The truth has been politicized in the United States, and this is absolutely a war against the public good. Something is either true or it isn’t, and whether that truth helps or hurts someone politically (or any other way) should play no part in the decision to make accurate information available to the public.
Oh, but it does.
I’m not naive enough to expect politicians or corporate bigwigs to routinely fall on their swords exposing fraud or falsehood in their ranks (though some honorable people certainly do); greed and lust for power have been around as long as there have been human beings.
The story that the public hears instead of the truth is called the “narrative.” And the narratives are killing us. Literally.
Ann Coulter’s column last week is a perfect example. In the column, titled “Apparently, Not All Black Lives Matter,” Ms. Coulter cited FBI crime statistics showing not only that most murders in the United States are committed by black people, but also that most victims of those murders are other black people. She excoriated the Biden administration and Democrats, as well as the media, for their hypocrisy and racial hatemongering.
The real facts and statistics don’t make the news because they run counter to the narrative that “white supremacy” is the biggest threat to the nation’s peace and security. Focusing on the false flag of “white supremacy” means that attention and resources are diverted away from the causes of so many deaths in the United States’ black community. This is inexcusable.
Homelessness is another example. The “narrative” around homelessness includes the position that involuntary commitment of the seriously mentally ill is not “compassionate”; that poverty can be remediated with taxation and wealth redistribution; that drug abuse can be contained by decriminalization or sanction-free, subsidized “injection zones,” and that living in the streets is somehow a constitutional right, or a matter of “dignity.”
The truth is much uglier. In Los Angeles County, for example, the number of homeless people has been exploding year after year. In 2013, L.A. County had 39,000 homeless. In 2014, it was 44,000. Los Angeles County now has more than 75,000 homeless, and that number is an increase of nearly 10 percent from last year. Homeless encampments are riddled with disease and crime, and cities such as San Francisco, Seattle, and Portland, Oregon, are facing the departure of residents and businesses fed up with violence and ever-present human waste.
How many lives have been destroyed or lost because of a slavish adherence to a “narrative” and the refusal to face reality?
The same can be said of decisions to reduce the penalties for shoplifting, as California did via Proposition 47 in 2014. The “narrative” was that prosecuting shoplifting as a felony contributed to prison overcrowding and disproportionately affected minorities. The reality is that retail theft in California (and elsewhere) has now become brazen and even more widespread, creating huge and often unsustainable losses for businesses. (Total retail theft in the United States in 2021 has been estimated at $100 billion.) Businesses are closing and leaving areas rife with theft.
And then there’s the COVID-19 pandemic, regarding which the narrative was that anyone concerned about the safety of the vaccines or pointing out the truth that masks do nothing to prevent the spread of the virus or opposing lockdowns was “going to kill people.” Those who were inclined to try pharmaceutical treatments such as ivermectin or hydroxychloroquine instead of multiple shots were painted as knuckle-dragging cretins eating horse paste. But the risks of myocarditis and pericarditis were real, as were the concerns about masking children and closing schools.
An enemy of the truth is an enemy of the people. That goes double for those whose job descriptions should include relentless pursuit of the truth and informing the public of that truth. In this climate, those who are willing to investigate, ask hard questions, and hold powerful and popular people’s feet to the fire, regardless of their political viewpoints or stated aspirations to “save the world,” deserve our thanks. Their job is even more difficult than it used to be.
But the rest of you? You should be ashamed of yourselves.
