Factoids and Fact-turds

Back in the day, my high school debate coach was unhappy with our practice efforts and our debate research.  We were sitting around after school, and he decided we needed to be given a speech.

In that off-the-cuff speech, accentuated with banging on the desk-top podium with his fist, he pointed out that we would never willingly put a turd in our mouths and swallow it, or shove one up our nose and inhale it.  So, why the hell would we insert one into our eyes or ears accessing our brains, in the form of poorly researched information?  He wasn't going to accept shit research from us, and we shouldn't accept it from anyone else.


I can only surmise that his uncharacteristic crudity reflected his passion on the topic of research - and the short amount of time remaining before we all had to catch the late buses, or other rides home.  The analogy, the metaphor has lingered with me over the years.  I evaluate what I select to read, or view, or hear, on the basis of is it crap, or garbage, or shit, or is it worthwhile.  Will it improve my knowledge and understanding or will it waste me time without benefit. For that reason, I don't care who wins American Idol, or what new scandal is surrounding Paris Hilton, or whether or not Lindsey Lohan is back in jail (and why).  I have a certain disdain for those who can name all the contestants on the current season of Dancing with the Stars, but not the sitting justices on the Supreme Court, or the holders of major cabinet positions.  To me, that is the difference between being an adult, and simply being too old to be called a child anymore.

Fun is fine, entertainment is wonderful, but not instead of or ahead of being an informed adult.

Around the same time, my other mentors, including parents, insisted on critical thinking and evaluation of all sources.  I was particularly cautioned by my father not to be too willing to believe people telling me what I wanted to hear; or more precisely, what they thought I wanted to hear.  I was rigorously taught that people who don't tell the truth, or who are not fact based in their statements were to be regarded with the greatest skepticism, and should be denied my trust --- MORE so, not less so, if they seemed to be in some way 'on the same side'.  The explanation for this more rigorous standard was protection against manipulation, and deception.

I don't see a lot of genuine proofing of the truth in the media, not nearly as much as what amounts to 'gotcha' journalism.  A case in point, one of which I have been critical, was the "He's a Nerd, Not a Nazi" post earlier, in defense of Richard Iott, who lost in the recent election in part presumably due to the attention his interest in historic reenactment attracted from those who tied to make it something very different than it was.

Meanwhile, more objectionable candidates like Illinois' Al Reynolds or New York's Jim Russell, who actually had ties to white separatists, and / or who made bigoted racist comments received far less dramatic attention.  Or Billy Roper in Arkansas, or Tom Metzger in Indiana races, or the California candidates Jeff Hall or Dan Schreunder.  That attention SHOULD have reflected that these candidates were seeking either  Republican party and/or the Tea Party endorsement --- and how that endorsement was refused or repudiated, to their credit.  None of them received the attention their own statements made appropriate, much less all of them together receiving as much attention as Iott in Ohio.  Iott deserved better coverage of his actual positions on policies and issues, and less gotcha sensational coverage distorting his interest in history to the exclusion of everything else.  Iott was not repudiated by Boehner, and shouldn't have been repudiated by minority whip Eric Cantor, for his hobby.  At some point, the media claiming to practice journalism should be leading the examination of our obsession in using the term Nazi for name calling, and contrast it with the reality of who Nazis were - and were not, and are not, more than they have.  Meanwhile I haven't seen any - not ANY - attention from the right paid to these other reprehensible candidates.  Shame on them.

Why not?  Why not from the right, as much as they were given limited coverage by the left?  Every election where the economy or some other facet of our country is in unusually great difficulty, fringe people enter the election process in numbers we do not see other years.  But those fringe participants also have a distillation taking place in the nature and essence of their extremism that has some reflection in the more mainstream.  In any case, they ARE part of the larger process, and deserve a fair, restrained not sensational examination before the public.  Christine O'Donnell was clearly another nut job -- but did we really need the volume (either sound or quantity) of coverage she received? No, but laughing at her (while understandable) played well to the center and left-wing crowds in need of a laugh this election cycle.

Fact checking, like charity, should begin close to ourselves before fact checking those more adversarial -- which we should do as well.  And we should challenge others to do it too.  NO ONE should give their trust and support, or attention and belief, to those who cannot be factual and be more honest in what they do and say, including their apparent intention for those statements and actions.

Or your factoids become fact-turds, and you should avoid that at all costs.  Make the effort. Do it - fact check. Hold all sources accountable, (and not just during elections either).