Who Are You?

We all know the old saying ‘if you’re not a part of the solution, you’re a part of the problem.’

Social media has made us all aware of how ignorant we all are of everything.  If we wanted to know something it used to be we could ask someone we trust or even look in our handy encyclopedia to discover new information.  Newspapers or the evening news would keep us up to date on current events.  Our modern world is very different.  When Ted Turner came up with his twenty-four hour a day news company the world fundamentally changed.  We all but stopped watching the 30 or 60-minute news show with people we trusted.  We started watching an endless stream of content needed to fill 24 hours a day.  Some of it was even news.  When that content started making big money off of 24 hours a day it was a short trip to other news networks wanting to cash in.  They competed with each other for your attention.

Then something changed.  One of those news networks went political.  They started having editorial type shows that reported ‘news’ from a political point of view.  Most of what people today think is news is, in reality, a political point of view.

There are two types of ‘news’ shows.  One is a straightforward news show.  It present events, as they happened to their viewers.  A quality news show will not form an opinion of any type, it will only present the facts of the event.  The other type of news show is an editorial show.  That show present things from the point of view of the host or the guests on that show.  The editorial shows are not really news, they are entertainment.  They are also what everyone watches when they watch what they think is news.

Because of the popularity of editorial shows, most people now see our daily events from an editorialized/political point of view.  Our ability to determine what is real news has gone away.  Social media has been a part of making us ignorant under the guise of free speech.  Social media is now starting to take some responsibility for allowing lies to be spread worldwide in a matter of seconds.  It will take some time to reverse the spread of ignorance and misinformation, but it will improve on social media.  In our small town, this inability to determine the truth from a political point of view has empowered a negative element.  There is an endless stream of lies and negativity that have taken over our reality.  They go by many names, but they are little more than gossip mongers.

The gossip mongers have been a thing since, apparently, before the Old Testament was written.  6000 years ago it was enough of an issue that the writers of those books felt it important enough to include.  I can imagine the breadwinner of the Old Testament family slinking back to the hovel after a hard day of slaying dragons or killing Philistines or whatever they did to hear the cooks snarking on the yard hands shoes.  They did it for the same reason we do it today.  Some people make themselves feel better about themselves by putting other people down.  It becomes such a way of life for them they find other like-minded people and become a group that puts down those around them.  Pretty soon you’ve got a group of grown-ups in a small town who put down everything.

Who are you?