: And maybe the mechanism if someone was going down the
Speaker 1: street young something you didn't agree with you, like, they're
Speaker 1: probably having a rough day, Like I just gotta let
Speaker 1: that go, Like I'll talk to them when cooler heads prevail.
Speaker 1: I think they're the manners and social graces will are
Speaker 1: are only now starting to come together. And I think
Speaker 1: it does occasionally take an event to make an individual
Speaker 1: old person realize where their blind spots are. But the
Speaker 1: downside while we figure this out is that we do
Speaker 1: have um potentially dangerous populism sort of bubbling to the surface,
Speaker 1: and it seems like people are getting more and more
Speaker 1: angry with each other. And that's actually you know, it's
Speaker 1: happening online, but it's translating into real life and our
Speaker 1: actual political situation. So there's some urgency here. And I
Speaker 1: think I think the I mean the events of the
Speaker 1: past week, you've seen unity on a on a larger scale,
Speaker 1: you know, calls for togetherness. Now, how that togetherness happens
Speaker 1: obviously is a whole other can of worms, But I
Speaker 1: think I think it goes back to finding the root
Speaker 1: calls for why people are divisive? What what is? What
Speaker 1: is the thing? What is the reason? You know? I live?
Speaker 1: Has been made about people economically hurting and then taking
Speaker 1: it out in certain ways or Yeah, I just I
Speaker 1: just feel if we recognize the people across from us
Speaker 1: as human beings with nuance opinions that have read things
Speaker 1: you haven't read, it to watch movies that you haven't watched,
Speaker 1: that have had tragedies happened to them that haven't happened
Speaker 1: to you, and taking a second go, maybe there's some
Speaker 1: summation of their life experiences, life experiences that have led
Speaker 1: them there and being empathetic to that. And that's hard
Speaker 1: to do a hund forty characters, I will grant you,
Speaker 1: but just knowing that that's possible, that that's even a
Speaker 1: possibility is something I don't feel like a lot of
Speaker 1: people are doing. They just summarily reject the thing that happens.
Speaker 1: What I've had. I had a couple of people share
Speaker 1: the piece you wrote, and I think it resonated with
Speaker 1: a lot of people. Um, what kind of reactions have
Speaker 1: you had? Did people? Were there people who? Because I
Speaker 1: mean I could see it going kind of two ways
Speaker 1: where they're like, yeah, this is a real issue. Or
Speaker 1: another reaction is I'm all for empathy, but why should
Speaker 1: I try to see the perspective of racist, xenophobic knuckle draggers. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And so I'm curious, like, what kind of reaction do
Speaker 1: you got? So there's a line right where? And I
Speaker 1: think racism is that line when someone just being outright
Speaker 1: racist me reasoning with you might not go anywhere. And
Speaker 1: I think that line is further back than people think.
Speaker 1: I think people advocate for certain you know, policy positions
Speaker 1: or the certain ways the country should work, and they're
Speaker 1: rejected as being out of touch or dumb or naive.
Speaker 1: And I think that all I'm asking is like take
Speaker 1: the step path that And I think I think I
Speaker 1: think that patience is what's needed. And it's easy to
Speaker 1: say that when someone's not being racist towards you, and
Speaker 1: I grant that a million times out of a million,
Speaker 1: but I just I just think dismissing someone as stupid
Speaker 1: or bigoted or not having all the facts, like, just
Speaker 1: take take a second, I guess all I would. So
Speaker 1: what was the reaction like, So the reaction there was
Speaker 1: two bits of reaction, which were three bits of reaction,
Speaker 1: which you're interesting overwhelmingly, which is very thankful when you
Speaker 1: write stuff and this doesn't normally happen, but people like
Speaker 1: this was great, this was helpful, thank you, And some
Speaker 1: people were said, I noticed I do this in my
Speaker 1: own life when this was happening gamer Gate was going
Speaker 1: on in full then, so a lot of people reached
Speaker 1: out to me about that. We're like, oh, I understand
Speaker 1: the other uh part. Now. Secondly, was what I said before,
Speaker 1: what happens when they're just wrong, factually wrong, And what
Speaker 1: I would say is get to the point of why
Speaker 1: they believe what they believe. And then third, I think
Speaker 1: the most troubling aspect of this is people who were
Speaker 1: closed minded used that article as a weapon to say
Speaker 1: why people that weren't them were closed minded, right, which
Speaker 1: is like an infinite loop. Yeah, which and I purposely
Speaker 1: try to as best I can use the language of
Speaker 1: the other side, because the other side is different things
Speaker 1: to different people. But then people use that to justify
Speaker 1: the fact that, like, more people should listen to me.
