23 February 2009

Opinions are like - noses - everyone has one, we are a contentious culture, and we disagree a great deal.  Freedom does that for you.

I have often made the case; that, through our ignorance, and I shall not move away from the belief that too many people are indifferent to learning and adicted instead to entertainment with a low quality content of knowledge; that we sell ourselves, and our culture, short.  However, on the other hand, what of the information to which we are exposed; information available beyond basic education; that is education that comes from our schooling?  And in fact even that, which is often simplistic and sometimes also slanted by ideology.

First I think we can all agree that the incredible amount of it that is available is daunting, even overwhelming; there is so much of it.  Furthermore its quality is debatable.  What to believe?  And because there is so much of it, there must be rationing, and rationing, by definition is propaganda.  We are the most propagandized culture the world has ever known - it comes at us from all directions, but particularly television and the Internet, where it is easy (that is obtainable passively) to obtain.  Propaganda is not bad; it is merely selective.  So who selects, and who among those who select should we listen to - and believe?

One might hypothesize that if everyone knew all the ramifications of a subject, that is both sides, with advantages and disadvantages of a given course of action, that we would agree.  I doubt it; there are too many different frames of reference - we simply think differently based on not only what we have learned, but what we have experienced.  Although it would help.

But it's not possible - there is too much to know, and much of it is quite complicated and technical, requiring us to know just that much more.  Ok, so then who should we listen to to sumarize it for us?  That selection is essentially a decision on which steam of propaganda to listen to, and our confidence in he/she who is delivering it. 

It is a shame that we do not get a straight and true discussion of important information.  Is that deliberate?  Sometimes; but it may also be the result of what is honestly and sincerely believed.  But in any event it is propaganda, and we must understand it so to be - and read between the lines.  Who said it, and what is his/her motivation?  Do they have something to gain from us believing them and not something else?  What is their reputation?  Not so much for veracity (but perhaps) but for prejudice or self interest?  That much is easier to find out - reputation is much more available than the value of the information.  It behooves us to know from whence our information comes.

All sides of an argument; political, economic or otherwise; has the intent to convince and is accompanied with some level of bias.  Having a knowledge of basics such as technical reality or history helps; but so does skepticism.  Or as is so often preached to us: if it sounds too good (or too unrealistic, or too improbable) to be true it probably is. 

We must question everything.  And if it doesn't make real sense we should question it that much more - or reject it out of hand.  The assumption that all sources of information have an axe to grind or a hidden agenda, is a good place to start, and certainly realistic.

We are in a time, economically and politically, where many are trying to sell us ideas, many of which are bogus; some blatant lies, some merely slanted, some even basically true - or at least reasonable in terms of what is beneficial to us personally.  It behooves us to be concerned about which is which; our future lives depend upon it for in many cases there will be no turning back.

In a word, THINK.   Listen as you will, but THINK about what you hear, especially from politicians whose bias may be based on their own personal ambition for continued elitism.