It is a bad day when colleagues from Europe, South America, and Australia message you in a panic about the status of the United States. They tell me that they cannot recognize this country, and they do not understand what is going on.
They are not the only ones who say this to me. I hear the same concerns from friends who have emigrated to the U.S. and are now American citizens. They have watched our character change in real-time. They ask me, where is this coming from and why?
I speak with friends in the military and fellow veterans who I went to war with. People who I would still entrust with my life. We took an oath of allegiance to support a common ideal of freedom and, above all, each other.
I hear it from activists and clergy who have devoted themselves to justice and peace in their communities. I would require an entire book to dictate the grief and hope expressed by fellow African-Americans and close LGBTQ friends.
We all share different opinions, common respect, and unilateral feeling that something is fundamentally misaligned.
We are in a crisis of disinformation.
What was taken for granted as tested, tried, and true is being battered by skepticism, cynicism, and lies. Today, inside this new “reality”, “No” really does means “yes” and “two plus two equals five”. Furthermore, such untruths are repeated so forcefully that many struggle to even tell the difference. Others feel intimidated from speaking up at all. And for what purpose?
The scenes on Capitol Hill last week were heartbreaking and tragic. Death. Injury. Destruction of life and property. A historic day of mayhem. Another wound on our national psyche.
And for what purpose?
If true that for each action there is an equal and opposite reaction, there must be a reckoning in response to this dark era of nihilistic disinformation. We tend to believe balance naturally follows periods of imbalance. But this is not true. Events may not always be under our control. Yet we can precipitate tremendous influence through our decisions, both individual and collective.
In my late 30s, I have lived enough to understand that I am part of many problems, and many deeper problems have existed long before me. I was born into a mythology of racism rooted in everything but scientific fact. I was bestowed with a flawed sense of privilege simply because I was born Western and male. Such legacies were never inherent to me. They were taught to me. I will live the rest of my life trying to rectify its damage.
The idea of bending fact into fiction is not original. Imagination can be a wondrous gift. Yet willfully applied to ignorance and fueled by hate, the end result is living nightmare. What advancements were ever built from an “alternate reality”? What problems solved? What lives preserved? What achievements reached? How can something like that ever last? On the contrary, lives are shattered in vain. History has provided countless examples that this mode of flawed logic simply does not work.
Our present dark period of disinformation will take time to correct. It will not correct itself overnight. A free and open society cannot navigate without some instinct for truth. Even original thinking must continuously challenge itself in order to grow. Anything less is delusion destined for disillusionment.
Now is a very good time to actively challenge all forms of disinformation.
This must be carried out calmly and thoroughly with clarity and resolve. Do it quietly. Do it loudly. Do what is right to purge it. We can start with the most elementary of building blocks. “Yes” means “yes” and “no” means “no”. We can acknowledge the behaviors that nurture society such as honor, courage, and commitment. We can challenge destructive behaviors that are aggressive and predatory. It must be challenged and rejected plainly.
This is not about becoming a moral vigilante nor an ethical saint. This isn’t a knee-jerk rush to shame, scorn, and ridicule anything we dislike, misunderstand, or disagree with. This is a simple call to conscience. A call to quit drowning out our conscience.
Conscience is the voice inside of our hearts that clearly recognizes what is right and what is wrong. This voice may seem small, yet, when heeded, it is louder than any mob.
I believe this voice is connected to our very humanity. We must listen to that voice and do what it says, while we can still hear.
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Dedicated to the memory of Larry Lamar Yates (1950 – 2020) who was a friend, scholar, and social justice activist.
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This post is republished on Medium.
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