Post-truth

'Post-truth' is a system the US establishment has created, which might indeed be described as such. Trump moves within that system, but he isn't the cause or even a principal part of the problem.

When you analyze the modus operandi of the US empire since the end of WW2 and especially since the end of the Cold War, it contains a huge amount of propaganda, information operations, etc.

The US, being a peripheral power, realized they weren't going to dominate the world either through economic or military power, so they devised something different: dominating information flows.

Eventually this poisons information flows to such a degree that no one trusts a word from anyone.

So what to do?

There's nothing to be done. Trust arrives on foot and leaves on horseback, and the US establishment has squandered all of it, both domestically and internationally.

The only thing that's left to be done is to bite the bullet.

You act as if this is your first election.

https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/SleazyPolitician

Q. “How do you know a politician is lying?” A. "Their mouth is moving."

Or day on Earth, frankly. :smirk:

You're dealing with ingrained human nature, to benefit oneself over that of another. Deception and unscrupulous behavior is a form of survival. You can't honestly tell me if there's one dose of medicine that doesn't belong to you, that you have means to procure, and there's two sick children, one being your own and the other being a stranger's, you'd "do the right thing", even if said medicine belongs to said stranger. Go ahead, lie to us. :smile:

You have a great point, it's an ancient debate indeed. We love to take the moral high ground and insist anything to the contrary will lead to the destruction of society itself- until push comes to shove and it's you or yours on the chopping block of life. Sadly, such is the way of the world.

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Quoting tim wood

By "truth" I mean to refer to people who are honest and who value, care about, truth and honesty.

By "truth" you mean people who care about truth?

I'd say an OP which cares about truth would have a more truthful first sentence. :grin:

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Reply to tim wood I feel your pain, like half of America and about 90% of Australia, I'm vastly dissappointed by the re-election of DJT, although I will stop posting about it as it serves no purpose other than sounding off. But one of the very many regrettable things about it is that it bakes his mendacity in to the highest levels of public discourse. He's said he's going to purge the bureuacracy of those who have expressed critical opinions about him and the January 6th atrocity, and so on.

Us ordinary citizens can't do a lot about that, of course, but the only antidote to lies is truth and the hope that others will heed it.

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Moreover, how did the American public react when Bill Clinton's affair was uncovered? Some thought he was a national disgrace, a "pig", per se. Others found him more relatable as a result and proof of democracy's function that the most powerful man in the world is "just like us", imperfect, prone to temptation and folly, and is not in some untouchable near-godly class. What about when the order to bomb Hiroshima and Nagasaki was given? Some consider that the worst atrocity against human life in history, rivaling if not surpassing the Holocaust.

It goes back to an ancient school of thought, a near-primal division, a form of culture and indeed "religion". Do we accept that we as human beings are imperfect and not only capable of horrors and sleaze but prone to them and in fact happier when we engage in these things and any sort of "morality" or piety is a lie that will inevitably collapse in on itself and serves as nothing but hindrance to human potential? Or do we realize that, like children, we have natural faults and tendencies that need to be corrected, perhaps constantly, so that we can reach a true and greater purpose and contentment as not just a society or civilization but as a species writ-large?

It's easy to have one's morals and values spun around and turned on their head by even a single isolated incident such as a heinous murder or debilitating accident, say in the course of being a good Samaritan and helping a stranded motorist, but should single isolated incidents or persons really serve as permanent indicators and premonitions of the entire future and destiny of mankind? I think not. They can certainly dramatically alter a particular society's zeitgeist overnight to the point it becomes unrecognizable, but I'd humbly suggest such an event does not dictate the declaration of a society let alone a world being "post-truth".

As far as Trump specifically, I've noticed he seems to moderate his actual behavior a bit better when he's actually in office as opposed to campaigning. He's an entertainer first and foremost, which seems to go hand in hand with politics. People have a tendency to be frustrated and like to hear their frustrations being echoed by the highest levels of power. Pandering 101. Additionally, there's an unfortunate bias among most people where we tend to believe if a person is being aggressive or callous it equates to being truthful. Which makes sense as the average person deals with a plethora of problems and frustration in their daily lives (work sucks, bills too high, goods and services too expensive, etc.) and they themselves often view their own instances of politeness as obligatory and not genuine. Like many things, only time will tell. Hope I'm right.

Reply to tim wood I too feel your pain (I'm still reeling from the election), but I can't take your proposal seriously. Or . . . OK, if some legitimate U.S. authority is miraculously empowered to set up a series of Truth Trials, a la Nuremberg, and if they hand down death penalties for the likes of Trump, I might be persuaded that this was "reasonable and appropriate." Maybe. But otherwise, no. I believe honesty is part of an array of virtues that includes tolerance, compassion, nonviolence, democracy, and respect for law. We don't get to pick which ones we like.

Quoting tim wood

By "post-truth" I mean to refer to liars and parasites who neither value nor care bout truth and honesty.

I think the problem is more pernicious and extends beyond liars and parasites. Post-truth is cynical nihilism. On the one hand, the doubt or denial that the truth exists, and on the other, the rejection of the value of truth. Instead of truth there are versions of things to be accepted or rejected. Instead of just facts, there are "alternative facts", which in truth are alternatives to facts.

There is also the assumption that what believes is the truth. Evidence is rejected because it must be false because it contradicts the beliefs held as truth. This might be called patriotic nihilism.

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Quoting tim wood

But we may most-of-us be under a positive obligation to cackle, as long and as much and as loud as needed - calling for truth, calling out the lies.

Now you're talking! More cackling, less violence.

I think "bullshit" provides a better tool for analysis here than "post truth". Bullshit is what folk say in order to get what they want, regardless of truth. "Post truth" suggests we are done with truth. With bullshit, there are still truths, they are just denied for expediency. The truth will out: global warming will not go away because the GOP denies it's reality; tariff will fuck more than just the 'mercan economy; appeasing Putin will not end well.

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Quoting Outlander

You're dealing with ingrained human nature, to benefit oneself over that of another. Deception and unscrupulous behavior is a form of survival.

So is trust. Those who indulge in deception as a matter of course will be rejected for the commonweal.

Reply to Banno Nice.

Quoting Banno

"Post truth" suggests we are done with truth. With bullshit, there are still truths, they are just denied for expediency.

I think this crystallises it.

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Americans are being shafted.


OECD Doc

Trouble is the only narrative being used to explain this to them is the muddled myth of migrants and inflation. Bernie Sanders is correct.

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Quoting tim wood

They refused to accept his lie or to let him off the hook for it. That we need across the board. We should have started with his claims that his first inauguration was "larger" than his predecessor's first. An obvious and absurd lie.

Yes! I was also trying to pinpoint when the bullshit began and I came to the same conclusion. He was let off the hook. But the old saying that if you give them enough rope, they'll hang themselves has not applied. Here, if you give them enough rope, it's us who hang...

Quoting tim wood

Geese cackle. They also attack. I don't know that any individual attack is appropriate. But we may most-of-us be under a positive obligation to cackle, as long and as much and as loud as needed - calling for truth, calling out the lies.

Depressingly, I feel that hordes of attack geese will not prevail against the might of a corrupted American military-industrial-political complex. (Maybe we could fly into the engines......)

Quoting Tom Storm

But the old saying that if you give them enough rope, they'll hang themselves has not applied. Here, if you give them enough rope, it's us who hang...

The point about demagogues is precisely that they turn democracy against itself for their own advantage. That is DJT's MO. If you look at the Wikipedia entry on demagogues, he ticks all the boxes (although the crowd-edited wikipedia has the good sense not to include him as an example.)

