The right wing of the Republican Party has managed to achieve what commerce and the dynamics of business could not in relation to the news industry and journalism as a whole. It has made it irrelevant.
By simply declaring that ‘alternate facts’ are not just acceptable, but worthy of belief, without any proof, it has unequivocally destroyed an institution, that being the news. No matter the training, qualifications, experience or capability of a reporter or journalist, no matter whether video or photographs of the incident or event, one viral chant by the political right has eclipsed, logic, rationality, truth, scientific evidence or visual fact.
Fake news.
The sheer childishness of such a statement should have created a backlash that would have buried those willing to destroy their own careers with such statements. That was until a presidential candidate, without any honour, substance or value used it repeatedly to address professional journalists and their reporting. Adopted by the cult of populists now known as the Republican Party and its extreme right wing, the term was applied to any and all reporting that ran contrary to the needs of Republicans to reinforce lies in order to cast aspersions that ultimately led to distrust and the convenience of ignorance.
Sound bites replace professional journalism. Perceptions honed by disinformation, misinformation, lies and half-truths have led the public to question all sources, irrespective how competent or thorough. The less educated, the willfully ignorant and those without any ethics need only suggest a whisper of ‘fake news’, and the public runs with it like an NFL fullback.
In January of this year, Jack Schafer of ‘Politico’ wrote a column entitled, “The News Business Really is Cratering”. In it he documented how the news business is in decline. The decline, I suggest, is in large part attributable to the spreading of ‘fake news’. When one need only subscribe to group think and garner support from a myriad of like-minded believers who have neither the ability, mental acuity or willingness to question the veracity of published ‘fake news’, it supports a strategy wholly unethical in relation to the facts of an event, statement or incident.
And when the possibly future President of the United States lies pathologically, it undermines democracy and our trust in its institutions. Wholly a half of America is incapable of differentiating fact from fiction, truth from lies. It clearly illustrates the failure of an academic system to enshrine values inculcated throughout the years.
As the mango-faced distributor of lies and ignorance attests, “I like the uneducated”, – why of course would he not. It has not just allowed but fostered the present level of distrust, anger, hatred and polarization evident within America today. Lies and scapegoating makes a return to reason, truth and rationality that much less likely, and it keeps America ignorant and worthy of their leaders beliefs.
America will pay a heavy price for ignorance, that may ultimately enable a charlatan, thief, rapist, pathological liar and sociopath to steal autocracy out of democracy.
America hangs in the balance, and Republicans have their thumbs on the scales of justice.
Leave a Reply