What’s Not to Love?

You’ve got to love the computer age.  Oh yes, this time of personal computers and the internet is indeed an ‘age’ and one that will no doubt be remembered long after we’re all propping up our headstones. Here for what may well be an ever so brief time in history, the world can not only speak to itself, but also speak FOR itself.

What’s not to love? On any given day and from most any place on the planet, millions of otherwise normal people can reach out and communicate with millions of others. This is a very unique time because prior to this, most of humanity was entirely dependent on newspapers, news reels and then, television to keep them informed. And what made even that so problematic was that the information conveyed via those mediums was almost always first screened and formatted by governments and press organizations.

What you got was what you were supposed to get. Now, don’t misunderstand this to say that this kind of information manipulation is not still prevalent today but… what has changed is that we now have a greater selection of sources and from there, we can all talk about it too. The ability to communicate, to compare notes as it were, allows the people of the planet the chance to uncover hidden truths and expose disinformation in a way that has never before been possible.

Of course, there is a flip side to this coin and it is not at all pleasant to look at. In the dirty arena of politics, the same avenues of communication that would otherwise work to insure it… have eroded the once sturdy guarantee of freedom.

American President Abraham Lincoln once said, “You can fool all the people some of the time, and some of the people all the time, but you cannot fool all the people all the time.”

That was enough, at one time, to assure that disinformation and propaganda would never succeed in fooling enough people to decide the course of national destiny. But that is no longer the case.

In today’s political environment, where a politician or movement can effectively reach nearly all the people, all of the time, the equation has been reduced to merely fooling most of the people, a simple majority of them, for just enough time to get enough votes to win an election.

So, in this computer age where we feel marginally safe from the upstart tyrannies that have plagued our species from the dawn of time, we are now called upon to display a greater vigilance than ever. If we allow ourselves to enjoy the comfort of our technology for only one moment too many… trusting it and ourselves to the instantaneous nature of the information landscape, we can be fooled.

If there is an axiom to be relied upon, to speak a millennium of truth in just a few words, it might well be this:

“You can avoid reality, but you cannot avoid the consequences of avoiding reality.”
-    Ayn Rand

Today’s reality is one that demands a constant degree of attention to detail. A healthy dose of doubt and objectivity, combined with a good education, will serve you better than trusting any or all of the world’s institutions to service this need on your behalf.

Love the age of computers and the internet? Yes but… don’t close your eyes when you kiss.

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