Reply to Banno [quote=Truthout;https://truthout.org/articles/the-10-richest-peoples-wealth-increased-by-64-bil-the-day-after-trump-win/]The 10 richest people in the world saw their wealth increase by a record margin just one day after former President Donald Trump won the 2024 election, a sign that already wide wealth disparities will likely grow even wider over the next four years due to Trump’s stated economic goals.

According to Bloomberg’s Billionaire Index, those 10 individuals saw their wealth rise by up to $64 billion on Wednesday. That’s the highest daily increase among the 10 wealthiest people in the world ever seen in a single day since Bloomberg started tracking those people’s worth in 2012.

For comparison, the $64 billion figure is equivalent to the annual wages earned by 800,000 American households making the U.S. median income of $80,000 per year.[/quote]

World's Richest Man, Elon Musk, is set to become one of the most powerful (and, I bet, most hated) men in the new Establishment. Let's hope he f***s off to Mars, like he said he would.

Reply to Wayfarer Well, I never much liked the way the screen in the Tesla looks like an afterthought. No way I'd buy one now.

Reply to Banno There’s a market for bumper stickers like ‘I bought the car before Elon went crazy'. Californians, who are one of Tesla's largest markets, and also overwhelmingly Democrat, are appalled by his right turn. But with this victory, he's well and truly ensconsed in the echelon of major world magnates on the scale of Nelson Rockefeller and J P Morgan. Which I think is pretty damn scary, considering his general obnoxiousness. :yikes:

Reply to Banno https://www.smh.com.au/world/north-america/the-alarm-over-elon-musk-and-national-security-has-yet-to-sink-in-20241106-p5koda.html

Reply to tim wood
Nice thead. We are definitely in the Post Truth era. But having said that, I'm referring specifically to the way obvious lies are treated publicly, not individually. In the past (as now) everyone had their personal appreciation of what they understand to be the truth. What has changed is the way what is commonly understood to be the truth (by a majority of society), no longer serves as a guardrail to moderate publicly spoken opinions.

For example, everyone has a preference of how a society should work. Many in the past, collected observations of society, pondered what "worked" and didn't work, then came to a conclusion based on their interpretation of the "evidence". Now many more folks come to (an expedient) conclusion first, then cherry-pick observations to support that conclusion. In the first scenario, new evidence can change the conclusion, in the latter new conflicting evidence is discarded (just as conflicting evidence was discarded initially) so the (usually self serving) conclusion is never changed.

Similarly, in the past public figures feared appearing to have conflicts of interest, or appearing to behave inappropriately and thus often tempered their behavior and their rhetoric to give the (often false) appearance of fairmindedness. Now public figures know that their constituents likely support their policies regardless, that is they and their constituents share the same conclusion of how society should work, so are willing to overlook impropriety, scandals and (for the purposes of this thread) lying.

Reply to Wayfarer

Quoting Wayfarer

?tim wood I feel your pain, like half of America and about 90% of Australia, I'm vastly dissappointed by the re-election of DJT

You may want to think twice about that percentage.

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Quoting tim wood

I'm evolving to a belief that as they try to subdue opposition in waves of lies,

we best return by insisting on truth and challenging the lies.

To people who understand nothing that is less than lethal force?

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Imagine a state enforcing historical and scientific truth and you’ll be imagining the most evil regimes in history.

Quoting Joshs

?tim wood I feel your pain, like half of America and about 90% of Australia, I'm vastly dissappointed by the re-election of DJT
— Wayfarer

You may want to think twice about that percentage.

It says 'a chunk'. According to my preferred afternoon radio host, DJT had a spike in popularity amongst younger men. Older Australians and most female voters rated him negatively. I read somewhere, not that it's significant, that he would have lost any vote were he running in Australia. But, all water under the bridge now.

Quoting tim wood

Bottom line, the lie itself can become a deadly tool, the liar a deadly danger. Like a virulent cancer. As with cancer, the earlier detected, usually the gentler the cure. Doctors of TPF, your suggestions?

Simply make the detection/diagnose of a "post-truth" person and then treat him or her accordingly. Understand that he or she will tell the truth only if it suits his or her objectives and agenda. It just a power game, so get over the stupid fascination about truth and falsehood. The are playing a role and they want to give everything to that role. Assume he or she is pushing an agenda irrelevant of the facts. That's it.

Understand the underlying thinking: "Post-truth" people think that truth simply is a means to further your agenda, just like speech that sounds honest and credible. Truths are just a tool for argumentation. And repeating the lie of the leader simply shows that you are giving 100% percent for the cause.

Subjects and the subjective matters, objectivity is for pussies.

Reply to LuckyR I wonder though how much Truth there was in the Truth Era as opposed up our current Post Truth Era. How much of is it that we just don't have a unified worldview and therefore we lack a subjectively consistent perspective?

Did the US and USSR.agree on the facts? Do Israel and Hamas agree on the facts? Do the Southern Baptists and atheists agree on the facts?

That is, is the Post Truth era really just a Post Common Ideology Era? We're used to people far away disagreeing with us on basic facts, but isn't a substantial part of this change just caused by our no longer agreeing with our neighbors?

From my perspective, the prior Trump election wasn't stolen. The arguments otherwise (which I hear among the educated where I live) are completely idiotic. But does the US Constitution really say anything about abortion? Are transsexuals truly women? Did Harris really have a chance like we were told? Not from your perspective, but what is the Truth?

Why do the murky areas of Truth always seem to land consistently with Ideology?

This isn't to dispense with the idea that there is Truth, but it is to suggest we've always found Truth/God on our side. We're just frustrated because we don't worship a common god.

Reply to tim wood

The way that I think we need to deal with the definition of "post-truth" is that it's not about the perpetrators of lies, manipulations, deception, disinformation or misinformation etc. It is rather about the inability to decipher them as doing such. It's mainly about how society and culture erodes a collective understanding and consensus of "truth", of "facts" and how we rationally reason in order to arrive at them.

What it means to live in a post-truth world is therefor not about the liars at the top, but rather that when truth loses meaning among the people, the liars at the top are able to gain power. They are the consequence and symptom of post-truth culture, and as such we won't get rid of them by treating the symptom itself...

...we need to treat the sickness.

Reply to Hanover How much Truth (in the Truth era)? The exact same amount. What distinguishes the Post Truth era isn't the absence or lack of Truth, it's the marginalization of Truth and a degradation of it's public influence. Previously, there was a general public consensus of the way various entities work, say elections. Of course many disagreed with this understanding, but there was a price to pay for verbalizing (usually self serving) alternatives publicly, since acting in a blatantly self serving manner in a public forum went against the public interest, which meant something in the Truth era Thus speech about ideas such as gerrymandering, or electing election officials who would only certify one party's majority could only take place privately among others with the same viewpoint. In the Post Truth era, a leader pays no price for verbalizing self serving proposals since his constituents are only interested in his conclusion or goal, but don't care how he accomplishes it nor the "logic" he uses to justify it. So liberated from any downside from not adhering to the Truth, he's free to say (or do) essentially anything, and for the purposes of this thread, that includes lying.

Reply to LuckyR But we've never trusted Russian elections or Iranian news. We've never agreed upon basic facts with our enemies. My question is whether the change is in what we take to be Truth as opposed to who our enemies are now. We find our enemies next door now, when we used to have to go far.

Isn't distrust just a symptom of polarization of viewpoints as opposed to something new?

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It's very hard to fight against cults. Just looking at some of the survivors or people who quit - it takes a lot of time and they usually have to hit rock bottom to awaken and notice they've been had.

Truth is certainly a big component, the issue for me is that the standards of evaluation from which we can make informed decisions are labeled as "political" instead of being taken as facts.

I fear that only when people notice how f*cked they are, will they change their minds. By then too much damage will have been done.

