Elon Musk X media platform is common venue for masturbation to USA “left vs. right” egoism of tribal alpha-male intercourse
“Are you smarter than a 3rd grade school student?” … Masturbatory Egoism of social media simulacra. Reactionary comment messages on social systems that boil down to: “I am smarter than Donald Trump”, “I am smarter than Elon Musk”, “I am smarter than Russia”
What Americans need more than amything, are Critical Thinking Slills. That’s what allows people to reject propagamda instantly. Often, research isn’t even necessary, because the basic premise is flawed enough to reject it, if you have the Critical Thinking Slills to analyze it.
“Instantly”, “reactionary” “without thinking”.
That’s exactly the opposite.
We have known this since the 1950 / 1960’s: “A point of view means a static fixed position and you can’t have a static fixed position in the electric age. It’s impossible to have a point of view in the electric age and have any meaning at all. You’ve got to be everywhere at once whether you like it or not. You have to be participating in everything going on at the same time and that is not a point of view.” — Marshall McLuhan, University of Toronto professor
This isn’t an American only issue. The Middle East has been in crisis for THOUSANDS of years with the same problem that Americans have. The BIble.
People are unable to tell fiction from non-fiction, we need to educate and address that problem. See here: !FictionNonFiction@lemm.ee
People used to go to the public library and look up information in books and fact-check. That is how you distinguish fiction from non fiction.
People in year 2025, all over the world, avoid Wikipedia and fact-checking. What they trust is Social Media machines of anonymous no-name people. They do not even know who the author of Lemmy comments are, they just accept anything they read because they like the decoration of the meme format. That is why things have gotten so terrible since year 2007 in USA. The Apple iPhone.
You can’t have every person watching different TV shows, going to 8,000 different Lemmy communities to get the meme news. People are NOT ON the same page. Instead of all of us building a Super Wikipedia that has every factional citation and reference of information that is common ground / common understanding Super WIkipedia, people get their learning and education from thousands of different Lemmy comments and they filter and subscribe to different Bluesky and YouTube feeds and live in their own ego-driven “this is attractive” information.
This crisis was spelled out in 1985 in a book by Neil Postman, see !BackTo1985@lemm.ee
Everybody “being on the same page” isn’t necessarily a good thing. MAGAs are on the same page - Fox News, and the Conservative Propaganda Machine. Christians are on the same page, so are Muslims.
Rather than everyone rowing in the same direction, it’s more important that people know how to find the truth, and differentiate between truth and lies, and it starts with Critical Thinking Skills, which requires people to first apply the “smell” test.
For instance, in 2016, MAGA made a claim that 3 million illegals were bussed in from Mexico to vote for Hillary Clinton on Election Day, and many people believed it, and repeated it as truth. It didn’t require research to prove it wrong, just some common sense Critical Thinking.
How many people does a bus hold? 50? So to bus in 3 million people would require 60,000 busses. Were border agents aware of 60,000 busses full of undocumented Mexican tourists crossing the border that day? The border crossings are on video. Do the videos show an enormous rise Mexican bus traffic that day? The answer is No.
What about the polling places? Did any report having busloads of Mexicans pulling up, and piling in to vote? The answer is No.
And who organized this giant operation? They would have had to register specific people to vote weeks in advance, tying their illegal registry to an actual address. Then they would have to find that same person on Election Day, and make sure they get on the exact right bus, to the exact right polling station on Election Day, and repeat that 3 million times, all on the same day, and not make any mistakes. Does any of that sound plausible, or even possible? The answer is No.
What about the human requirememts of 3 million people on that day? They would have to feed them, and let them use restrooms. Any reports of 60,000 busses flooding truck stops all over California that day? The answer is No.
It would have taken an army of people dedicated to pulling off this enormous election fraud in a reliably Blue state that didn’t even need the votes. It was an extrely controversial election, and not one person has ever stepped forward to say they participated in it.
Just a cursory look at the alleged “facts” is enough to reject the idea as preposterous, without any research at all. That’s the value of Critical Thinking Skills.
Nope, Muslims are on a different book, Quran, than Christians, Bible.
Have you ever lived outside your home nation? I’ve lived in North Africa, Algeria - Islamic nation. I’ve lived in Jordan in the Middle East. I’ve lived in USA, my home nation where I am now. I’ve lived in Indonesia and Malaysia - Islamic nations. They are not on “the same page”, a Mosque is not reading The Bible.
I suggest you work on your media literacy. I suggest Finnegans Wake by James Joyce as study basis; !JamesJoyce@lemm.ee
:::: _____________
“Finnegans Wake is the greatest guidebook to media study ever fashioned by man.” - Marshall McLuhan, Newsweek Magazine, p.56, February 28, 1966
Yes, I understand all that. I didn’t mean that Christians and Muslims are on the same page with each other, but as individual groups they are on the same page, due to whatever propaganda they injest. Conservatives follow the Conservative Propaganda Machine, Christians follow the Bible, Muslims follow the Quran. Neo-Nazis/ White Supremacists have their websites and podcasts. Etc., etc.
Often those individual groups have similar objectives and will form alliances, such as the alliance between Christians, Conservatives, and White Supremacists.
My point stands that having everyone singing from the same sheet music isn’t the answer. That just takes mindless obedience, which is easily exploited by bad-faith entities. Encouraging people to render their own decisions based on Critical Thinking Skills, guided by a genuine sense of morality, is far more important to the health and security of a nation.
But you clearly didn’t understand what I was saying about the urgent need to get people on the same page, a “Super Wikipedia” and stop consuming junk comments on Lemmy.
I disagree with that. Having everyone relying on the same propaganda is what has brought us to this point. Too many people abdicate their responsibility to think responsibly to whatever their propaganda of chouce is, whether its the lies of the Conservative Propaganda Machine, or the mythology of their religious books. Any blind loyalty to a single source invites manipulation and exploitation.
People need to sharpen their brains, and question all statements coming from any Authority, know how to consult original sources for varification, and not rely on canned explanations from political and religious propagandists with their own evil agenda.
Yha, why would you want to feed people fiction and falsehoods as the same page to get on.
You seem to have a comprehension problem with the idea. I’ve lived in nations that mandate the Quran as the book to all be on the same page.
that’s not reality. I suggest you study this book: This Is Not Propaganda: Adventures in the War Against Reality is a 2019 book by Peter Pomerantsev about disinformation and propaganda, which covers such campaigns in multiple countries.
My “Super Wikipedia” is people adopting science. Carl Sagan ideas. see also: !sagan@lemm.ee community.
What I suggest you avoid is more and more comments on Lemmy, go with the books.
Books are just one more opinion, and too many people confuse opinions with fact. I prefer original sources, and draw my own conclusions, instead of relying on the interpretations of those sources by those with their own agendas.
Id rather watch the speeches, see videos of incidents, read data, etc. MAGAs believe that the Jan 6 Insurrection was a peaceful tourist visit because their news source of choice chose to not air clips of the violence, showing a few calm moments out of thousands of hours of video, to represent their story.
OTOH, i watched it first-hand from beginning to end. I know what they said in the pep rally, because i watched it, i didn’t rely on someone else’s interpretation. I watched them attack the Capitol, and fight with the police. Nobody can ever tell me it didn’t happen because it wasn’t on Fox News, or because their favorite pundit spoon fed them lies. I saw it with my own eyes, live and unedited.
Propaganda is too pervasive in our society, so i no longer trust any book or person’s opinion, even when they seem to be on my side. I verify everything before forming my opinion, and even then, my opinion is open to change with more verified information. I have never followed the Conservative Motto: “Dont bother me with facts, my mind is made up.”