On Ignorance

Hi all --

The last 20-30 years of living in the United States are pretty much this: right-wing outrages over nothing make people in our lives perpetually angry, paranoid, and–it sounds quaint to say this–ignorant. Trust me, that last problem is very relevant. Not only are we dealing with those who indulge every conspiracy theory possible, but they don't know how to ask questions about anything. Granted, this isn't a phenomenon unique to contemporary conservatism. I know some who can barely understand that I have a job with responsibilities. If I try to tell them I know something, they'll laugh in my face. Those like this who aren't cruelly conservative have been through a lot; they don't know how things work because the opportunity to know better hasn't presented itself properly. I have to cut them some slack even though their lack of respect is unacceptable.

But those bouncing from Fox News to Ben Shapiro to Joe Rogan to every other idiot trying to establish their own celebrity can't be given that sort of grace. It's been nearly 3 decades of garbage media and the human toll is staggering. Whether it is non-stop war or kinetic operations, or family separation, or yelling at poor people while denying them housing and healthcare, or straight-up racism or sexism or homophobia, or stripping public services to the bone, right-wing lies have cost all of us. The game of garbage media is to bully everyone and never stop. Outrage drives ratings, making their audience feel empowered. With that semblance of power, listeners and viewers and readers feel free to indulge their worst selves, dehumanizing everyone they think they're scared of. Not only are they incapable of growth, they're easy recruits to fascism, if they don't collapse in a pile of misery first.

The radicalization of much of the U.S. will take years to undo, but the knowledge problem I spoke of earlier is pressing. It means we have to constantly deal with the bullshit spewed by garbage media and its audience, and I mean bullshit in the technical, Harry Frankfurt sense. It is not merely lies we can disprove. It aims to distract, to overwhelm, to delegitimize. Bullshit is purposeful, toxic nonsense. If I'm caught arguing that people shouldn't be shot in the back for doing nothing wrong, I am fruitlessly fighting "maybe he wanted to kill everyone." In my case, this came from a former military policeman who would be court-martialed if he did anything similar to CBP. He's so taken by right-wing media that he forgot the instruction of his own job. I didn't engage, instead posting this video by someone who worked in the Inspector General's office of DHS:

Bullshit is this sort of argument times a million. "Prove evolution is real," "show me what good vaccines do," "What do you mean Trump won't lower healthcare costs?", "How do you know we have poor people? I saw a guy use food stamps to buy vapes"–these are the forms we encounter in daily conversation, and they are demoralizing to deal with. I can answer your questions but increasingly feel like the human race isn't worth saving as I do. Look at how slick right-wing media is, though. Everything is so much worse because of it. If you didn't know any better, you really would think invading Greenland made sense or there were legitimate reasons to unleash armed force on an American city. They'll talk about the optics of a situation, which gives that air of critical distance defining refined thinkers such as Sean Hannity. Or they'll make you confront statistics without context or present urban legends with the tone of a documentarian. The bullshit is fancier, imbuing its spewers with authority. But the game is the same: it serves to delegitimize far less resourced operations, to put you in a space where you will accept power as an answer because you don't care to find the truth.

At this point you're tired with me. I can hear "WE KNOW ALL THIS STUFF" across space-time, as it is interrupting my game of SimCity. What do we do? You can't have society, let alone a government, when abusive liars can get away with anything. This much I know, and you know it too: it does no good to try to fact check bullshitters and the army they've created. Their instinct is to move the goalposts, to never admit being wrong. They are addicts, dependent on winning their silly little arguments on inconstant terms. How do we identify and cut the source?

If you asked me 20 years ago whether Fox News, conspiracy theory forums, and a steady diet of social media trash would lead to a consolidating authoritarian government over the most powerful country in the world, I would never have guessed things could get this dark. And if you told me it would take no less than the rediscovery of community after innumerable sorrows to stand up to angry uncles who can't stop saying racist shit–that everyone would have to band together to make sure the unacceptable was unacceptable–I wouldn't believe it. That's the complicated thing about the problem of ignorance. It isn't just ignorance. Even "motivated reasoning" doesn't quite grasp how severe what we're dealing with is. There are plenty of people who will sacrifice themselves and their families to formerly eradicated diseases than admit a vaccine might be helpful. And twice now, we have given a lecherous casino owner the nuclear codes.

The very concept of heroes is problematic. Homer saw them as god-men with an inherent right to rule. If humankind was to rule itself, heroes would have to withdraw. But what should interest us is how heroes are made. Not so much through myths, but the recognition of good deeds, good words, and growth. The right-wing limits heroes to whichever media figure they have a parasocial relationship with, whatever make-believe friend will tell them which person serving the homeless deserves nothing but rage. In so many places across the country, we see so many heroes, so many putting their bodies on the line for others they don't even know. People who understand that if you don't have neighbors, you have nothing. It sounds unfitting to say we should look to lionize those who lead the way, who are forced to leave us–it sounds like creepy, manipulative behavior–but the truth is we rarely let people shine in everyday life.

It's not our fault, of course. We're bogged down with work and responsibilities. When we make media, we have a specific thing to say or topic to explore. And so what's happened is something like this: we are more careful with praise while loud assholes make the worst-of-the-worst larger than life figures. But if we're going to get back to the truth, it is going to be through heroes. There needs to be acknowledgment of who does the work, not interviews with influencers or newsmakers, because we must hear what the work is and why it is pressing. I know, when I say it that way, that you can see how little we ask those who we respect to comment on affairs where their guidance is invaluable. If we want knowledge back, we need respect, and if we want respect, we need to model it fully. It isn't enough to simply "give" it in an age which reserves piety for frauds.

I began this meditation far away from the proposition that we would need to respect actual heroes to get back to the truth. I started with the notion that anger, paranoia, and ignorance have created a tidal wave of bullshit which constantly throws us off our guard. I can't tell you that doing a bit more to praise genuine heroes will dispel b.s. for others like sunlight against a vampire. I can tell you it will keep you sane. Heroes can certainly disappoint; I've had to throw away a few. But the ones who will make it did the rarest of rarities in an age which wants you to throw away one product to buy another instantly. Not just last, but command loyalty because it was deserved. So many things are horrible about people who will not change the channel to see what someone else has to say. But they are missing out on one of life's true joys, if not its truest joy: to realize someone else is better and learn from them.