Worst of all, if the Democrats keep with this centrist "bi-partisan" crap, they may win in 2028 - but if they don't change quite radically, the cycle will repeat itself all the time going further to the right, which drags everything to the right as well. That's not a path that will lead to sanity.

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Quoting tim wood

Both. Education for the ignorant (which includes all of us), and appropriate penalties for liars. "Appropriate" meaning penalties that will strongly disincentivize lying.

Free education for all that is of equal quality for all. Media literacy as a major part of all education, not just interwoven in minor ways. All of this includes higher education as well, like nations who even incentivize students with funding for it.

There are many things that can be done, but such a large education reform makes the most difference fundamentally. It's not just about getting people past post-truth. Such a reform would generate more educated people working on solving complex problems as well as more educated people taking the place of manipulators and liars who scheme their way to the top. Why chose a maniac like Trump if the pool of educated and functioning politicians is larger? Why implement politics that cater to billionaires if there's educated people with philosophically sound political visions to market to voters?

Overall, a reform that makes education of the best quality available to every single individual in a nation, is the absolute best way to improve any nation and any society.

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Quoting tim wood

Most - I think all - lies are soluble in appropriate analysis.

An example: I was speaking to a Russian woman who's been in the US for decades. Her recollection of the "Miracle on Ice" when the US won the Olympic gold in hockey was that the Soviet team was paid off. She said there was no way a top rated professional team could lose to amatuers. She said for the right money, they'd have had sex with each other (her words).

What fit my narrative was freedom over oppression and that Americans can win if they just believe. What fit her narrative was that her team was superior but her nation was corrupt. I hadn't thought about it before, but who knows what actually happened? We have no evidence of cheating, so I go with the US version, but my guess is that Russians rolled their eyes at the result while the US cheered.

And so if I'm as entrenched in US culture as Trumpians are in Trump culture, I can't imagine things being other than they appear. Does this give rise to conspiracies? Of course it does, but that's what breeds this post truth thing.

In the Truth Era, I wonder how much truth there was, or were we just more accepting due to homogenuity of ideology.

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Quoting tim wood

Trump, apparently one of many, is post-truth. His - their - lies should not be, cannot be, accepted.

It seems to me that the Trump narrative, that things used to be good and have gone to shit is fundamentally true and agrees with the experience of middle America. So the only lie is the promise to make it great again.

Whereas the democrat's lie that everything is fine because the stock market is up, which feeds on the lie that everyone is an entrepreneur (though who is left over to make the trade that everyone takes a cut of is a mystery); that lie is not convincing any more.

Ordinary people are being screwed, and deceived into voting for the people who are screwing them, by misdirecting their discontent towards Johnny Foreigner and feeble democrats offering no solutions to a problem they are pretending isn't happening. The lies are on both sides and the result is no communication and the breakdown of society.

Idiot Wind.

Reply to tim wood

Well - maybe in certain situations such a measure could be appropriate.

In the meantime, it's not as if one is going to go to Truth Social or some site like that to reason with anyone. Yes, we react - maybe that should change.

I don't see where to start at the moment, other than donating to causes, participating in events. The thing is to communicate with those that are not yet completely gone.

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Quoting tim wood

On education, agreed. Let's call that the carrot. Your opinions on the stick?

As to education, I have direct experience with the USA version, indirect with the "British" system. The general verdict seems to be that the British, though not itself perfect, is wa-ay better than the US. Best in my opinion, would be a lot of British, tempered with some American. What do you say?

The Finish school is considered best in the world. They generally excel at national tests. And in Sweden you get paid to go to school.

However, I'm in the strong opinion that education should be even more of a financial focus for tax funding and support. Teachers should be paid more, but also have more demand on them to reach a certain level of quality as teachers. Classes need to be smaller in size overall in order to structure education to support the differences between children's learning capability and psychological leaning (some are better at math at certain ages, some are better at language and so on). There should be a greater push to support education in poor regions and education needs to be mandatory for all children.

I'm less fond of sticks as they usually just create villains when a problem have been stricken away with that stick. But I would have laws and regulations demand that constant factually wrong statements in politics, especially to the public during campaigning will lead to the dismissal of that politician from politics. It would incentivize politicians to structure their politics around actual facts and truth rather than manipulation of the publics opinions to support their agendas.

I can't see how such regulations and laws against politicians would have negative effects. The only thing to keep an eye on is so that politicians then don't put money into research institutes to "produce facts" through research papers that conclude something that aligns with their politics. But putting a long prison sentence onto such corruption and strict observation of the money, where it comes from and its use would spot it easier and the blowback would be too severe for politicians to attempt it.

Quoting tim wood

Obama's first or Trump's? Answer! And we can play this game for years, because that is how many lies Trump has told - or forever because he is still lying. And if you repeat and maintain them, then you're a liar as well. Just look at the history.

Yes, I already drank that cool-aid, and I'm wondering why it turns out most people are sick of it. Yes Trump only lies when he opens his mouth. But there is a lie you and all the righteous pedantic democrats have missed that they are telling, that matters and that people know is not true for them, that everything's fine except Trump's mouth. Really, people are poorer, and they don't like it, and everything is not fine. To people who are suffering, happy-clappy looks plain stupid. As stupid as worrying about who has the biggest hands/crowd/dick. And that's what you come back at me as the fucking issue? Maybe swear off your own cool aid for a day. You know how many times I've been told that Hannibal Lector is a fictional character? I been listening to too many democrats already. You're looking the wrong direction, man, you bin misdirected and you lost. Think about that. You corrected all the lies people don't give a damn about, and you lost, because people vote for demagogues who spew hate when they are full of hate because they are suffering.

You can play your being right game for years, and go on losing and not understanding as long.

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Quoting tim wood

But to the extent that any party controls the better and the worse, which do you think has in the US governed for the worse, since, say, Hoover?

It really doesn't matter much what I think. Americans seem to think... well I'm an ocean away, see if you can get an idea of what they think. But I think that they think, since you ask, that you're all a bunch of incompetent greedy lying buggers, and they're messing with your heads by voting for the greedyest, lyingest, incompetentest, bugger around to give you a taste of the medicine you've been force feeding them from both parties since, say, Hoover.

I'm not saying this is a good idea; I think it's going to work out really badly for America and the world. I wish it hadn't happened, but it gives too much intelligence to Trump to make him totally responsible. Democrats have been getting it badly wrong for a long time and this is their fault as well as ordinary republicans fault. Maga happened because they both failed.

Quoting tim wood

Trump was a criminal from his beginnings: imagine how the world would differ if he had simply been jailed for his crimes then.

And that leaves the question of what to do when law fails?

Democracy or a Republic works only if the citizens uphold the values. Even in school I remember my philosophy teacher reminding us that there's no limit to what a Parliament can decide: it can jail redheads if it wants as it can change the constitution (with 3/4 majority votes, but still). Even for the US Constitution there have been 27 amendments.

The real problem is when corruption is basically made legal. Or where do you put it when Jared Kushner starts a private equite firm and gets an investment of 2 billion from Saudi Arabia? At least Trump is talking about Saudi Arabia very favorably. Naturally there's been the allegations of Hunter Biden, which just shows how usual this is.

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Reply to tim wood Big picture, dude. You do the closeups! Never mind carry on.

I found it almost literally incredible that even a large minority of Americans could vote for Trump, never mind a majority. How did it come to pass - the credulity required is incredible?

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Reply to tim wood I'm not sure what you mean. Do you mean the act against the "instrumentalization of migration", where Finland cut the rights to asylum seekers if pressured by a state actor (read Russia) allowing and assisting people to seek asylum in Finland? Well, as some Finns are quick to bow to direction where power is (and thus show their arse to the opposite side), someone wrote here that perhaps Finnish border laws are seen positively by the Trump people soon populating the political offices in Washington DC.

