Democracy Starts With You
Category: Current Events
It sounds counterintuitive to say that we’re not polarized as a nation. We see each other as almost separate countries.
There are people from every state who say they are willing to tear apart their communities and save the “good ones” from the devastation, whether that’s snarky liberals on a blog or gun-toting secessionists in the Mountain West. It seems like we can never ever agree on things, and even when we do express some consensus, we’re all suspicious of the others’ motives.
It’s true: the nitty gritty of the policies and programs that impact our lives are complicated as all get out. It’s a lot like trying to explain the mechanics of an entire house – plumbing, HVAC, heating, electricity, construction, foundation. Each one of those systems is its own area of expertise that a person can spend years learning and memorizing. Just like politics, the technical aspects of those are constantly changing with new information and developments, which means that to truly know what’s going on, you have to be constantly learning.
Who doesn’t love a political scandal? In our Age of Outrage, there’s almost nothing that we want more. Scandal comes from feet on the Resolute Desk or the Oval Office couches, from vouching for friends or appointing them to your Cabinet, from firing Deputy Attorneys General because they wouldn’t affirm your political goals, and from sexual harassment with a cigar. In fact, it almost seems like we can turn anything into a scandal, which has the disconcerting effect of making almost anything normal.
On this day of Love, I want us to start fixing our relationship with the media. Yes, that’s right: the dreaded MSM. The “lamestream” or major media outlets, institutions with long track records that follow journalistic ethics (mostly), have lost America’s faith. Years of reporting without context or explanation mixed with a soul-crushing cynicism has left us apathetic and frustrated. We’re like an abandoned spouse, wondering where the love’s gone.
Continue reading “Week 6 – How Do We Get A Better Relationship With the Media?”
Citizen Zero 