Installing a universal bullshit detector, how to...

[Mythsaje]

We need to teach our fellow Americans to forget about the latest episode of American Idle ;) and the final score of the most recent Monday Night gladitorial game and pay more attention to the horseshit the corporate media is feeding them.

We need a universal bullshit detector at least as badly as we need universal healthcare. People need to learn how to actually listen to what they're being told. Why does a small majority still believe that Iraq had something to do with 9/11? Because too many of them have never been taught to differentiate between rational thought and purest bullshit. As long as it sounds as if it might be vaguely plausible, people will swallow it as if it were a basket of Belgian chocolate truffles dying to be consumed by a chocaholic.

I do believe that some of the blame lies with our education system. Not so much what is taught as how it's taught.

We're taught to swallow whatever they feed us. If we don't, we're somehow looked upon as a unwelcome disruption. We're taught not to challenge the "facts," even though there are SO many things that are entirely open to interpretation.

And it's only likely to get worse with the testing requirements for NCLB. Absorb, regurgitate. Do NOT question.

I questioned everything from the beginning, which didn't exactly endear me to my teachers. :shrug: I did the same in college, which probably didn't serve me all that well either. But, on the other hand, I managed to develop a pretty good bullshit detector when it was all said and done.

My ex, the mother of my children, found it frustrating that I liked confirmation of anything she told me--regardless of what it was. Especially if it was about me.

Americans have grown entirely too accustomed to passively taking in information--which has made us far too vulnerable to marketing techniques. Hell, these last several years, since the 2000 election, has been nothing but one long marketing campaign. And no one knows it better than us--those with functioning bullshit detectors.

So how do we install bullshit detectors in the rest of the population?

One person at a time. We wage a covert war against disinformation. We make it our job to inform people of the truth when confronted with things that send our b.s. detectors to the red line. We act as surrogate b.s. detectors for those deprived of the asset.

On the national front, at least we have Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert to act as our collective bullshit detectors. Along with Stephanie Miller, Thom Hartmann, Randi Rhodes, and Mike Malloy. They sound the alarm over the airwaves--but it's up to us to do it on a daily basis for people who don't know any better.

Then again, we can make it simple.

How do we tell when a Republican politician is lying?

The lips are moving.

:evilgrin:

[Lasher]

1. I bought a bullshit detector but it's defective

Every time I speak it goes off.

[EST]

3. Some unethical dealer must have sold you a virgin detector

instead of what you requested. And a republican virgin detector, at that.

[EST]

2. Critical thinking comes easier for some than for others.

In the case of republicans, they think they have their own bullshit detectors in the likes of Rush Limbaugh, Hannity, O'rielly and too damn many others. Republicans live in magic.

Their lives are about returning to some mystical, mythical, idealized past wherein times were simpler to understand and life was clear, with everything pegged.

Unfortunately, such a time machine does not exist and there never was a time when people didn't fuck, where queers didn't exist and when everybody "knew their place" and happily lived in it.

The reality based community understands that those were the years of back-breaking toil, air conditioning non-existent, you had to chop the wood by hand and feed a smoky fire yourself or you starved or froze to death--if some untreatable disease didn't get you first.

We are making a little progress-being slapped in the face by reality is a great educator-but it is very slow and will prove remarkably short lived, absent some dramatic moves to limit corporations and corporate ownership of communications.

[Berry Cool]

4. You forgot Keith Olbermann

an excellent detector of bullshit.

I don't know why people aren't being taught to think critically in school nowadays. I guess there just isn't time when you have to "teach to the test." All I know is, I was definitely taught the skill.

[Mythsaje]

5. I did forget Olbermann...

An unfortunate oversight on my part.

[Hubert Flottz]

6. Hip Boots don't help anymore...it's gotten too deep...on shite crik

Tired of that Deep Voo-Doo-Doo-Doo?

Blow up your TV throw away your paper
Go to the country, build you a home
Plant a little garden, eat a lot of peaches
Try an find Jesus on your own

http://www.oldielyrics.com/lyrics/john_prine/spanish_pipedream_blow_up_your_tv.html

[vixengrl]

7. So how do we install bullshit detectors in the rest of the population?

I think we need to break down political bullshit just like any other kind--deconstruct the slogans and reveal the strings being pulled--short-circuit the soothing slave of oily language before it coats the thinking mind and bogs it down. I think "language-monitoring"--like subsituting "escalation" for "surge" is part of it, but sometimes even taboos will have to be challenged to get minds jump-started. Things like what "honor" means, or being "god-fearing. Words are used that stir people in one way because of emotional impact, but lull them in the other, because they assume we all agree on what those words mean.

The marketing machine of the right uses buzz-words that are supposed to be good, like "patriotism", "values" and "freedom". The meanings are twisted, and need to be countered with truth about "constitutionality", "ethical behavior" and "human rights". But the trick is brutal honesty--some people might scream that they want their fictions, but it's kind of hard faced with the facts.

[sendero]

8. I hate to be a wet blanket...

... but as my 7th grade math teacher used to say "you can lead a horse to water but you can't make him drink".

Americans don't know what is going on because they don't really want to. They know the media is a pack of liars, believe me. In poll after poll you will find Americans do not trust the corporate media one bit.

But how many of them bother to seek out reasonably objective sources of information?

Precious few it seems.

Like most people, Americans as a whole will not shape up until they hit "rock bottom", until the consequences of their inactions and action hit so hard they have no choice. I feel sorry for the Republican party (only a little :)) because when the economy of this country finally dips into what can no longer be spun, they are going to be blamed for it as well they should.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

9. start by throwing away your television

the most enlightened and bs free kids I've met come from homes where there is no TV. They read books instead and learn critical thinking skills--and yes, there are teachers who encourage kids to challenge what is presented to them--but then they are the ones out at the anti-war and pro-environment protests.