Overcoming the F.E.A.R. Factor

https://newslit.org/

Before you go on, an article in the May 8 & May 22, 2021 issue of Science News ran with a cover "Awash in Deception:  How science can help us avoid being duped by misinformation."  In the lead article titled: "The Battle Against Fake News," Alexandra Witze presents five suggestions on how to debunk bad information.  They come from the News Literacy Project (see the above link).

How to Debunk:

1.  Arm yourself with media literacy skills, at sites such as the News Literacy Project (newslit.org), to better understand how to spot hoax videos and stories.

2.  Don't stigmatize people for holding inaccurate beliefs.  Show empathy and respect, or you're more likely to alienate your audience than successfully share accurate information.

3.  Translate complicated but true ideas into simple messages that are easy to grasp.  Videos, graphics and other visual aids can help.

4.  When possible, once you provide a factual alternative to the misinformation, explain the underlying fallacies (such as cherry- picking information, a common tactic of climate change deniers.

5.  Mobilize when you see misinformation being shared on social media as soon as possible. If you see something, say something.

"Misinformation is any information that is incorrect, whether due to error or fake news.  

"Disinformation is deliberately intended to deceive."

"Propaganda is disinformation with a political agenda."

Sander van der Linden
Social Psychologist
University of Cambridge

Source:  Science News/May 8, 2021 & May 22, 2021

In our struggle to restore decency and good back into the American psyche, it is important that we restore faith, hope and positive thinking back into our collective mindset. The restoration of these three essential elements are the keys for restarting America’s Constitutional engine.

I believe that we can all agree that those three things are good things. How do we, in these United States, get those things back?

I despise the co-opting of the phrase “Make America Great Again” in that it has been employed to imply that America was only great when straight wealthy white men held all the social, political and economic power. It has been used destroy faith, hope and positive thinking through a deceptive and destructive turn of phrase

The phrase, in its current iteration, makes my stomach turn. It makes my stomach turn because it sounds like it has the noblest intentions in mind when it has just the opposite intentions in mind. Keep the rich white oilagarchs in power, return American women back to “Susie Homemaker” and keep the middle classes blindly consuming while keeping the rich rich, the poor poor and ethnic minorities in their place. Oilagarchs is not a misspelling.

The phrase isn’t new. Ronald Reagan used it in his presidential election campaign of 1980. It was used at a time when the United States was reeling from the Iran Hostage Crisis and a 60% majority of Americans wanted a larger budget for national defense. Check out the link above to see other presidents that have invoked this phrase.

Let me get firmly back on point. My minister came up with an appropriate acronym for what I believe is the root cause of our national malaise:

F alse

E vidence

A ppearing

R eal

“F.E.A.R. ” is the opposite of what I will call “R.E.A.L.” (Rational evidence about life). F.E.A.R. has been used to confuse us, to divided us and promote fear. Fear is a powerful tool. Carry a gun because the country is being overrun by ethnic minorities, eliminate the woman’s right to choose what they do with their bodies because they belong at home barefoot and pregnant, deny climate change change because it is too “woke,” Democrats are baby killers.

Fear is a powerful tool used by those with the real power to keep their power. Those of us down here under the thumbs of the rich and powerful are fighting their proxy war. Divide and conquer. Keep us fight among ourselves while the real source of our national problems are sitting in their elitest mansions and corporate boardrooms enjoying the fruits of our labors. They have turned us against each other, red v. blue in order to save their own position of wealth and power.

We can get out of this mess if we work together and fight back against the forces that divide us. We can do that by overcoming this fear and uniting as people to take our country back again.