In 2005, Stephen Colbert coined a term that in only a few syllables encapsulates one of the biggest problems in contemporary politics. Truthiness is defined as the "the quality of seeming or being felt to be true, even if not necessarily true." The word was originally just a joke on the Colbert Report, but its characterization of the American political problem prompted it to actually be added to the dictionary. But now, it's been 11 years since the creation of this word, and never before is it so clear that this is one of the biggest problems in discussing politics. In our currently dichromatic political atmosphere of red vs. blue, the only solution to such a heated and divided atmosphere is a discussion. But after a little thought, one realizes that discussion only works if both sides are on the same fundamental ground of facts. But that's just it – they aren't anymore.
The night after the election of Donald Trump, someone decided to have a conversation with me about why he felt Trump was a far better candidate than Clinton. I did not entirely understand why one would want to debate the night after the election, but fine, let's debate. But quickly the debate became an argument, as I tried to use my facts and he simply dismissed my facts as wrong. So I simply asked, "Well, where are your sources that disprove my facts?" I only got a grunt as a response. Here it is, the word truthiness, the problem. After he said that, he continued to argue, but there was no point in continuing. It was clear we could not argue on an even playing field. It's as if we both were trying to play a game in a pool, except we were in different pools on the other side of the world and not in the same place.
Colbert coined the word truthiness to represent facts that are not actually true but feel true. This, in different words, states that somehow in 2016 facts have become negotiable. Nothing is more telling of this pandemic than the fact that over half of the US does not believe in climate change or the man-made causes of climate change. I can comprehend legislation, legality and even economics having a blurry line for truth, but science? Truthiness has come so far that people are ignoring science. Science tells us that the climate is changing. This is a fact, it isn't negotiable. Yet somehow in modern America, it is.
How can we ever hope to heal this divided nation, to compromise and to have fruitful political discussion, if we can never agree on what a fact is? It's relevant at this time of the year, now that Thanksgiving is around the corner and thousands of liberal college students will be having debates with all their conservative relatives (at least I will). But what is the point if we aren't even on the same playing field if we cannot even agree on what the facts are to base our political opinions and ideologies off of? Simply put, this new age idea that a fact is negotiable, that it is not directly a fact, is disturbing and dangerous. But now that we know it does exist, we want to know how it got this bad, and how can we fix it.
I'm not too sure how the truthiness pandemic became so bad. Possibly it spurs from a slew of news media outlets that value ratings and dramatized TV over factual and fair television. Personally, I hate CNN and FOX and read Reuters and AP directly, rarely reading the NYT or WSJ. It could also be the two political parties mixed with their media surrogates, and a growing division between ruralism and urban elitism, that all coupled together have led to a divided nation that cannot even trust the facts of the other side. Sometimes questioning if the facts are the entire picture, as often occurs in economic reports, is fine and necessary. But recently, it is becoming predominantly a complete rejection of a fact – for instance, the birther movement that Donald Trump started against Barack Obama, stating he was a Kenyan Muslim. Despite all the facts that disproved this idea, many stated it was true. The same occurred for climate change. Often these rejections of truth are met with insane conspiracy theories, like the idea that all the scientists in the world have been paid to keep climate change alive as an idea. That would be an obvious logistical nightmare to the point of pure impossibility. Yet people trust that as a fact, and not the statements of 99% of the world's scientists.
How we can fix it is an important question. Ask anyone in your family as a quick survey if they trust their news source and many will say no. This is the start of the pandemic. When debating someone at the dinner table, ask for their sources. If they have none, then you are likely arguing against nonsense. Both a liberal and a conservative can agree that finding a news source can be difficult, but doing this is necessary. Try introducing people who may not trust the news, and may be contributing to this pandemic, to older news sources such as Reuters or AP, which have been around for over 150 years, before this whole pandemic of truthiness started. Killing this disease is paramount to fixing the current political division within the US, and is necessary so we do not end up with another election like 2016. It's time to have a restoration of the facts and kill truthiness. Otherwise, the current chaotic political nightmare will thrive for decades onward.
