Affiliation:
1. University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Section of Integrated Ethics, USA
Abstract
Under conditions of high social and political polarization, expressing political anger online toward systemic injustice faces an apparent trilemma: Express none but lose anger's valuable goods; express anger to heterogeneous audiences but risk aggravating inter-group polarization; or express anger to like-minded people but succumb to the epistemic pitfalls and extremist tendencies inherent to homogeneous groups. Solving the trilemma requires cultivating an online environment as a deliberative system composed of four kinds of groups—each with distinct purposes and norms. I argue that applying empirically-guided design principles to this systems framework provides political anger a place where its powers can serve justice without damaging the epistemic, ethical, emotional, and community resources required for a democratic path to correcting systemic injustice.