Stavros
08-03-2018, 03:34 PM
I have been musing on the peculiar attitude to the truth in politics which in recent years, it seems, has become a battleground of competing claims. I use the word 'seems' because in reality truth in politics has always been contested, but with the spread of social media what once were simply daft claims but also extremely offensive ones have been edging toward the centre ground of our debates. One can watch with alarm the rabble-rousing chants of CNN Scum! at a Presidential rally where he himself condemns the media as 'disgusting' -but note it is not because they fake the news, but because they don't adore him, as if adoration were a necessary part of American politics.
Where the intention is to deceive, one finds even the most trustworthy politicians capable of telling a lie, be it a brazen lie or more likely, an interpretation of a fact, because in that Machiavellian sense the end justifies the means. We could list a catalogue of lies, within which the 'false flag' would appear, being the favoured tactic conspiracy theorists love to embrace because it both proves and does not prove that the State tricked the people into believing that something happened that did not.
If we can agree that philosophers have struggled with the 'truth', it may be that while there are facts that can be verified -we know that France won the FIFA World Cup because we watched it happen live on tv- it may be that it is the interpretation of facts that creates competing narratives. One might say France did not win the World Cup, Croatia lost it, the emphasis being on the weakness of Croatia as the cause of France's win, rather than the superior expertise of Les Bleus.
In the context of the President's war against the Media, and the Infowars war on the truth of Sandy Hook, interpretation becomes -or appears to become- the vital spark, but is this the case? If Alex Jones had verifiable facts to support his claim that Sandy Hook was a hoax, he might be believed, but not only does he not have such facts, the facts don't matter. The interpretation offered does not even relate to Sandy Hook but the long-established campaign by Jones to undermine the State, to do so by claiming, again and again that 'the people' are being lied to in order to sow doubt not just about Sandy Hook but with everything 'the State' says, on the basis that it is a protection racket for the 'deep state' where all the money and power is, the money being the dollars you worked for ending up in a rich man's pocket.
If you believe in the 'illusory truth effect' then by repeating something often enough people will believe it -during the EU Referendum campaign the Leavers repeated again and again 'Take Back Control' even though the UK never lost control in any sense of the word with regard to its membership of the EU. If you say 'Crooked Hillary' enough times, enough people will believe there is something there to be investigated, and if there is an investigation that finds nothing illegal, that is the 'deep state' protecting one of its own elites. There is a discussion of the Illusory Truth Effect here-
https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/6/17/15817056/alex-jones-megyn-kelly-lies-nbc-psychology-illusory-truth
Listening to the former leader of the Conservative Party (Ian Duncan-Smith) on BBC at lunchtime today I was struck how he argued that the objection that led the UK to vote to leave the EU was based on the political fear that over time the integration of EU members into a Federal or 'super-state' (though he did not use those words) would erode the identity of the Nation-State. It struck me that what Duncan-Smith, the EU Leavers, Marine le Pen, US Republicans loyal to their new President, and Alex Jones, Nigel Farage and ex-con 'Tommy Robinson' all have in common is in fact the distinction they make between Nation and State.
If the State is the problem: the Nation is the solution, because 'the Nation' is US, where the State is THEM. This rift between government and the governed is a reflection of the abuse of power that has enabled the privileged and the powerful to become rich at everyone else's expense, but more than that, in a context shaped by immigration, becomes the 'sell out' of OUR country to 'foreign interests' to the extent that foreigners are 'allowed in' and breed, so that in time, OUR country will no longer belong to US.
Thus, the 'populist' movement seeks to undermine established forms of rule to 'return' power to the people who, after all, own -or should own- the nation they built, lived in and died for. But when you ask what in fact this Nation is, the answer narrows it down to 'people like US' which for Alex Jones means, quite simply, White People of European Descent.
In the end, the truth may be malleable, but the proof of the 'post-truth' movement is that they have their own facts and their startling truth -that not everyone belongs to the USA and thus not everyone has the right to live there. If he were to be truthful, Alex Jones should claim he wants the USA to be free of government, of taxes, and foreigners- as defined by him.
