When Henry David Thoreau wrote Civil Disobedience , he was reacting to something. That something was the pressure for conformity as it existed in his time.
One of the things he focused on, was the most extreme example of conformity in human behavior, the rituals of the military. What is more extreme in enforced conformity than close order drill of soldiers marching, or, in our times, folding a flag removed from a coffin at a burial ceremony, where they attempt to look like robots.? No dance floor robots are more stylized than these performing soldiers.
So when he spoke of the ideal of patriotism, he said the real patriot was not the man who seeks to become a "wooden soldier" but the man who serves his country by thinking for himself. He was thinking at the time of the war against Mexico, which he thought was an outrage. He was saying before you turn yourself into some sort of robot, marching off to war, think first: Is this war something our nation ought to be doing?
This is a heavy burden, much more difficult than simply echoing--you have to hear both sides, weigh the arguments and then judge.
In our past election, it was clear many voters heard only Rush Limbaugh, but never tuned into Jon Stewart or Stephen Colbert. Many, but fortunately, not most.
They are listening still to only one side and not thinking. And when enough people do this, everyone stops thinking, eventually.
It is fashionable to say, well, but both liberals and conservatives do this, stop listening. This is why PBS and the News Hour try to have a David Brooks and a Mark Shields exchanging views, but they stopped really examining long ago--they simply exchange pithy quips.
That is what blogs might do. Certainly not twitter. Real discussion requires length, duration and time.
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