You're Entitled to Your Own Opinion, Not Your Own Facts
How did we get here?
How has this country become so disjointed, so disconnected to the point where people are just making up their own "alternative facts" as they go along? When did we become so skeptical? When did we stop believing in facts?
Yet another unfortunate side effect of the three-ring circus that was the Trump presidency. Kellyanne Conway, a member of Trump's inner circle, coined the term "alternative facts" in a 2017 Meet the Press interview where she tried to justify the White House Press Secretary's exaggeration of the size of the crowd at Trump's inauguration.
There's no such thing as an alternative fact. Anything other than a fact is a lie. Elementary school children are taught that. It really isn't that hard. The sky is blue. That's a scientific fact. The Earth's atmosphere contains particles that diffuse sunlight. Blue light is scattered the most because it travels in shorter wavelengths. That's why the sky appears blue. If someone claims the sky is red, that is not a fact, and it certainly isn't an alternative fact.
You don't have to like the fact the sky is blue, but your saying and believing it isn't blue doesn't create an alternate reality where your lies are true.
While the blue sky example may seem silly, the exact same concept has spread to other more dangerous alternative facts that give birth to unsubstantiated conspiracy theories and other craziness tearing the country apart.
Add these ridiculous alternative facts with, quite possibly, the fastest incubator and delivery vehicle for these crazy theories — social media, and you've got a dangerous toxic combination that isn't slowing down anytime soon.
One example of this unsubstantiated misinformation is the ultra far-right conspiracy theory that Shari'a Law is making its way into the United States. This theory is not new; anti-Muslim crackpots have believed the conservative set of Islamic laws, rules, and restrictions will eventually replace the American legal system. However, Trump took this conspiracy theory and ran with it as he gained support by spreading fear and hate.
The fear of Shari'a Law in the United States promoted some state legislatures to consider passing laws preventing the courts from enforcing Shari'a Law.
There's already a law that does that.
Scholars spent countless hours explaining how the implementation of religious law was not possible in the United States. You don't need a graduate degree in social science or government to understand it. It's really simple — the First Amendment specifically prohibits Congress from establishing ANY LAW on the basis of religion.
Conspiracy theory debunked. However, people still believe the ridiculous idea.
The problem is these alternative facts and conspiracy theories used to be the lifeblood of tinfoil hat wearing recluses huddled in dark basements. Now, mainstream politicians have given these crazy ideas an air of legitimacy.
The biggest of these wild alternative fact sets still centers around the 2020 election and the belief that Trump won reelection and is still the "real" President of the United States running the country from the shadows. Trump supporters keep releasing dates when Trump is going to be "reinstalled" as president.
That's not how the presidency works. But again, you know — alternative facts.
Trump isn't the only politician who lives in this alternate reality. One of the scariest events in modern American history was the infamous capitol insurrection of January 6th. The entire world was witness to the violence and chaos that descended in Washington DC in real time. Members of Congress scrambled ran for their lives and hid as invaders destroyed offices, attacked law enforcement officials, and tried to lynch the Vice-President of the United States.
Georgia Representative, and neo-Republican Trump supporter, Andrew Clyde testified to a House committee, saying the January 6th riot more closely resembled a normal tourist visit and the invaders "behaved in an orderly fashion."
He said, "As one of the members who stayed in the Capitol, and on the House floor, who with other Republican colleagues helped barricade the door until almost 3 p.m. from the mob who tried to enter, I can tell you the House floor was never breached and it was not an insurrection. This is the truth."
I don't think Clyde knows the definition of the word "truth."
If our elected officials spread these lies, it stands to reason they are going to have tons of support from the general public.