If you refer to what larger problems Finland has avoided (and have been issues close to constitutional law), then it's different. I think the real issues that Finland has avoided is authoritarianism and ethnic conflict. In the 1930's right wing extremism basically rallied up by fear of communism didn't result in authoritarianism that many Eastern European countries descended into, but the democratic system prevailed. In fact the 1930's saw the social democrats coming back to power (as the party's left wing had made the bid to join the Russian Socialist Revolution in 1918). The other notable thing that didn't happen is that there wasn't any ethnic conflict between Swedish speaking Finns and Finnish speaking Finns. The reason is obvious from this: the Swedish speaking considered themselves Finns and didn't relate or yearned for Sweden and only the far right talked about Swedish speaking Finns as being Swedish. Then also Sweden, which had for a moment occupied the Åland Island didn't at all have any desires for Finnish territory, hence the old country that we had been a province to accepted us as independent neighbors. And now the relations are very warm between the two.

Reply to Hanover I don't disagree with your analysis of the relative roles of distrust as pertains to enemies in the Truth vs Post Truth eras. My point is that among those who share the same conclusions, say party members and party leaders, shared ideology trumps adherence to the Truth (meaning the generally accepted Truth, not ideological Truth). Thus the rise of QAnon believers etc among party leadership.

Reply to tim wood

I mean you’re turning inquisitorial, Tim. The winds of narrative aren’t blowing your way so while you sound off on your censorial feelings you also seek for other’s punishment instead of revising your own technique. No one is buying what you’re selling.

The post-truth canard might have some weight if those who claimed to possess it really did. But a Post Truth Era implies that there was a Truth Era, and there never was one. Rather, it is because the commissars of the truth era lied that these people don’t believe their brand of political education anymore. We’re post-legacy media; we’re post expert; we’re post-official word, maybe, but not post-truth. Whoever had it is losing their monopoly on what is true and false and that’s a good thing.

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Reply to tim wood

Why should we care if people lie and are dishonest? This merely provides a challenge which will be adapted to. One should only trust what should be trusted. Its quite silly to say that the world should change to be entirely truthful, when in reality you need just change how gullible you are.

An entirely truthful world would only ignore the problem of irrationality and gullibility that prevades through humanity.

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Quoting tim wood

I cannot think of any way to respect your comment.

If you find my comment disrepectful, its not because of the way I worded it. You merely conflate "respect" with "agree", which we dont.

A society which values "truth" as the opposite of "post-truth", is fundamentally a society which forces conformity and crushes disagreement, and thus is a dogmatic society which is inevitably flawed and unable to change. A skeptical society where individuals learn to discern truth from lie, in their own lens, will always be healthier. Adversery breeds Strength.

The reason I ask why we care, is that the only reason you care is because people dont accept your conception of truth, and dont value you with their framework to be honest with you. This has nothing to do with society, you simply wish to force your idea of truth upon others and consider political violence a potentially viable tool to do so. You are the parasite.

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One should only trust what should be trusted.

Reply to Ourora Aureis I don't disagree, but what distinguishes the Post Truth era is which entities qualify as "what should be trusted".

Reply to tim wood

I dislike if a lie affects me negatively, otherwise I might not care or I may even like the lie. Value only has meaning when attached to a perspective, it doesnt exist independent of me. A surprise party is good, a cheating partner is bad, there is no contradiction.

Reply to LuckyR Quoting LuckyR

what distinguishes the Post Truth era is which entities qualify as "what should be trusted".

There is no such thing as a ‘Post Truth’ era, except as a fabrication of the media based on partisan politics. Ideological combatants throughout history have accused each other of falsification.

Reply to Joshs I'm not an American, but do you think there has been an increase in deceptive behavior from politicians in recent times?

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Quoting tim wood

I recommend meds and a program of therapy. And that you wear a warning label.

Calling people mentally abnormal because they enjoy surprise parties is quite ironic.

Reply to tim wood Post Truth will really have it's day in the sun on Trump's Day One, when he pardons all those who had been criminally convicted for the January 6th outrage, and then commences to gaslight the nation that they had been imprisoned due to the weaponisation of the Justice Department.

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This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

Quoting tim wood

Apparently Capitol police are not happy about the prospect of J-6 pardons....

can you blame them? The whole US public sector is alternately furious and terrified of what is going to happen. The EPA will be gutted, the Justice Department will have waves of firings. Anyway, I'm going to stop posting about it, I have to try and get it out of my mind.

Reply to Tom Storm Quoting Tom Storm

?Joshs I'm not an American, but do you think there has been an increase in deceptive behavior from politicians in recent times?

No, just an increase in polarization.

Quoting Wayfarer

Us ordinary citizens can't do a lot about that, of course, but the only antidote to lies is truth and the hope that others will heed it.

Not at all. Vote with your wallet. The question is, whether you're willing to do that.

Quoting tim wood

Education for the ignorant (which includes all of us), and appropriate penalties for liars. "Appropriate" meaning penalties that will strongly disincentivize lying.

The blind leading the blind, the blind judging the blind?

You don't see just how authoritarian you are.

Quoting LuckyR

I don't disagree, but what distinguishes the Post Truth era is which entities qualify as "what should be trusted".

That's a problem right there: trust cannot be a matter of "should".

Trust requires time and effort on both sides. But many people want to force it, expect it to be unilateral, even that it is someone's duty to trust a particular other.

Quoting Joshs

There is no such thing as a ‘Post Truth’ era, except as a fabrication of the media based on partisan politics. Ideological combatants throughout history have accused each other of falsification.

Agreed. And the polarization is due to economic pressures, not ideology.

Quoting Christoffer

The way that I think we need to deal with the definition of "post-truth" is that it's not about the perpetrators of lies, manipulations, deception, disinformation or misinformation etc.

It is rather about the inability to decipher them as doing such.

Not at all. It's natural for people to take sides, it's a necessity of survival to do so, and survival takes precedence over everything else. But maladapted idealists don't see this.

Quoting baker

The blind leading the blind, the blind judging the blind?

You don't see just how authoritarian you are.

Hopefully I'm taking this well out of context, but it did hit a nerve. So I'm addressing this not to you in particular but as a general reply in respect to the overall thread:

That global warming is a hoax is steadily strengthening as our socially constructed truth. "Drill baby drill" being the general motto, with its great economic appeal.

Authoritarians will label those who value truth to be authoritarian. Tyrants will label those who value justice to be tyrannical. Evil/vice will label good/virtue as evil. Nothing new historically in any of this. Endless power games and mind fu*ks, to not mention worse. And our socially constructed truths rule the day in the short term.

But Nature, the bitch that she is, doesn’t give a shit about our socially constructed truths. Nor about our shortsighted will to conquer as much as we can for our egos’ benefit – everything from others' consent to Nature itself irrespective of means.

Nature is the ultimate authority. Call it authoritarian, tyrannical, evil. This will not change what Nature is and what it does. And our not being true to it - our not corresponding/conforming to its reality – [s]might[/s] will just bite every last one of us in the ass rather painfully. Oh, and this irrespective of how one might want to philosophically justify the reality of Nature.

No doubt many will take this to be just one more idealistic and authoritarian opining in a world of relative realities wherein might makes right. Yes, and lemmings never do end up drowning themselves in mass droves on account of their shortsightedness. Not if we socially construct the truth that they don’t.

We have never been and never will existentially be in a post-truth world. And individual societies are aspects of it – "post truth" as individual societies might become – which makes the whole issue of people no longer valuing truth alarming; this, at least, to some. But there’s nothing new in those who value the benefits of dishonesty and corruption greatly tending to champion the dishonest and corrupt - this while disavowing those who don't so value.

