Politics of Fear

     “Mr. Robinson, do you think our founding fathers would be proud of our nation today?” I usually get this question in my American History classes sometime around Thanksgiving or Christmas. By this time we’ve covered the Revolutionary War and the writing of the Constitution. The question normally, though not always, comes from a student with a troubled view of society in general. They tend to focus on the negative traits of our society, thinking that I will join them in a pessimistic assessment. They, and almost everyone else in the classroom, express surprise at my answer.

     “I think they’d be rather proud of our nation, and perhaps surprised at our success.” I seriously believe this. This comes from two sources; my generally positive outlook and the fact that I have to read a lot of history in order to teach it. It also stands in contrast to much of the socio-political speech and imagery that fills modern media. Politicians and their surrogates expend large amounts of money, time, and creative energy stoking the fires of fear. Vote for me, support my candidate, accept my policies, embrace my world view or life as we know it will cease to exist. This exploitation of fear skews the view of many people into a very dark place. Many, despite evidence to the contrary, feel fearful, living their lives in dread of some unnamed enemy or catastrophe. They constantly wring their hands despite the unparalleled prosperity and security of this time.

     I understand that my glass is constantly half-full. I also know that by almost any metric you choose, we live in a land and time of great material blessing. Without laying blame or assigning credit we enjoy an unemployment rate of 5.8%. Since my birth in 1961 the U.S. economy has continued to grow, albeit with periodic downturns, most notably in 1974, 1982, and 2010 ¹. Since 1948 our unemployment rate has consistently been under 10%, rarely above 10%, and usually below 5% the figure traditionally quoted as full employment ². Of course we’ve endured various downturns, but nothing as painful as the great depression. This applies to crime as well.

     In almost any water-cooler conversation that turns to crime, most people assume that things are much worse than they used to be. Yet, violent crime rates have fallen over the past twenty years. This information comes from the FBI, a trustworthy source ³. In general, the United States is a much safer place than it used to be, yet most people find that hard to believe. Even after viewing data that contradicts their view, they insist that in their neck of the woods crime rates are rising and the streets remain unsafe. They long for some idyllic point in the past when bad things did not happen to good people. Where does this pessimism come from?

     The current political season causes much of this. Candidates and parties on both sides of the aisle employ the politics of fear. Elect me or things will get worse. Some even put out a message that claims our nation teeters on the edge of an existential abyss, claiming that we’ve gone backwards somehow. This incessant hue and cry of impending apocryphal crisis influences people. Despite the problems we face, and we do face a variety of serious problems, by almost any measure our nation is a stunning success. I regularly chat with colleagues who express grave doubts about our nation. They struggle to believe when I point out facts that say otherwise.

     We must construct our world-view based on facts. We must not let politicians, news organizations and pundits continually stoke the fires of distress and alarm. All of them profit from fear mongering. Some build constituencies, some increase market share, and others simply make money through a continual ringing of the claxon. Through creating a climate of fear, those in power avoid addressing the serious problems we face. They encourage us to focus on nonexistent dangers. This enables them to gain our support without having to develop sound strategies for dealing with the real challenges we face as a nation, and as a global community. In this election cycle we must force politicians to address the difficulties of our day. In so doing, we will forward this great experiment in democracy, continuing the progress our founding fathers worked and sacrificed to start. We must thwart those forces which would exploit fear and take us backward. Instead, let us with firm resolve, clearly evaluate our current situation and determine the best course of action to address the real issues we face. Then we can effectively continue the great work building and strengthening those democratic institutions which have made our nation a great one, one that its originators will be proud of.

