Can we just cut the bullshit? Let’s stop saying stupendously idiotic things like Americans who are on the wrong side of an issue are “ignorant” or “uninformed”? There’s one reason and one reason only why so many Americans can’t hold a decent conversation involving topical issues, and that’s that they don’t make any effort to learn. Nothing outside of making a conscious choice to believe whatever headline is spewed from whatever media giant they’ve chosen to fortify their opinions with.
The culprit of current American evolution is choice. Americans have the information of the world at their fingertips. Not just at their fingertips, but easily accessible in a very short period of time. Despite the fact that I’ll sound like an old man, I’ll admit that as a child, I had to either rely on parental membership in the Encyclopedia Of The Month Club, or hop on a bicycle and head to the local library to look up the information, only then to be faced with the daunting task of “cross referencing”, which prevailed only if the books referenced through the card catalog weren’t checked out by someone who may or may not return them, at least within my attention span.
In 2008. there’s barely a household without computer access, a mere two or three mouse clicks away from unlimited volumes of information. Given that undeniable reality, you’d think Americans would be smarter, and much more frequently. Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened. There’s just as much empty opinion in the media as in individual conversations. Passion to debate, however, has increased, as more and more Americans feel the urge to participate in the conversation.
We all know “majority opinion” in America doesn’t necessarily amount to anything genuine, since we’ve read history involving things like slavery, the barring of inter-racial marriage and the restriction of women and other segments of Americans in the voting process. We, as Americans, have no choice but to admit this as truth, as actual history, the fact that majority opinion frequently translates into hatred and prejudice, nothing more than restrictive actions violating the integrity and foundation of the (supposedly) treasured United States Constitution.
But in 2008, many Americans, including those outside the right wing, have decided it’s okay to restrict same sex marriage based on nothing more than a slight majority of American opinion. It exposed Americans as lazy and disingenuous, despite access to facts which dispute every piece of any such stringently adopted opinion.
So let me just say this. If you’re an American unwilling to do independent research on a particular issue, then stay out of the conversation. It’s not 1970. We can look it up. And, although it may come as a shock to you, so can you. Let’s look at the light of temptation that leads empty opinions toward places like YouTube and MySpace. Fame has always been justification for violations of logic and reason.
