Friday, December 2, 2016

And Speaking of Our Post-Truth World

Yesterday's post dealt with the challenges real journalism faces in this era of presidential prevarications and attacks on the media.

The following video, via Mother Jones, shows what critical thinkers everywhere have to contend with.



Considering the above, we, as a species, clearly have little to be arrogant about.

6 comments:

  1. That woman exhibits what I suspect is a good deal of conditioning that seems widespread across the US. It's as though some malevolent mind found an additive that could be put in milk to erase logic and critical thinking. This woman has become so undiscerning that she gets her information from Facebook and she sees nothing wrong with that, nothing at all. Once you have enough people like her that tuned up, Lorne, you can do whatever you want to them and they'll thank you for it.

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    1. As someone who tried, directly and indirectly, to inculcate critical skills throughout my career, I shudder when I contemplate the implications of people like the woman in the video, Mound.

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    1. I have a feeling there will never be a shortage of such people, Owen, eager to be told where to go and what to think.

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  3. Unfortunately, it is not only the "alt-right" that seems to lack critical thinking facilities. This election cycle, surprisingly, saw many liberals/Dems. uncritically believing Hillary when she made the unfounded claim that the Russians were influencing the outcome of the election (as if Putin could influence how millions of Americans vote, even if he had wanted to).

    Of course we now know from credible journalists such as Greenwald, Hedges and Parry that the CIA had long planted fake stories with the media (look up Operation Mockingbird) to justify the American hegemonic wars.

    Then there was also the now widely panned story from Washington Post based on the now also panned ProporNot that claimed, without evidence, that some 200 websites were "useful idiots" of Russia: http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/washington-post-blacklist-story-is-shameful-disgusting-w452543 The WaPo "blacklist" included Greenwald, Hedges and the former Senator Ron Paul too.

    If WaPo could publish such junk, it is indeed the post truth world when we need to ask who are the real journalists and real media. Recall that the NYT had published the fake WMD story that unfortunately resulted in hundreds of thousands dying. This fake stroy was then repeated uncritically by media such as CNN: http://www.globalresearch.ca/five-times-corporate-media-got-caught-publishing-fake-news-causing-the-death-and-suffering-of-millions/5557924

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    1. You make a very good point here, Anon. Clearly, there is plenty of blame to be apportioned to the progressive side as well.

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