Exit The Echo Chamber Challenge

Editor's note: Tomorrow begins a week of tough challenges designed to for us to all get out of our comfort zone, and with any luck, expand it. Echo chambers got us to where we are in politics, and it's time to make our exit, y'all. Nobody is saying you have to participate in this challenge but we hope you will. 

Keep it nuanced. That's all we've ever asked of you.

But this show does not exist in solitude. We are one of the millions of spaces that compose the internet, and if you've ever taken a stroll around this universe you know that it's tribal. Just like in regular society we tend to flock with birds of a feather - whether those similarities present themselves in skin color, hobbies, political ideologies, economic classes, or any other factors - birds of a feather echo together. We sing the same song because we know it, it feels comfortable, we can hum along and never feel out of place, awkward, challenged, or threatened. 

Enter Exit The Echo Chamber Challenge.

A week's worth of challenges to help us better engage those who believe differently than us, to consume information we normally zoom past in our newsfeeds and timelines, channels we click past while channel surfing. Echo Chambers cause us to make quick judgments based on surface values. Imagine if that instead of relying on the first thing that came to your mind about someone who held different beliefs than you, you added 2, 3, 4 or 5 things? What would you do with that extra information? Would it change your opinions? Would it bring you closer to that person? Would it make a difference? Maybe it would and maybe it wouldn't, but the point is we ALL have to try harder. 

Our challenge is centered around 3 goals:

1. To better ourselves

2. To better our community

3. To better our world. 

Our goal is not to try to change people's minds. It's not to be correct. It's not to troll. It's to engage and learn from others, and learn more about ourselves in the process. And it's going to be HARD. 

During tomorrow's episode we'll go into more detail about the challenges. We'll be posting blogs and updates via social media. And we'll be with you every step of the way. Remember, we want this to be something we all do together, and if you don't feel comfortable with that it's OK. We encourage you to share screenshots, emails, social posts, whatever you can to let us know how you're doing with the challenge. Let's make our exit, y'all