Western culture is the world’s first bad faith culture and America’s leadership has made the world’s greatest country a bad faith nation. Humanity’s history has never seen such a perverse normalization of insincerity like Western culture has advanced throughout the world. Donald Trump, the West’s leader, magnified this dysfunctional trait and just like President Richard Nixon eliminated monetary reckoning by taking the dollar off of the Gold Standard, Trump will be seen in history books as the President who took America off the truth standard. Right now as I write this, Republicans are full-steam-ahead on nominating Amy Coney Barrett to Replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg on the Supreme Court. They are doing this as if they never introduced a supposed new precedent under Obama of never nominating Supreme Court Justices during an election year. Donald Trump’s advancement of bad faith culture and principles has lead the whole Republican Party to shamelessly abandon the principle used to deny Barack Obama his nominee, Merrick Garland. The usual fake dissenters, Susan Collins and Lisa Murkowski, are currently pretending to express opposition to the nomination but we know that, just like with Brett Kavanaugh, they will ultimately fall in line. The truth is Republicans made a new rule, but instead of orienting their future behavior to that reality, America is watching them, the media and government as a whole select from details within the truthful circumstances to paint different pictures. America is so disconnected from actuality that media, America’s eyes and ears, rather than bind their product to a prevailing truth, use what I call a “reality palette” to alter the perception of occurrences to their liking. The Reality palette is just like it sounds, a multitude details within a truth of which, just like a painter selects from a palette of colors to create the picture he or she wishes, media select from a palette of details to paint an existing truth in the theme of their choosing.
The reality pallet requires an uninquisitive populace, accustomed to accepting preformatted views from so-called “experts.” These so-called experts, whether they be news outlets, academics, scientists or even regular people who seem to be knowledgeable, bolster preconceived viewpoints with carefully selected and arranged elements of the actual truth to support the conclusion sought. It’s like every source of information has given up reckoning with actuality and seeks solely to align their facts to an agenda.
Hillary Clinton attempted to combat the reality pallet when she floated the legality-line by using a private server to conduct her official business as Secretary of State. Effectively fulfilling her position required tons of discourse and dialogue with others, effectively filling her opponents’ reality pallets with enough material to create damaging narrative after narrative throughout the 2016 political cycle. She took a chance by using a private server and instead of using public record to craft story after story, media only had the server itself to criticize. Had media gained access to what was on those servers, Clinton’s opposition would have represented everything she did as a scandal and, given how Republicans stretched the server scandal itself to span the whole election cycle, I guarantee she would have lost the popular vote.
Prior to Trump’s Presidency, media and politicians used the reality pallet but they kept their theories somewhat in relation to the truth for fear of losing their credibility by being caught too far out. Donald Trump shattered that norm and in true pimp fashion, he simply repeats lies, despite them being placed side-by-side with the truth. When confronted by the two hims, he simply walks away from press conferences. Evidence in how Trump changed the media can be seen in their willingness to call the Commander in Chief a “liar.” I recall media grappling with using such a word to describe the Commander in Chief in the beginning of his presidency. Now it just rolls off the tongue.
America has prepped citizens for the sheep-like behavior we exhibit today through the educational system. In my book, To Pimp a Nation, I explain how this dulling of American citizen effectiveness and natural inclination to pursue complete understanding takes place. We can stop it today but first we must turn towards the mirror and realize that we are only humans and our individual truths are relative. Instead of imposing your own reality on others, learn to accept that other people’s truths are as true to them as yours are to you. Try whole-heartedly embracing their opinions as if they were yours. This gains you perspective. Not only does this technique help you to empathize with their position, but it also helps you recognize inconsistencies in not only their views, but yours as well. However, when fabricated and promulgated by media, truths are almost always purposely contrived. They are processed through huge think tanks and the position agreed upon is solely for the purpose to influencing the masses. By whole-heartedly embracing other views, your own become more true to actuality and the reality pallet becomes ineffective because rather than cling to false authorities’ cooked-up, packaged viewpoints, Americans would mine them for details that help them see the truth more clearly.
Effective thinking and pursuit of complete understanding needs to be what Americans of all ideologies aggressively pursue. Being American should put us in good faith dialogue with one another that places our individual viewpoints side-by-side so we can sharpen our contemplative swords and become more effective against media’s painted up truths. Constructive dialogue would make us more comfortable with those who disagree as well. I feel that fighting over politics and Americans’ tendency to seek ideological vacuums to express their views are because the subconscious mind recognizes the flaws in media-concocted viewpoints; deep down people sense the inability to intellectually defend these reality-pallet-painted points of view so they automatically seek means of ejecting from the conversation; the argument. A person speaking confidently from a solid logical background relates others’ theories to their own wealth of knowledge and responds accordingly. Listening helps them understand where the other person stands on the mentality map versus the details they themselves have explored. This solid orientation causes curiosity rather than anger, making one ask questions rather than seek to end to the conversation or convert it to violence. I have a saying that goes like this: “Smart people seek details to form a conclusion. Others begin with a view and seek details to bolster it.” Donald Trump, the Leader of the Free World, taking America off the truth standard means more and more people will simply declare their truths and seek details to support it like he does. Trump supporters, Republican politicians, the media and increasingly the public are essentially painting from the reality pallets, instead of being beholden to the Truth.