One Sucker's Saga, Part III: Our Uninformed Populace

Whenever the people are well-informed,
they can be trusted with their own government;
whenever things get so far wrong as to attract their notice,
they may be relied on to set them to rights.

-- Thomas Jefferson, 1789


In this installment of my saga, I'd like to suggest a corollary to Mr. Jefferson's observation: "Whenever the people are ill-informed, their government can trust them to do nothing to correct wrongs, no matter how much those wrongs attract their notice."

There are many ways to prevent information from spreading. One can create a cover story. One can use mouthpieces to tear down the reputations of those who dare investigate the story buried beneath the cover version, or to disseminate conflicting versions of the story, thereby sowing confusion. One can simply bury the story itself, quashing attempts to bring the story to light. Provided one has enough resources and accomplices, there is just about no length one can reach to affect the official version of What Happened.

Long-time readers know I've been pointing out examples of such manipulations for years. Some topics so threaten a group vested in maintaining the status quo that they will hire operatives to troll LJ groups and plant seeds of doubt in a given topic, publish articles referencing research that completely misrepresent the research itself (and then deny the original researcher a chance to correct the record), report widely and often on salacious details but fail to correct the record with nearly as much fanfare -- these are just a few examples from just one controversy, examples that barely scratch the surface of what has happened. All one needs, as I've said, is some cash to throw around to "research" groups and foundations and ideologically like-minded newspapers and magazines. The juggernaut will follow, one that may crush hard scientific findings or at least dissuade further research.

When it comes to the truth about certain topics, you see, very few people care. I know, that sounds harsh; ( but it's pretty accurate. )