Reply to Joshs If you'd have read and understood what I've posted, you'd know that my use of the descriptor "Post Truth era" doesn't reference "ideological combatants".

Reply to baker A not unreasonable opinion, but as anyone can tell, I was addressing Ourora Aureis' idea, I didn't originate the concept.

Quoting baker

Not at all. It's natural for people to take sides, it's a necessity of survival to do so, and survival takes precedence over everything else. But maladapted idealists don't see this.

Not sure I follow your train of thought from what I wrote?

The point I was making is that defining post-truth as merely the means that people use to control a narrative is not really correct. The behavior of people has been the same throughout history, but times with low post-truth tendencies have more to do with the public's ability to see through such behaviors and form a consensus around what is actual, rather than fictional.

In our modern post-truth era, society is eroding this ability to such a degree that it's becoming increasingly impossible to stand up for what's actual, due to an increasing inability for people to understand what is a fact and what isn't, what is a rationally reasoned argument and what isn't.

Post-truth is therefor not so much about the liars, but a time in which the public don't know how to spot truth.

Reply to tim wood Also lovers of truth and wisdom lie whenever it helps them stay afloat on a sinking ship (or perceived as such). On a shrinking job market, supposedly civilized professionals use their elbows instead of merits. Moreover, many intellectuals claim that there are no truths, not because it is true but because it is a way for them to relativize or arbitrarily dismiss the truth of the words of their opponents. In sports, most participants respect truth. In wars, however, truth is the first victim. People on opposed sides fear truth more than they fear each other!

Reply to baker

Quoting baker

Agreed. And the polarization is due to economic pressures, not ideology

Across the world we’re seeing the same pattern of a split between social traditionalists living mainly in low density rural areas and social progressives concentrated in densely populated urban centers. This split isn’t caused by economic pressures, since what those pressures are is subject to different interpretations depending on whether one is a traditionalist or a progressive, and the economy is only one of many issues that divide the two groups. For many on the right , social values are more important than the economy.

Quoting baker

the polarization is due to economic pressures, not ideology.

A vast simplification of a complex problem. Polarization forms out of many different reasons. Economical inequality is one, but not everything.

We can't ignore how individualism and neoliberalism combined disconnected people from each other. The formation of individuals who were brought up into believing they were the protagonists in contemporary history, that they, if they want, could be whatever they chose to be; a movie star? A successful business owner? The next president?

The cognitive dissonance facing adult life or older people realizing they never became anything they thought they would be transforms into anger and disappointment towards the narrative they were programmed to believe. This anger and disappointment therefor gets aimed at whatever is available to be blamed. Clustering in radicalized gatherings around a similar aim; "that group is to blame", "this ideology is to blame".

The hate from these people then meets the reaction of the groups they hate, defending themselves. And society spirals down into the consequences of these sides triggering each other.

While who's at fault is obvious in the direct confrontation and conflict, the underlying mechanisms that created the polarization in the first place is an overall cultural issue.

While authoritarian states propagate the authoritarian leader's ideas and emotion down through the people, either by force or brainwashing, the western democracies have been blind to the psychological consequences of the delusional narrative that everyone can individually become whatever they want and that the ego is preferred over the group.

As in pretty much all systems in reality, balance prevails over the extreme. While societies have tried extreme collectivism, it only led to the destruction of the self and the violence against individual thought and agency in life. But the extreme individualism has divided and alienated us from each other to the point of not only extreme polarization, but an epidemic rise of depression and loneliness throughout almost all western democracies.

None of this can be helped by just balancing the economy. It's part of it, especially leveling out class differences and intersect different classes to bridge over polarized distances. But at its core, western democracies need to form a better set of values that better reflect positive human nature and sociological structures.

Counter the addictive online algorithms, promote collective events and culture in society, cater to individual's strengths but don't ignore their weaknesses, help people find realistic life goals rather than inflating their childish ego delusions.

The biggest mistake that is being made is that people believe that the solution comes from somewhere else, some political party or leader who's gonna fix everything, some "parent figure" who's gonna swoop in and take care of it all. No, the change has to come from the people. Promote more positive collective things in society, decrease the use of social media online (until there's a system that does not rely on predatory algorithms), stop inflating the ego of children growing up, focus on what you can do, not unrealistic dreams and so on.

Continuing living in the same way just perpetuates the society we've arrived at. Blaming the top just ignores the participation that all have in society and it is society that places people at the top, either with money or by vote, so the change needs to happen in society, among the people first, not top down.

Reply to LuckyR

Quoting LuckyR

?Joshs If you'd have read and understood what I've posted, you'd know that my use of the descriptor "Post Truth era" doesn't reference "ideological combatants".

You make a distinction between objectively sifting the evidence in order to arrive at truths undistorted by existing prejudices , and allowing oneself to be biased by presuppositions shared by a group based on ideological considerations, and then go on to claim that what defines the ‘Post Truth era’ is a propensity to do the latter.
I argue instead that all formations of empirical truth are and always have been socially constructed according to forms of meaning and value which change from era to era. This doesn’t mean that truth is ‘fake’, but that what you would call bias, distortion and prejudice are necessarily built into what it means to produce truth., that its meaning is contextually and social situated

What is different about the contemporary era compared with previous periods of history is not that it is Post Truth, but that a growing number of people are only now recognizing in our highly polarized times what has always been the case, but was until recently denied in favor of a ‘God’s eye’ view of truth, the inextricable relation between socially formed practices and the determination of truth. But they arrive at the wrong conclusion from the fact that two sides of a polarized political community interpret truth differently, insisting that only one side has arrived at the properly objective God’s eye truth , while the other side is succumbing to ideologically driven prejudice.

Reply to Christoffer

Quoting Christoffer

We can't ignore how individualism and neoliberalism combined disconnected people from each other. The formation of individuals who were brought up into believing they were the protagonists in contemporary history, that they, if they want, could be whatever they chose to be; a movie star? A successful business owner? The next president?

The cognitive dissonance facing adult life or older people realizing they never became anything they thought they would be transforms into anger and disappointment towards the narrative they were programmed to believe. This anger and disappointment therefor gets aimed at whatever is available to be blamed. Clustering in radicalized gatherings around a similar aim; "that group is to blame", "this ideology is to blame

I have a slightly different take. I agree that the idea of the autonomous individual, and the values of freedom and utilitarianism that surrounded it, characterized much of American society from the days of its founding until recently. And I think that the vast majority of those who voted for Trump still hold onto that worldview. But I don’t believe that their anger is directed at the “ narrative they were programmed to believe” if by this you are referring to that traditionalist worldview and its associated values. In the first place, there are many wealthy Trump supporters who voted for him precisely in to protect those values. Secondly, one has to appreciate how disconnected urban progressive thinking has become from the traditionalist worldview shared by Trump supporters.

Those of us who identify with a progressive worldview are the interlopers, the ‘aliens’, from the perspective of less densely populated and more traditionalist parts of the country. Our thinking has changed rapidly over the last 40 years and the rest of the country hasn’t had a chance to catch up.We speak an indecipherable language to them. But they can’t just ignore us because when we’re in power we try to shove down their throats values which are utterly alien to them. Plus we dominate institutions of higher learning education and other cultural domains , and produce 70 percent of GDP. So they feel that their way of is threatened by us in myriad ways.

Quoting Joshs

But I don’t believe that their anger is directed at the “ narrative they were programmed to believe” if by this you are referring to that traditionalist worldview and its associated values.

As I'm saying "western democracies" I'm not talking about the US specifically. This is a global problem.

