Tribal Truth

2020 is a crazy year. We've seen half a million die from a pandemic, the world completely shut down, rioting on the streets, a dozen other terrifying events.

Even amongst all that, to me the most alarming thing has been the complete and utter erosion of truth. And I don't mean that the truth doesn't exist; only that we live in the most polarized time I've ever seen, and for every incident that occurs in the media, you can find whatever version of truth you prefer -- and since everything these days is politicized, there are natural battle lines over everything that happens in the world today. You can't read about pandas being born at a zoo without the comment section fighting about how blind and stupid the opposition party is. I can't even know the truth about how dangerous COVID is because I'm inundated with dozens of contradictory facts every single day that suit each political party's needs. I don't know the truth, and I've put in my time and done the research. That shouldn't be possible! Viruses have nothing to do with politics! Why is it so hard to find the truth about something so important? (and people from both sides will say it's easy to find the truth and I'm foolish for missing it; but their conclusions will be opposite). Is social distancing ruining the lives of small business owners and starving poor foreign economies who rely on tourism, or is it saving lives by slowing the spread of the virus? Are we in a worse position now, during the second wave, because cases are increasing again, or are we doing great because deaths are at a low since it started? People argue with their dying breath for one or the other with no middle ground. Liberal or Conservative. Black or white. Take a side and run with it. Choose your party's truth and shout it loud, and if someone disagrees they're probably stupid because look at all the people who agree with you.

People like things to be black and white. It makes it easy to see where the battle lines are, easy to see who's part of your tribe and who's the enemy, and it gives you a built-in community during a time when community is really hard to find. I get it. You share a meme disparaging the other side and your comment section is flooded with people coming to support you, and that feels really good.

But this tribalism has completely done away with well-reasoned, fact-supported, dialectic truth, which almost always exists in the middle ground, between black and white. But if you reject black *and* white, you lose your tribe, and you find yourself alone.

And if you choose a middle view, who's going to listen? With all the shouting going on, who can even hear you? Our country, collectively, has chosen to advance two opposite versions of every truth as loudly as we can, and anyone who's not on board is left feeling isolated and confused until they join a bandwagon. But in actuality both sides have some truth, and neither side has the whole truth; and somehow any dialogue between the two results in increased division rather than a merging of the views.

I hope this goes away, but I don't see how it does. Facebook and media biases feed into division, and the internet as a medium makes hateful speech easy, since people can hide behind their screens.
To me, this is the most terrifying and depressing part of "the age of information:" weaponized data. Data can say whatever a paying proprietor wants it to say, and people have lost the ability to see from another point of view. I hope for better, but folks, the internet is a war zone right now.