Yet another dangerous alternative fact centers around the COVID-19 pandemic, vaccinations, and wearing masks to help prevent infection. I won't dive too deeply into this craziness — unless you've been living in a cave cut off from civilization, you've seen and heard all the people who are opposing medical prode7and virologists who have dedicated a substantial portion of their lives studying the science behind these types of illnesses. I guess it makes more sense to believe the 23 year-old girl on TikTok sticking a non-magnetic key to her forehead rather than the doctor who went to school for a decade and has been in the medical field for forty years.
Now the alternative fact crowd has trained their sights on the country's public education system.
For the past 40 years, a theory attempting to explain the evolution of racial tensions in the United States has been studied. Critical Race Theory (CRT).
Internet sites describe Critical Race Theory as, "an academic movement of civil-rights scholars and activists in the United States who seek to critically examine the law as it intersects with issues of race and to challenge mainstream liberal approaches to racial justice."
The far right argues CRT helps further promote racial division and hatred towards white, or what people erroneously call Caucasian, people. There is a public outcry from these people to prevent CRT from being taught in K-12 settings. Angry mobs flooded school board meeting chambers with placards voicing their displeasure with public schools teaching CRT.
The only problem is, with the exception of some school districts on the West Coast, and a small number of other school districts around the country, Critical Race Theory is not being widely considered for implementation in curriculums around the country.
The fact is, most CRT is taught at the university level. Several graduate and undergraduate programs have added trying to understand the racial tensions in the United States to their programs of study. General Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, supoorted studying CRT, saying studying the theory would help potential army officers understand race relations in, and out, of uniform.
But hey, why let something annoying like facts get in the way of people being outraged?
The Loudon County School District in Virginia had to suspend the public comment portion of their school board meeting as protestors yelled at school board members to prohibit teaching CRT in the classroom.
Here's the thing — Loudon County does not, and was not considering, adding CRT to the curriculum. The agenda item was introduced merely to discuss the implementation of CRT by other school districts around the country.
The Superintendent of Loudon County Schools was quoted as saying, "We've had ongoing misinformation and citizens concerned that critical race theory was being taught in our schools. I will say again tonight that it is not." The superintendent is clearly saying they are not teaching CRT in the classroom.
Again, a fact.
But that didn't stop people from essentially shutting down the school board meeting.
Here in Texas, our illustrious governor has joined the Trumpian platform of misinformation and alternative facts. Coming on the heels of Governor Abbott's announcement to build a Texas border wall, and his recent signing of the "Heartbeat Bill," Abbott is encouraging Texas lawmakers to introduce legislation banning the teaching of CRT in Texas classrooms. It's apparent Abbott is trying to shore up neo-Republican support as the gubernatorial race gets closer and closer.
And the real tragedy of the whole thing is if people on the right would put their unbridled hatred and indignation to the side and if the revisionist Cancel Culture on the right would put their incessant desire to change everything for what they think is best, they'd see components of CRT have been in the social studies curriculum long before anything called Critical Race Theory existed. In my classrooms, I always taught about the different struggles and discrimination immigrants experienced when coming to the United States. The international slave trade and the Civil Rights movement are things I taught. The persecution Japanese-Americans experienced during WWII and the shameful treatment of African-Americans, Mexican-Americans, and obviously the horrible mistreatment the Native Americans had to endure we're all things I taught. You don't have to label something in order to teach it in class. If you teach US and world history properly, you're already teaching Critical Race Theory, it's just not called Critical Race Theory.
The more people want to change history we realize it's always been taught — it just doesn't have a fancy sounding name. It's just called history.
I fear we have gone too far in warping and twisting reality to fit our myopic, narrow vision. Gone are the days of compromise and rational, fact based thought. If we don't like the story, we just make up alternative facts to support our own narrative.
When we have a passing, casual relationship with the truth; when we refuse to believe the real story despite being presented with evidence and facts, do the lines begin to blur between fantasy and reality? Have we crossed over to a world where the truth has been replaced by the imaginary and the theoretical? Perception, no matter how misguided, is reality, I suppose.
Maybe the sky isn't blue, after all.
Comments
Post a Comment