I'm saying that individualism and neoliberalism is not so much an ideological stance but a form of values and ideals which have replaced a more balanced and collectively inclusive perspective on life. This, in turn produces polarized groups when the inflated expectations of life clash with reality and thus produce a reaction in the form of blame that these groups gather around. It exists everywhere, among all polarized groups, but is generally pushing conflict-driven behaviors among those with more conservative world views as they not only have to face a reality different to expectations, but also the reality of historical progression. It's why the anger and violence often is initiated by the conservative minded individuals and groups, as they have the traditional pressures of fighting against the tides of time, and now also against the inflated ego they formed out of individualism.

But the problems exist throughout all groups and all groups help perpetuate the polarizing consequences. Even within larger polarized groups there are further polarization.

What constitutes "post-truth" however, is the inability to break free from any form of radicalization because people have lost the ability to spot what is an actual truth. So they gather around individuals who perpetuate the narrative they emotionally feel gives them comfort against the reality that formed their cognitive dissonance.

Economic problems and class differences are just among the things in reality that clash with those inflated expectations and the emotional distress paralyzes people into comfort zones rather than the work that needs to be done to fix a problem (mainly because they've never learned to collectively fix a problem in society themselves).

Reply to Christoffer

Quoting Christoffer

I'm saying that individualism and neoliberalism is not so much an ideological stance but a form of values and ideals which have replaced a more balanced and collectively inclusive perspective on life. This, in turn produces polarized groups when the inflated expectations of life clash with reality and thus produce a reaction in the form of blame that these groups gather around

Unlike you , I make no moral judgements of individualism or neoliberalism as an ‘unrealistic’, ‘unbalanced’ , ‘regressive’ value system. I think all such value systems work for their adherents, but each works in a different way , and it’s the clashes between incommensurate systems that causes the problems we’re seeing today with political polarization. I suggest that it is not cognitive dissonance that is causing the anger among social conservatives, but the justified sense that they are being talked down to by people like you who believe they have some superior moral or objective vantage and try to shove it down their throats. I am a progressive , but I dont claim that my perspective is morally or objectively superior to other ways of thinking.

Quoting Tzeentch

'Post-truth' is a system the US establishment has created, which might indeed be described as such. Trump moves within that system, but he isn't the cause or even a principal part of the problem.

Trump didn't cause the problem; he exploited it and exacerbated it.

Reply to tim wood
IMO, the solution is education. This includes formal education- teaching critical thinking, and also revising Civics classes to help kids learn to make more rational voting choices ( looking beyond the slick ads).

The post-high school masses are a more challenging group to reach. One possibility is entertainment, like movies, TV shows. They've been effective at pushing more people to embrace conspiracy theories, so it's not unreasonable to think they could do the opposite.

Quoting Relativist

Trump didn't cause the problem; he exploited it and exacerbated it.

But so did the establishment media, no?

The establishment has dominated the media for decades. They have operated on 'post-truth' principles for just as long.

The difference is that now there are multiple actors operating on 'post-truth' principles and the resulting bullshit cacophony makes it impossible not to notice something is wrong.

Quoting Joshs

Unlike you , I make no moral judgements of individualism or neoliberalism as an ‘unrealistic’, ‘unbalanced’ , ‘regressive’ value system. I think all such value systems work for their adherents, but each works in a different way , and it’s the clashes between incommensurate systems that causes the problems we’re seeing today with political polarization. I suggest that it is not cognitive dissonance that is causing the anger among social conservatives, but the justified sense that they are being talked down to by people like you who believe they have some superior moral or objective vantage and try to shove it down their throats. I am a progressive , but I dont claim that my perspective is morally or objectively superior to other ways of thinking.

In what way is what I said a moral judgement? It's a direct observation and I think you are looking too much into the specifics of the symptomatic psychology of conservative voters and not at what is causing the general social reactions in society as a whole. The individualistic values I'm talking about is the overarching ideals for almost all western democracies today, it's built into how society functions and is structured today much more than before. It affects everything in life, it's not a value system of choosing as you describe it. I'm talking about a sociological undercurrent that fuels modern culture. It's a holistic perspective that everyone is involved with and the cognitive dissonance is everywhere; you, me, everyone around us. It's just that it affects some more than others and the consequences show up in different ways. You're looking at the direct symptoms at the end of the chain, the behaviors within the polarization itself. There's no morality to this explanation, I'm pointing at what values that drive society today as a whole, the fundamentals, not ideology. It doesn't matter if you are on the left, right or center, individualism is the undercurrent of modern life in western democracies and everything is trickling down from those values.

Quoting Tzeentch

But so did the establishment media, no?

Hell yes!

[Quote]The establishment has dominated the media for decades. They have operated on 'post-truth' principles for just as long.

The difference is that now there are multiple actors operating on 'post-truth' principles and the resulting bullshit cacophony makes it impossible not to notice something is wrong.[/quote]
The media is giving their customers what they want. How did we get here? The pivotal point in history was when the FCC, under Reagan, revoked the Fairness Doctrine.

Unfortunately, that ship has sailed. Any return to "fairness" ideals would be treated as an assault on free speech. The dark corollary of free speech is the right to lie. So the only thing we can hope to do is to help people learn to seek truth.

This user has been deleted and all their posts removed.

On the subject of how individualism fostered the post-truth society, it also increased the Dunning-Kruger effect among all people. The more individualistic people are, the more confident in being right individuals become and the less able they are to spot the blind spots in their knowledge.

Quoting Relativist

Unfortunately, that ship has sailed. Any return to "fairness" ideals would be treated as an assault on free speech. The dark corollary of free speech is the right to lie. So the only thing we can hope to do is to help people learn to seek truth.

I think people generally prefer truth over lies, and they also absolutely hate being tricked, so at least there are natural forces which ought to nudge people towards truth.

The problem is, all sources of authority have adopted 'post-truth'; governments, international institutions, media, science - it's all tainted.

It appears the only way forward is for the common people to completely reject traditional sources of information, and rebuild the truth from the bottom up. I suppose it's just a matter of time before the house of cards comes tumbling down and people will be forced to do so.

Quoting tim wood

What I'm about is some minimum degree responsibility and accountability, and in gentler times these things usually just flow. But not now. Where once folks were more-or-less responsible and accountable, now they're not. And either we have them or we don't. I say we should have them, and where folks deny them, to impose them.

The issue is that the very governments who would impose on people are part of the problem. When was the last time you heard of a government holding itself accountable and acting responsibly?

Quoting Christoffer

On the subject of how individualism fostered the post-truth society, [...]

Surely you are aware of the questionable relationship history's various collectivist projects had with the truth? Hell, it was the commies who formed the OG post-truth societies.

Quoting Tzeentch

It appears the only way forward is for the common people to completely reject traditional sources of information, and rebuild the truth from the bottom up.

The issues with major news organizations are not fatal. They are selective in what they report, but that's dealt with by using multiple sources. They usually report facts; the problem is the interpretations of those facts. It's usually possible to distinguish fact from interpretation. Opinion shows (which dominate cable "news" stations) are entertainment, not news.

Deniers of climate change, vaccines, Jan 6, 9/11, etc. invariably get their information from "non-traditional" sources. These usually aren't actually sources - they don't typically have actual reporters gathering news. They select stories from MSM, and internet rumors. Their selection of stories and their interpretation, can be more distorted than mainstream news sources. This is AFAIK, anyway. If you know of some alternative sources that don't have these pitfalls, please share them.

Quoting Joshs

I argue that all formations of empirical truth are and always have been socially constructed according to forms of meaning and value which change from era to era. This doesn’t mean that truth is ‘fake’, but that what you would call bias, distortion and prejudice are necessarily built into what it means to produce truth., that its meaning is contextually and social situated

What is different about the contemporary era compared with previous periods of history is not that it is Post Truth, but that a growing number of people are only now recognizing in our highly polarized times what has always been the case, but was until recently denied in favor of a ‘God’s eye’ view of truth, the inextricable relation between socially formed practices and the determination of truth.

