The one thing I would love to go away is my learned lack of faith in humanity in 2020. It’s been growing for many decades.
One by one my young adult rosy eyed views of humanity have been stricken down. Fifty percent of the people have gone down the rabbit hole to a very strange world.
Education is the key to making wise decisions
Nope. Emotion and self-interest are what’s used. People form attitudes, driven by emotion, and this is what guides their decisions.
Correct information can help people overcome misinformation.
Nope. People feed on what pleases them, not what is true.
Misinformation can be overcome with truth.
Nope. People would rather believe a lie.
Sensationalism and dirt don’t fly for most people.
Nope. People want to believe it and wallow in it.
People use logic to make decisions
Nope. Emotion and self-interest led by identity and peer influence (polarization). I’ve been writing about the dangers of polarization for many years. By 2020 the plant had fully blossomed.
I had seen it in professional groups that uniformly rejected things like religion. The entire nation has divided into myopic tribes. Identifying with a certain tribe became extremely important as financial and other troubles drove fear over incomes and jobs.
People today ignore science, facts, and anything that threatens the identity endorsed by their peer worldview. If you present an informed view to either the extreme right or left, their reaction is to reach for even the most ridiculous objection, and their polarization becomes more hardened. It’s better not to discuss with them.
People will help others.
Nope. They may help others if the people are in their tribe. Beyond that too many people are inherently selfish and use any racial and ethnic myth to justify it.
I wish I could find some humor in this
I deeply regret having come to this conclusion. I desperately want to restore my faith in humanity.
Weekly Prompt