It is the intention behind the lies that reveals the politics they want to create, most often an impossible politics, but one which, when applied in practice, produces hatred, violence, misery and failure.
Where the intention is to deceive, one finds even the most trustworthy politicians capable of telling a lie, be it a brazen lie or more likely, an interpretation of a fact, because in that Machiavellian sense the end justifies the means. We could list a catalogue of lies, within which the 'false flag' would appear, being the favoured tactic conspiracy theorists love to embrace because it both proves and does not prove that the State tricked the people into believing that something happened that did not.
If we can agree that philosophers have struggled with the 'truth', it may be that while there are facts that can be verified -we know that France won the FIFA World Cup because we watched it happen live on tv- it may be that it is the interpretation of facts that creates competing narratives. One might say France did not win the World Cup, Croatia lost it, the emphasis being on the weakness of Croatia as the cause of France's win, rather than the superior expertise of Les Bleus.
In the context of the President's war against the Media, and the Infowars war on the truth of Sandy Hook, interpretation becomes -or appears to become- the vital spark, but is this the case? If Alex Jones had verifiable facts to support his claim that Sandy Hook was a hoax, he might be believed, but not only does he not have such facts, the facts don't matter. The interpretation offered does not even relate to Sandy Hook but the long-established campaign by Jones to undermine the State, to do so by claiming, again and again that 'the people' are being lied to in order to sow doubt not just about Sandy Hook but with everything 'the State' says, on the basis that it is a protection racket for the 'deep state' where all the money and power is, the money being the dollars you worked for ending up in a rich man's pocket.
If you believe in the 'illusory truth effect' then by repeating something often enough people will believe it -during the EU Referendum campaign the Leavers repeated again and again 'Take Back Control' even though the UK never lost control in any sense of the word with regard to its membership of the EU. If you say 'Crooked Hillary' enough times, enough people will believe there is something there to be investigated, and if there is an investigation that finds nothing illegal, that is the 'deep state' protecting one of its own elites. There is a discussion of the Illusory Truth Effect here-
https://www.vox.com/science-and-health/2017/6/17/15817056/alex-jones-megyn-kelly-lies-nbc-psychology-illusory-truth
Listening to the former leader of the Conservative Party (Ian Duncan-Smith) on BBC at lunchtime today I was struck how he argued that the objection that led the UK to vote to leave the EU was based on the political fear that over time the integration of EU members into a Federal or 'super-state' (though he did not use those words) would erode the identity of the Nation-State. It struck me that what Duncan-Smith, the EU Leavers, Marine le Pen, US Republicans loyal to their new President, and Alex Jones, Nigel Farage and ex-con 'Tommy Robinson' all have in common is in fact the distinction they make between Nation and State.
If the State is the problem: the Nation is the solution, because 'the Nation' is US, where the State is THEM. This rift between government and the governed is a reflection of the abuse of power that has enabled the privileged and the powerful to become rich at everyone else's expense, but more than that, in a context shaped by immigration, becomes the 'sell out' of OUR country to 'foreign interests' to the extent that foreigners are 'allowed in' and breed, so that in time, OUR country will no longer belong to US.
Thus, the 'populist' movement seeks to undermine established forms of rule to 'return' power to the people who, after all, own -or should own- the nation they built, lived in and died for. But when you ask what in fact this Nation is, the answer narrows it down to 'people like US' which for Alex Jones means, quite simply, White People of European Descent.
In the end, the truth may be malleable, but the proof of the 'post-truth' movement is that they have their own facts and their startling truth -that not everyone belongs to the USA and thus not everyone has the right to live there. If he were to be truthful, Alex Jones should claim he wants the USA to be free of government, of taxes, and foreigners- as defined by him.
It is the intention behind the lies that reveals the politics they want to create, most often an impossible politics, but one which, when applied in practice, produces hatred, violence, misery and failure.