Friday, February 23, 2018
Democracy is the religion of our time –
just the way Christians, Muslims and Jews have become in the past.
Ours is a godless faith, but one filled
with saints and sinners – at least to those of us who follow the true belief.
Media is filled with prophets and give
us the doctrines we must believe in order to become members of this faith.
A scene from “Indiana Jones and the Last
Crusade” best illustrates the massive change in news reporting over the last
few decades
Archeology is about facts, if you want truth,
you need take a course in philosophy.
Media has ceased dealing with fact and
has become the archangel that delivers us truth.
In civic class we got a false vision
about what democracy is, as teachers told us that we as citizens listen to all
sides of an issue and then support those leaders that align with what we
believe.
In truth, we are largely told what we
should believe by a media obsessed with internet hits and delivering us “all we
need to know.”
The Washington Post, the New York Times,
CNN, each deliver a gospel of liberal truth that steers us towards what we
should believe in order to become a faithful member of the liberal
establishment.
The same is also true for those who take
Fox News or the other right-wing media broadcasts as gospel.
We already seek membership in this tribe
or that and must be told what the current doctrine is.
This is true regardless of how
well-educated we are. In fact, the most educated actually become prophets
themselves, as those less informed take our word for what we should believe,
accepting the true faith from us when they do not seek out the gospel for
themselves.
The misconception that media gives us a
balanced view is as popular a fallacy as the belief that we choose our leaders
because they reflect our beliefs.
We come to politics with built in
biases. We do not listen to false prophets or skewed views, which have become “fake
news.”
In truth, fake news really is fake –
often made up parables that are posted on the internet to counter what we
perceive as false gospel being spewed by questionable media sources.
But even the so called legitimate news
is so slanted and so geared towards providing us with direction as to what to
believe that it ceased to be real.
It is modern media’s search for truth,
instead of fact.
Media itself has become a religion, as
reporters and editors seek to protect their sacred rites and their position as
priests by defending their gospel against challenges.
These arbitrators of truth think nothing
of slanting facts to fit their faith so as to keep the faithful in line, and to
make certain they continue to follow accepted scripture.
Thus, the Washington Post and New York
Times thinks little of filling their stories with questionable descriptions
that skew the reader’s perceptions. CNN recently was caught designing questions
for a Florida high school student in order to fit its preconceived agenda.
Lesser priests of smaller media outlets
throughout the nation quote from the sacred texts that come down from more
prominent media sources, the way monks regurgitate biblical passages.
More importantly, we get these alter
boys and girls defending the sacred text against challenges of “fake news”
partly because each of us who follows the faith gains importance and power from
being in the chain of command.
We can never admit that our news is fake
news, or we will fall from grace.
And perhaps, we already have.