Our reasoned doubts are supposed to be the guardrails that protect us from foolishness and fanaticism, but we are now often told that doubt is not allowed—ever. Remember only a few years ago when we were not allowed to doubt that masking, social distancing, and experimental vaccines were necessary during the Covid-19 hoax; to disagree could easily result in the loss of your job or arrest.
Today is little different. We are not allowed to doubt that we are only a few short years away from our planet becoming uninhabitable. Or that all of our personal and societal problems are due to bigotries that many times seem either imaginary or grossly exaggerated to benefit those who profit from anger. Or that illegal immigration benefits our country despite the costs to our nation in terms of health, safety, and public aid. Or that Marxist/Socialist tax and spending schemes will turn our country into a paradise on earth. Or that people can choose their own gender, even if they are too young to choose even their own bedtimes. Or that government programs are always beneficial, despite the many examples of fraud and abuse that are uncovered on a daily basis. Finally, are not allowed to doubt that America is an intrinsically evil nation despite having acted as the guarantors of freedom around the world with our treasure and blood for well over a century—just ask any Leftist Humanities professor.
To doubt the officially-sanctioned wisdom of our priesthood of experts and activists (who, truth be told, often seem one and the same) is to potentially give offense to someone who takes a peculiar joy in being offended, so we are now not ever to be allowed to doubt the life choices and morality of others that seem either self-destructive or harmful to society. Moreover, our reasonable doubts might be cutting into someone’s wonderfully profitable and government-funded scam, so we are required to keep our mouths shut and cooperate—or else. The result of this is that we are often compelled to endorse ideas built on mere fantasies, which explains more than is probably comfortable to know about why our country is so screwed up today and common sense reforms are nearly impossible to implement.
The ultimate consequence of the denigration of doubt is that we today live in a golden age for liars of every sort. Demagogues fool us, politicians betray us, and marketers sell us a wide variety of useless junk. We are instructed to ignore problems, shun good advice, and give our trust to smooth-talking snake oil salesmen who care not at all about our concerns and well being. Unsurprisingly, we waste a great deal of our energy on nonsense, flush our wealth down the toilet, and swallow whole the pronouncements of people who probably do not have enough brainpower to tie their own shoelaces.
The tsunami of social media and other streaming propaganda that today pours into our minds and hearts from those who profit from our all-too-human gullibility is a phenomenon that is without historical precedent and is warping the perceptions of the credulous and unhinged in a manner that is both terrifying—and perfectly understandable. The German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, writing in the 19th century, succinctly observed a basic truth that has been with us since we first skulked out of a cave: “Sometimes people don’t want to hear the truth because they don’t want their illusions destroyed.” Lies often comfort those who find self-reflection and self-criticism a total drag and instead loudly demand our eternal validation—regardless whether they are wrong, immoral, or mentally ill—because this is far more self-satisfying, although this actually signals only their own ridiculous immaturity.
Doubt, as it turns out, is both necessary and beneficial, and we put ourselves and our nation at risk when we insist on its banishment because one of the most uncomfortable truths of modern life is that we are constantly lied to by those who want money from us and power for themselves. This has always been true to some extent, but the rise of 24/7 marketing and propaganda that is now turbocharged by A.I. algorithms designed to keep us engaged with a steady diet of both fear mongering and rage bait is overwhelming—and many times extinguishing—our already scant ability to distinguish the difference between truth and lies.
Consequently, the average American is often left bereft and befuddled by official and quasi-official lies from craven elected officials, social media pests and provocateurs, lavishly-compensated lobbyists, academic shills angling for grant money or a consulting gig, and the talking heads disguising their outrageous partisanship as actual news. Because it is baked into human nature to seek self-protection and guard our loved ones from harm, we are hardwired to respond to any alarmist call to action, but this deluge of hatred and horror leaves us terribly vulnerable to all manner of charlatanism and total nuttery, which has produced a shadow army of crazies who are convinced that their endless screeching is synonymous with a semblance of sanity.
Doubters and dissenters have, of course, had a tough time throughout the course of human history, and we can at least be thankful that we are not being burned at the stake for refusing to support the dysfunction and dreck that we must wallow in today. However, it is a problem that indoctrination has now replaced education in our schools and colleges, so we are producing fresh generations of Americans who are expert at blaming but notably lousy at conversing, which reduces our necessary national dialogues to shouts of anger and incitements to violence because students are taught to believe that human history begins with themselves while conveniently forgetting to learn the wisdom, restraint, forbearance, and sacrifices of those who built our nation.
Our doubts are the armor we must wear in a world awash in deception, manipulation, and prevarication. Great harm results when we forget this fact.