The Threat to Our Time

How bad actors and fear of change is ruining our world.

For quite some time now, state actors (particularly in Russia, but also elsewhere) have been manipulating the narrative. They've been seeding doubt everywhere and about anything. They've been perpetuating conspiracy theories, doubt in science and trust in facts. There's always been fringe ideas, but social media has been a place where with some state sponsored stirring they've been able to blow it out of all proportion. Anti-intellectualism has been spreading like wildfire as the fringe latch on to people's inherent insecurities. But while individuals might hold these opinions on their own, bad actors stir up the fury to drive their agenda.

Then we get the commercial news outlets realising that division and extremism creates an environment where people tune in because they want to see what to be outraged by next. Then fringe political elements jump on that by catering to the zeitgeist. Then because news agencies don't want to bother challenging lies, they perpetuate the message without filter or context.

We're now in a state of perpetual anxiety, polarised to hate and getting programmed to ignore facts and ignore authority. When things get difficult, the comfort of simple lies is easier than a complicated truth. Maybe there are numerous and uncontrollable reasons for something you don't like? Nope, it's simply the immigrants, or it's the chemicals, or it's whatever has changed since your preferred nostalgia era. It couldn't possibly be a nuanced problem that you don't have control over.

Another issue is to deny anything that's inconvenient. Climate change, all evidence is that it's anthropomorphic (caused by human activity) and that it'll cause great harm to our existence on this planet. But because the solutions involve challenges and changes? It's no longer real, or it's natural and we'll be fine, or we shouldn't bother because nothing we could do could fix it. Look at the ozone layer, that issue went away didn't it? Yeah, because we banned CFCs globally. Y2K was all hype and no disaster came! Yeah, except armies of developers and engineers spent years making sure nothing bad happened.

"Ignorance is bliss" they say, we're in the era of 'wilful ignorance' because people will put their hands up and shutdown when it's too difficult. They don't want to be troubled because it's hard work or requires a change to their world view.

I am not immune from the fatigue of these problems we're faced with, but I am more concerned by that wilful ignorance, political/social polarisation and anti-intellectualism. When we vote, when we engage, we need to ask ourselves what we can do to move the world forward? What can we do to make the world better for everyone? Not just ourselves and even if that means we have to go out of our way.