So the move Black Panther opened on Friday. A superhero movie centered on an African prince who is to lead a hidden kingdom on the African continent. I haven't seen the movie and cannot comment on the content, but I have seen that it has been a movie that has inspired a sense of pride among African Americans in the media. So of course there is a segment of our culture who feels this is a problem. To respond to this there has been a deluge of fake Twitter posts showing pictures of white people with physical injuries saying they were jumped as showings of the film. This was completely untrue and easy to prove wrong. Twitter has had to ban users who have been doing this. But the story isn't going away and that is the problem. Once it is out there people will believe it and won't do the research. It demonizes the black community suggesting that white people shouldn't go see this film. It also will push down the box office numbers in some communities, though it still was a record weekend. But facts don't matter anymore do they?
CNN has gone out of their way to get the mythical both sides of any information they report on in what has become in the last 30 years or so news analysis. Virtually every day there is someone on their air that lies to the hosts. Sometimes called out but mostly there is a nuanced push back that doesn't seem to want to offend. Just a few minutes ago I switched over to CNN to hear about a rumor that Rick Gates, Paul Manafort's second and the head of the Trump inauguration team, has plead guilty. Two people were arguing about gun laws in the wake of the Florida shooting. Once again false talking points were unchallenged on the air. But that has been going on since last Wednesday with this story. For example, the call for armed guards in schools. The school in Florida has an armed guard. The shooting went to fast to have him engage. Shooting stories bring out the lies consistently. Most of the people who have opinions about guns do it from an emotional place. (except members of Congress who are on the NRA payroll). So even news stories are riddled with false statements. I get that a little but I wish the news media would do a deep story about the facts of these events. After the shock and awe, after the crazy number of reporters are sent to stick microphones in the face of grieving families, after the political class stops using victims as political football, I would like to see a documentary done on what is true and not true about these shootings.
There are journalists who are doing deep work on the Russian involvement of our elections. NBC's: Left Field: After Truth which looks at a known Russian troll farm Facebook ad to organize anti-refugee rally in Twin Falls Idaho. This has created a growing anti-refugee feeling and people are being attacked in the town. In fact it is one of the ground zeroes for fake news. Like the Bowling Green massacre lie from the White House, it has ginned up people to repeat nonsense about Muslims in our country. What is amazing is the number of people who, despite the facts, continue to believe things that a proven to not be true. But the more we push back with facts more people with have to believe. Facts are important and the fact that we have documentary shows called After Truth and a White House that believes in alternative facts it will not be easy.
But there are those who don't want facts to interfere with their world view. When Supreme Court Justice Sonya Sotomayor was nominated for the court an old speech in which she suggested a "a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." Speaking about how certain perspectives will color a judges decision. As they always have. It was a speech about Latina jurists. In context the statement made the point that a diversity of perspectives give the court a better understanding of issues that may involve people of color or women. When discussing it on Fox News one commentator when asked about the context said something to the effect that context isn't important. Context helps define truth. But to this right wing noise maker truth was unimportant.
Now is par of the course for pundits but should it be for members of Congress they should be held to a higher standard, by themselves as well as us. However my hope that this could be true is just not realized. Rep. Claudia Tenney (R-NY), a conservative upstate Republican, went on CNN “Newsroom” on Saturday, attempting to defend President Donald Trump in light of the recent indictments of Russians for their illegal meddling in the 2016 election. While she twice, at least, said that the indictment put an end to the idea of collusion of the Trump campaign with Russian troll farms (it doesn't) she had to be asked if she thought the 37 page indictment seems to be a conclusion of the efforts of the special council. Tenney had to admit that she hadn't read the indictment released on Friday. Seriously, the indictment was online before I got home on Friday. She is back in her district and not in session, she was going on national television to speak about this and she didn't read it. Not because she didn't have time it is because she didn't care about the facts. When pushed a little about the role of Russians in the election she said they helped both sides. (They didn't and the indictment is clear about that). How is it that a member of Congress can get away with that.
The answer is simple. We are living in a Post-truth world. Facts don't matter. If it violates our worldview it can't be true. Be it about what is happening at movie theaters, restrictions on guns, Russian involvement in our election or virtually anything these days there is no trusted referee to help us. Where have you gone Walter Cronkite, a nation turns its confused eyes to you? Who is your heir and will we believe her?
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