Well here’s something that scares the shit out of me. We live in a time of immense intellectual sophistication, with access to information in manners that are almost infinite, and yet in spite of that, in fact because of that, our species is not only more confused, but more and more of us are throwing in the towel when it comes to the act of critical thinking. You can’t get through the week without encountering some kind of reporting about this from a sociologist or expert on cyber sciences.
The problem we are facing has to do with the truth and the dissemination of propaganda. Because there are multiple biased sources of information, the truth today is easily manipulated and transmitted through multiple believable authors a multiple number of times until the truth becomes unrecognizable and the average person doesn’t know what to believe. What we now have is an enormous population that has given up, and won’t take the time to research the truth. It is just easier then to let passion override reason. Although commentary will almost always point out distortion of the truth is considerably more impactful when it is promoted by an authoritative figure like President Trump, both liberals and conservatives, Republicans and Democrats, are guilty of promoting faulty information.
This is bullshit. Society should be evolving into a higher place. Are we devolving into turkey-like creatures capable of little intellectual activity other than staring at the sky? Ben Franklin said “Being ignorant is not so much a shame as being unwilling to learn.” Our founding fathers understood that democracy critically depends on an informed public. The truth is out there. We need to demand it.
Contact your state congressional representatives. A huge majority of the American public wants to hear from any administration official with personal knowledge of what went on with the Ukrainians, and see related documents. If the president truly wants to be vindicated, that is exactly what is required. Let your elected officials know you want the truth. We should also demand to know what the urgency was in assassinating Qasem Suleimani. We’ve been down this road before with the lying about Tonkin Gulf and WMD in Iraq. Let your official representatives know you want the truth.
If you see some bullshit on Facebook, call it out. Report it. Reply with the demand that the comment in question be fact checked. It’s relatively easy. Tell the author to look at any number of fact checking services- allsides.com and factcheck.org are just two. I have done this a number of times. Every so often I even receive a reply of thanks instead of the usual request that I engage in some form of complicated intercourse with myself.
This is becoming a frightening situation. There are now supposedly intelligent members of congress like Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham publicly stating they do not want to have anything to do with the truth, and even worse, the example of Kevin McCarthy promoting completely debunked Russian conspiracy theories. That is not right, these people should know better, and need to be held accountable. Constituents of districts represented by this type of unsavory misconduct should be embarrassed. Democracy can work, but it is the public’s responsibility to make it work.
“All lies and jests, Still a man hears what he wants to hear, and disregards the rest.” Simon and Garfunkel from The Boxer
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