Reading the news has turned into a harrowing practice of castle intrigue. You never know who to trust while you’re sulking in the shadows.
Perhaps that’s too dramatic. But the point is this: trust is hard to come by in our culture. “Fake news” is pervasive and everyone on the left is pointing the finger at everyone on the right and vice versa.
In the past year and a half or so we’ve experienced a lot of newsworthy events: a worldwide pandemic, a violent summer of social and racial unrest, and a contentious election. The news has had a lot to talk about. Through it all, the way news reporters and commentators have talked about these events have served to divide us further. Accusations of “fake news” and “conspiracy theories” abound.
Certainly, there has been a lot of fake news and conspiracy theories. What concerns me is that there has been much haste made to dismiss certain things as “conspiracy theories” before paying attention to any credible evidence, one way or another. This has undermined the trust we had in our institutions.
Hasty Judgements
All sides of the political spectrum have been guilty of making some hasty and reactionary judgements.
Consider early on in the pandemic last year when states were just beginning to respond to the threat of COVID-19. Some state authorities quickly initiated stay-at-home orders and mask mandates. Others set looser restrictions and took their time doing it. The political affiliations of these authorities contributed to a politicization of the issue.
Before we had time to dig into the data and learn more about the enemy (COVID-19) we already had narratives being formed. Once a narrative is formed, it is much harder to curve the narrative to shape the facts than it is to curve the facts to shape the narrative.
Now, things are different than they were last March. More intel has been gathered about COVID-19 and a new weapon (vaccine) has been deployed. But the attitudes of many people have remained entrenched.
Do masks work? It depends on who you ask. And the chances are, they won’t be able to give you solid evidence one way or another. The maskers continue masking up, even after being vaccinated. The anti-maskers continue to forge ahead mask-less. Because both are entrenched in their narratives they won’t bother changing behavior. The mask became a symbol for both sides involved: for the pro-maskers it was a badge of honor and solidarity; for the anti-maskers it was a symbol of cowardice and submission to overreach. What it can’t be for either side is this: a simple mask.
What Happens When We Get Siloed
When we retreat into corners, entrenched in our narratives, or battened up in our tribal silos, we lose the ability to trust.
That’s what is in really short supply now: trust. People don’t know who or what to believe. Every stream seems to be tainted by narrative. We don’t know where to drink from.
The facts seem to be of secondary importance to the people on television or the news writers. They seem more intent on pushing a narrative than on laying out the facts and letting us connect our own dots.
When trust is in short supply we need to always be willing to follow stories to the source and prize truth above all else. We ought to approach narratives with caution, aware that they can develop quickly and just as quickly can shadow reality if we aren’t careful.