Claims for the transformatory power of social information packaged up as news are, I fear, much over-rated. It seems much easier to understand as a reframing of arguments that go back to the atomistic impact of the print media — which transforms people into readers and also isolates them.

Still I’m not apolitical — hence my book — I just think we need a healthy dose of realism about our motivations and I’d rather try and rationalise them than romanticise them. (But that too could be just a frustrating psychological trope!)

Don’t you suppose that decision-making follows the distribution of information? Bibles in every home and a few centuries later, members of every home decide whether or not to believe it or how. Apostasy, too, is a choice. Perhaps it is the same thing with politics. To sing the apolitical blues like Lowell George is, of course, a choice.

And by the way, I’m not making these comments to dismiss what you’ve written but, rather, because I find it thought-provoking.

Oddly enough both I and Arthurs legend, two islington Bloggers have dealt with not dissimiliar subjects recently.