Speaker 1: You see, I'm I'm part of the other side. You
Speaker 1: should take me seriously. But everyone thinks the other side,
Speaker 1: and everyone thinks that they're the marginalized one exactly, and
Speaker 1: and some people are right, but it's it's I've had
Speaker 1: people say thank you for this article. I use this
Speaker 1: to uh, you know, all those those damn feminazis online.
Speaker 1: I finally I should I said this to all of
Speaker 1: them to shut them up. And I'm like, did you
Speaker 1: listen to what they were saying, you know, to take
Speaker 1: up take a minute? Why did they feel that way?
Speaker 1: Just just just don't don't use this as another weapon. Alright,
Speaker 1: a plead for some civility on the internet. Why don't
Speaker 1: we leave it there, Sean, thank you so much for
Speaker 1: joining us, Thanks for having me. Thank you, Joe. I
Speaker 1: know that wasn't as market see as a lot of
Speaker 1: our other episodes, but what do you think about that.
Speaker 1: I think this is just such an important topic because,
Speaker 1: as I was saying before, it's really hard to be
Speaker 1: that optimistic about democracy if these trends towards walling yourself
Speaker 1: off to only like minded argument and only facts that
Speaker 1: could support your side. If we continue with that trend,
Speaker 1: it seems like a certain um level of valuing debate
Speaker 1: and a certain some degree of a shared set of
Speaker 1: effects seems to be sort of a crucial ingredient. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and I think this idea of the Balkanization of opinions
Speaker 1: is incredibly relevant now obviously in politics for democracy, as
Speaker 1: you pointed out, but again also when it comes to investing.
Speaker 1: And I know that there have been reams written about
Speaker 1: confirmation bias and investing cognitive biases, that sort of thing.
Speaker 1: But really it seems more important than ever to kind
Speaker 1: of stop and think about what the other side is saying.
Speaker 1: And if you manage to do that right, if you
Speaker 1: managed to gauge increasingly divided public opinions correctly, you could
Speaker 1: make a lot of money, and um, maybe you could
Speaker 1: come to understand your fellow man a little bit more
Speaker 1: as well. Yeah. The bregsit um, the breggsit vote obviously
Speaker 1: a huge opportunity for people to make money had they
Speaker 1: had a different perspective than the mainstream, you know, even
Speaker 1: within investing in economics. It's kind of fascinating how people
Speaker 1: form certain camps like the gold camp or the anti
Speaker 1: fed camp, or the tech camp or whatever. And so
Speaker 1: I think that there is probably almost always an opportunity
Speaker 1: for profit if you force yourself out of um how
Speaker 1: you think. And I know, like I've changed my mind
Speaker 1: many issues relating to both politics and economics. Big mind changes, uh,
Speaker 1: over the years, and I think I'm better for it.
Speaker 1: All Right, we'll do Joe Wisenthal Mind Changes episode sometime
Speaker 1: later this year. But maybe, all right, I just write
Speaker 1: a post twenty big things have changed my mind on that.
Speaker 1: Well I would read that. Yeah, well it was. It
Speaker 1: was great talking with you, Tracy. This has been another
Speaker 1: episode of the Odd Loves Podcast. I'm Joe Wisenthal. You
Speaker 1: can find me on Twitter at the Stalwarts, and I'm
Speaker 1: Tracy Alloway. I'm on Twitter at Tracy Alloway. You can
Speaker 1: find Sean on Twitter at Sean Blend. Thanks for listening. Yeah,