Here is a correct point of an extremely high level of polarization in the contemporary political community. Opposed parties always try to transform their particular interests into a universal, truthful articulation. However, paradoxically, nowadays, the dimension of truth is not primarily based on rationally organized discourses or representations of sets of values but on the relying on an affective factor. Collective social emotions have been amplified, echo-chambered, and structured by social and mass media. Post Truth era means that political discourses express primarily the self-referentiality and authenticity of a political subject of affect. As a result,
the opposing parties systematically attribute each other the status of an evil Other so that civil discourse becomes ultimately impossible.

Reply to Joshs Not quite. I'm pointing out the reality that in the past those with ideological differences tended or tried to follow their ideology where ever it led, even if they result wasn't to their liking. Currently groups advertise their ideology merely as a convenient label, but have no trouble not following said ideology if it happens to logically lead to a non self-serving (predetermined) conclusion.

Quoting Tzeentch

Surely you are aware of the questionable relationship history's various collectivist projects had with the truth? Hell, it was the commies who formed the OG post-truth societies.

If you actually read and understand me first you would understand that I argue that post-truth is a problem within the public itself and their relation to truth and how to evaluate who's honest and who's a liar. Communist regimes used and use state violence methods to craft narratives that the public follow by force or indoctrination, it's not the same thing as what post-truth is about.

Quoting Tzeentch

The problem is, all sources of authority have adopted 'post-truth'; governments, international institutions, media, science - it's all tainted.

It appears the only way forward is for the common people to completely reject traditional sources of information, and rebuild the truth from the bottom up. I suppose it's just a matter of time before the house of cards comes tumbling down and people will be forced to do so.

Wouldn't that require complete abandonment of culture and society, medicine and technology? 'The bottom' you would need to start from would be like existence in a pre-agrarian society, a literal re-invention of the wheel (and fire, for that matter.)

Reply to Wayfarer :up:

Quoting Joshs

I suggest that it is not cognitive dissonance that is causing the anger among social conservatives, but the justified sense that they are being talked down to by people like you who believe they have some superior moral or objective vantage and try to shove it down their throats. I am a progressive , but I dont claim that my perspective is morally or objectively superior to other ways of thinking.

I think I agree with this for the most part. What reason do you have or holding progressive values if you do not consider them in some sense superior than a range of alternatives you could hold?

I don't buy the 'all sides are the same' argument at this point in history. In US politics, one particular important player is notoriously mendacious, self-interested and unfit for public office. But - who cares? The recent GOP Congress was notoriously dysfunctional, consumed by internicene disputes and pointless inquisitions. But they were returned anyway, with an increased majority. Meaning: the electorate doesn't know or care, they think it doesn't matter. Or, maybe that all sides are the same.

Quoting Wayfarer

Wouldn't that require complete abandonment of culture and society, medicine and technology?

No, it would just require people to become highly selective in what sources of information they initially trust.

Turn off the television, stop watching "the news", stop using social media. Touch grass, talk to your neighbor, see what's real.

Quoting Christoffer

If you actually read and understand me first you would understand that I argue that post-truth is a problem within the public itself and their relation to truth and how to evaluate who's honest and who's a liar. Communist regimes used and use state violence methods to craft narratives that the public follow by force or indoctrination, it's not the same thing as what post-truth is about.

Oh, I disagree with that definition of post-truth. People in general do not become delusional voluntarily. Some outside force is necessary, like a corrupt government elite that feeds them propaganda, and uses censorship to block off all roads to the truth.

Since the end of the Cold War, western governments (with the US at the helm) have dominated the information landscape and abused that position to influence their population in a way that can only aptly be described as 'brainwashing'.

Communist regimes functioned in exactly the same way, essentially holding a monopoly on information within the totalitarian state.

Today, that western/elite domination of media has been broken, hence we notice something is terribly wrong and call it 'post-truth'. But we have been living in this 'post-truth' reality since 1991 onward, and it started perhaps even before that.

The difference is that now large amounts of people are able to tell something's wrong, which they simply couldn't before due to the totality of the propaganda system.

Quoting Tzeentch

Since the end of the Cold War, western governments (with the US at the helm) have dominated the information landscape and abused that position to influence their population in a way that can only aptly be described as 'brainwashing'.

Rubbish. I could stand on a street corner in Washington DC and pass out flyers accusing the US Government of corruption and at worst be moved along by the DC police. I was a Russian citizen who expressed hostility to the war in Ukraine, I could be arrested and jailed without trial. There’s no moral equivalence there, and you should thank your stars you’re in a society which gives you the ability to express your dissident opinions, because it’s under threat.

Quoting Wayfarer

I could stand on a street corner in Washington DC and pass out flyers [...]

The difference with systems like China and Russia is that at least there it is clear the population has little to no agency.

In the West, populations have been tricked into believing that they are in charge when in fact they are not - a much more effective way of placating a population, because it keeps them ignorant and/or guessing as to who their masters are.

I'm not sure whether it's endearing or grotesque that you would suggest handing out flyers in the face of the influence of the MIC, big business, powerful lobbies and establishment elites.

Quoting Tzeentch

Oh, I disagree with that definition of post-truth.

Why? It's literally the most common interpretation of it:

""Oxford Dictionaries popularly defines it as "relating to and denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.""

And I'm describing the circumstances here. If you're trying to redefine interpretations in order to validate your own argument, you're pretty much playing into the same behavior as post-truth society generates. What's the point of even discussing then if you transform definitions to fit your narrative?

Quoting Tzeentch

People in general do not become delusional voluntarily. Some outside force is necessary, like a corrupt government elite that feeds them propaganda, and uses censorship to block off all roads to the truth.

Who said anything about it being voluntarily? It's like you invent things that haven't been said or don't understand what I'm writing? I've already done an extensive breakdown on why it happened and none of it pointed to it as being voluntarily.

Quoting Tzeentch

Since the end of the Cold War, western governments (with the US at the helm) have dominated the information landscape and abused that position to influence their population in a way that can only aptly be described as 'brainwashing'.

Conspiratorial nonsense. What has dominated any form of brainwashed values since the 80s is the market. Have you done any form of analysis on any of this, at all? We're literally living in a Baudrillardian simulacra of free market constructs forming life narratives that are actively killing us. One of the biggest sources of self-harm in any form is how the identity of the person, the individual does not fit into the narrative they've been taught to believe. Nothing of that comes from any state actor, it comes from society's love of the neoliberal market which fuels the individualistic value system that everyone in western democracies live by today.

This idea that western governments is in control, especially US government, is literally giving them too much credit. They're not that smart. You're describing an X-Files storyline, not reality. Politicians in the US are interested in power and money, but most of them are too stupid to have any grand plan. Even the fascist type politicians like Trump don't have a grand plan, they misuse their power and to the danger of the public, but there's no deep state bullshit going on.

If you look at citizens in any western democracy, what are the things that research points towards being detrimental to their life and health? The thing that's killing us is stress and unreasonable expectations on life. It's unfulfilled dreams and skewed perspectives on wealth. NONE of that has anything to do with the government, it has to do with how the free market conditioned us into certain life values that does not mesh with what is good for us as animal human beings.

Being blind to what actually brainwashed us, blaming the government for brainwashing us instead, leads to the fundamental question... brainwashed us into what? What exactly has the government "programmed us into"? Raegan only gave the market the keys to the kingdom, he didn't orchestrate the world we live in.

