Non-readers, plants, influencers, staged events

I am a mere observer and do not take much of “news” seriously. Yet the essential meaning of news stories penetrates the consciousness of the mass of humans so easily that it can be distressing. So much of what appears to be human stupidity is really just indifference based on trust, and it is trust that is the great human failing here.

Some years back I was in a conversation with a relative about some thing or event, and in passing suggested either a book or an article, some form of written reference to help support whatever claim I was making. “Oh, we don’t read” was the answer I got, so don’t bother sending along anything. Much later on, same company and playing a card game that had special rules in the various cards, I was repeatedly reminded that I had not read a card correctly. Asshole that I am, I replied “Oh, I don’t read.” My reference was not taken kindly to the two who knew what I was talking about. I could not help myself, as the idea of not reading has such large implications, and I lack filters.

One implication of which is that if one does not read, one does not think properly. Reasoning requires exposure to ideas, but when the ideas are encountered in a skeptical mindset, with doubt always on call, they do not easily penetrate our minds.

What I have noticed, and of course this is universal among all who distrust media, is that exposure to “news” on TV, and in entertainment, usually entails instant belief. Just yesterday I had a conversation with a cousin who suggested we had gotten out of Europe in time to avoid the terrible unprecedented heat wave they are enduring. I told her, to no avail, that 1) much of inland Europe is unbearably hot in summer, not a new phenomenon, and 2) that the planet as a whole has been gradually warming since the end of the Little Ice Age, 1860 or so, so that new “records” in the era of instrumental data should be expected. How much of my response got through to my dear cousin, a wonderful lady I grew up with and love … none. I contradicted the news reports. They spoke it once, and done. I can yammer on, but to no avail.

On the radio or in a podcast yesterday I heard reference to the “Tea Party”, and it made me think of all of the women protesting Trump’s selection … people are  so suggestible. There would have been no Tea Party had not someone high up thought of it (originally, a “tea bagger” until the real use of that term became known). All it took was a few news reports and some well-placed apparatchiks to make it a nationwide phenomenon, which it could not be without help of TV news. Same with the women’s rallies**. It’s just power of suggestion on a grand scale. No one reads. Trust me. Ideas in circulation are controlled from on high, and mindlessly repeated down low.

This brings to mind the idea of the “influencer”, put forth by the same “We don’t read” person to describe the means by which advertising and public relations spread ideas. The latest I’ve encountered is on Facebook, Lucy Biggers. She’s all over Facebook and Instagram, a reformed climate alarmist joining the denier camp. People of this ilk measure success by followers. She’s young, and spent too much time in the wrong camp, and so is not well-read (there was no time!) but has gone off like a rider on a horse in six different directions at once. I don’t know what to make of her … real, or planted? Ideas of value? Mere repetition of things not really well understood? Verbose, for sure. Attractive female … doesn’t hurt. Perhaps the other side of the Greta Thunberg coin.

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**It does not hurt that Donald Trump was reported by Billy Bush in an interview for Access Hollywood to have made lewd and aggressive statements about his attitude about women. This was part of the suggestions that set people afire. I can assure you that no such interview took place. It was a staged event. Why that sort of things works, why it did not bring him down, is a matter for behavioral psychology that I do not grasp. But it was a deliberate and fake story meant to enflame women.