1.   The World Bank at: http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/NY.GDP.MKTP.KD.ZG?locations=US

2.  The Wall Street Journal at: http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052748703338004575230041742556522

3. The FBI at: https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2012/crime-in-the-u.s.-2012/tables/1tabledatadecoverviewpdf/table_1_crime_in_the_united_states_by_volume_and_rate_per_100000_inhabitants_1993-2012.xls

Truth Matters

     “…if I really cared…,” the words stood out to me as if written in glowing crimson. In fact they refuse to leave me and in many ways seem emblematic of what ails our political discourse today. An acquaintance had posted something that, while factually correct, had been taken out of context to make a political point, to somehow paint their perceived opponent in a dark light. I had differed reminding them of the salient facts and how they had distorted them. They did not dispute this. They just did not care about the veracity of how they used them. They were willing to perpetuate a falsehood in order to buttress their political position. We must care.

     We must strengthen our mental discipline to care about facts and how we use them. We must take the time to check our facts before posting, or otherwise using, them in the public domain. This is the critical issue in this election cycle; indeed in any election cycle. We cannot become so intellectually flaccid as to not care about the truth. When a politician, public figure, or newspaper handles facts carelessly we must take the time to call them on it; to demand retraction when appropriate. We exist in a day where a variety of a-political organizations provide free public fact-checking. PolitiFact.com and Snopes.com are just two of the many sources available to help the public sort through the morass of political sound-bites. Without public vigilance politicians, and other public figures, will lapse into saying what they think we want to hear and hope of effective government diminishes and perhaps even disappears.

     If we relax our standards, allowing leaders, pundits, and those seeking public office to savage the truth, soon they will not consider truth important when making public statement. Discarding integrity as a critical and cherished trait will further erode public trust and confidence in the institutions on which we depend. And in so doing, we will leave our children and grandchildren a sorry mess; a non-functioning country. We must work to make integrity in public discourse the only acceptable standard. We cannot accept dangerous lapses in integrity. Sometimes, when pressed a person might say, “Well all politicians lie.” I am sure that I have let slip those words. We must guard against such a cynical dismissal of the importance of truth. While it is probably true that all politicians have lied at one time or another, it does not lesson the importance of truth. Pilate, the Roman leader charged with upholding justice in Palestine, took such a cynical attitude, saying, “What is truth?” when confronted with a challenging statement by Jesus. We must not let their casual insults on our integrity and intelligence go unnoticed and unchecked. We must push back against the rampant scorn of this age, which has led to such a casual disregard for the truth. Truth matters.

     We must also discipline how we personally handle facts. Knowingly posting or reposting a snarky meme that plays loose with the truth on the social-media platform of our choice is not acceptable for the Christian. We must take the time to verify and when something untrue or misleading slips past, we must quickly retract, admitting the mistake. Scoring political points in order to support our chosen candidate, party, or issue by misrepresentation or dissembling is not defensible for the Christian. We must retain our dedication to the truth.

     Truth matters. It matters so much that Jesus reminds us that He is the truth. If it mattered so much to Him, we ought to care for and handle the truth in a similar fashion. When we become so enamored with a party, platform, idea, or candidate that we manipulate, or even abandon, the truth we lose our moral compass. This level of commitment requires sacrifice. We must willingly commit to measuring our ideas and beliefs against the stringent, unforgiving, standard of the truth. Such commitment, and its attendant time requirement, challenges us. It does not fit well in our sound-bite every-hour-on-the-hour driven world. A commitment to the truth entails that we first ascertain, or apprehend, the facts and then use them in an appropriate fashion. It also requires that we give up basing our identity on a party or cultural set of biases; instead basing our identity on the truth.

     In an odd theological twist; which I believe to be more than a linguistic quirk, Jesus equates Himself to truth. Ultimately commitment or fidelity to the truth is a commitment to Jesus. More than “knowing” the truth we must also rightly handle the truth, II Timothy 2:15. We can, as my acquaintance did, present “true” facts in a fashion that distorts or deviates from the truth. We must not use facts to misdirect or deceive. To engage in such activity is deception, and incongruent with a lifetime commitment to adhere to the truth, and in this election season does not serve our nation or our Lord well at all.