And seen as large cap tech corps have so much power that politicians don't know how to handle them, who do you really think have the power to brainwash us? The market (with its tech companies) or any government?

Quoting Tzeentch

Communist regimes functioned in exactly the same way, essentially holding a monopoly on information within the totalitarian state.

This is not the same as post-truth.

Quoting Tzeentch

Today, that western/elite domination of media has been broken, hence we notice something is terribly wrong and call it 'post-truth'. But we have been living in this 'post-truth' reality since 1991 onward, and it started perhaps even before that.

You're confused as to who has power over the media. And you seem to haven't taken part in much of contemporary philosophy that is actively analyzing the relation between media and society. Ignoring the largest contributor to our modern world, social media. The elite do not have that much control over those channels, they're driven by income that formed the algorithms and those algorithms focus on conflict and negativity promoting influencers of the sort. The chaos of these voices aren't controlled by an elite, it's the system itself perpetuating the chaos as it drives sales in the attention economy. People at the top each money on this engagement, they don't care about a narrative, they care about the money.

Quoting Tzeentch

The difference is that now large amounts of people are able to tell something's wrong, which they simply couldn't before due to the totality of the propaganda system.

What propaganda are you talking about? You're so vague and sloppily broad that you end up with such large brush strokes that it becomes platitude nonsense.

Your arguments basically just boils down to "government bad", "government tell propaganda", "people brainwashed". There's zero substance of theory.

Reply to Tom Storm

Quoting Tom Storm

What reason do you have or holding progressive values if you do not consider them in some sense superior than a range of alternatives you could hold?

They’re superior for me, given my needs, the way I live my life and rhe community I identify with. They’re not for everybody.

Quoting Christoffer

Ignoring the largest contributor to our modern world, social media. The elite do not have that much control over those channels, [...]

Yes, that's my point.

Today the media dominance of the western elites has been broken, which is why now all of a sudden people are starting to notice something is wrong.

Guess what: it has been this way for decades, but because there was very little to stir up the echo chambers most people didn't notice.

If you find it difficult to believe that government elites conspire against the common people, I don't know what to tell you. Open your eyes?

Quoting Tzeentch

If you find it difficult to believe that government elites conspire against the common people, I don't know what to tell you. Open your eyes?

This is conspiracy theory stuff and rhetoric. That top people try to wield power is true, but you have no proof of unlimited power in doing so. If you think the public and the free market companies, especially the largest corporations on the planet are more innocent in producing our modern living conditions you aren't paying attention. State actors primarily try to influence elections, or they're targeting what they consider enemies. Western democracies have too much freedom among the people to be steered like that; what is steering them is the sum of our culture and that culture is consumerism. Governments aren't controlling consumption, it's corporations and the free market that does. It's not actual political ideology that actually drives people, even in online debates, what people believe is political discussions are usually different value systems being promoted and those value systems do not come from political leaders, they come from manifested perspectives on life.

A racist, homophobic conservative from an industrial town in the middle US do not hold those values because of political leaders forming those narrative, they hold them because of their surrounding culture and the dissonance between values when they grew up in clash with the values they meet in modern life. It happens in every generation, but in our modern world, all these values clash online and they've been entangled in the algorithms of social media, formed by business strategies that focus on manipulation of the customers.

You're only repeating yourself over and over saying that "it's the government". It's nothing more than conspiratorial parroting and regurgitating some narrative you believe is true. Where's your argument for it? And I'm not talking about linking to some dislocated events of state actors trying to do something specific because specific events does not form the foundation of an entire culture and a foundation for the modern condition. You're not arguing philosophically, you're doing a reddit post.

Reply to Christoffer If you really need to be given proof for the major influence governments have on public opinion then you must have been living under a rock for the past couple decades.

If you need a place to start I would read Manufactoring Consent by Noam Chomsky.

Quoting Tzeentch

If you really need to be given proof for the major influence governments have on public opinion then you must have been living under a rock for the past couple decades.

If you need a place to start I would read Manufactoring Consent by Noam Chomsky.

And anyone who seems to JUST read Noam Chomsky will only have that perspective and regurgitating only his ideas.

I was waiting for you to name-drop him, as this inability to understand what I'm talking about is common among those who don't read much more than his writings.

You are still just saying the same thing over and over. Where's your actual argument, where's the theory behind your words? What's the reasoning? You're just saying that everyone who does not say what you say is living under a rock. What about the rest of contemporary philosophy? Have you forgotten about that? Have you forgotten about how online media have fractured the core thesis of his book as it's based around an outdated dominance in media? Ignoring writers like, Jürgen Habermas, Byung-Chul Han, Shoshana Zuboff, Slavoj Žižek, Evgeny Morozov, Geert Lovink who are all talking about what I'm talking about here; and how the power has shifted from governments to corporations, that governments aren't powerful enough to manufacture anything that corporations and the market aren't better at.

If there's anyone who's been living under a rock in here...

Quoting Christoffer

And anyone who seems to JUST read Noam Chomsky will only have that perspective and regurgitating only his ideas.

I was waiting for you to name-drop him, as this inability to understand what I'm talking about is common among those who don't read much more than his writings.

You asked me for substance. I gave you substance.

If you think I view your offhand dismissal of Chomsky as anything other than clownesque posturing I'm afraid you are wrong.

You simply prove that you're not really interested in anything I have to say, which is why I haven't been taking this conversation particularly seriously. It begs the question, if you're not interested then why do you keep writing these cramped replies? :chin:

Quoting Tzeentch

You asked me for substance. I gave you substance.

No, you pointed at Chomsky without the substance of connecting your argument to it. Manufacturing consent is outdated in today's world. The media landscape has been fractured and become much more complicated with the introduction of individually formed media online. So it requires further philosophical thought to expand it into modern relevance. Which is what all those philosophers I mentioned have done, and which you ignore.

Quoting Tzeentch

If you think I view your offhand dismissal of Chomsky as anything other than clownesque posturing I'm afraid you are wrong.

Why are you so black and white binary in every thought you write out? It's like you don't even realize how ironically polarized you are in a thread about polarization. If I say that Chomsky ISN'T ENOUGH to describe the modern condition, that doesn't mean he is irrelevant, it means that [u]he alone[/u] can't describe our modern society and the post-truth condition of it.

Your arguments rely on a single thesis without including consequent thought and arguments made after it. As I've said, you're not doing philosophy, you're doing dogmatism and appeal to authority. You aren't engaging with the text in the discussion, you're just saying opinions that are loosely based on your favorite philosopher on the subject and just points to that without ever actually making an counterargument to what I say, while ignoring the references I provide. It's infuriatingly annoying to have a discussion with someone who's not even engaging with what is actually written and who is unable to understand nuance.

Quoting Tzeentch

You simply prove that you're not really interested in anything I have to say, which is why I haven't been taking this conversation particularly seriously. It begs the question, if you're not interested then why do you keep writing these cramped replies?

Not interested? You're the one who's ignoring the points being raised. You're the one clowning around here with these non-answers and then have the arrogance to say that those who actually write arguments aren't interested.

Making one-sentence appeal to authority statements isn't philosophy, it's lazy and ignorant.

Quoting tim wood

Who is blind?

You said earlier:
Quoting tim wood

the ignorant (which includes all of us)

If all of us are ignorant, then who is going to teach us? The ignorant?

And authoritarian misses the mark. What I'm about is some minimum degree responsibility and accountability

Responsibility and accountability toward whom? The ignorant?

I say we should have them, and where folks deny them,

to impose them.

Ie. authoritarianism.

A good video on the subject of how society transforms into post-truth. As I've mentioned, the key is the erosion of truth within society more than the language of its leaders. Post-truth language from leaders only works if the definition of truth has already eroded away. You cannot defeat what you cannot define.