James Madison argued at the constitutional convention that the president should not be decided by a popular vote of the general masses alone. Why? Because he felt that the average American was not educated enough to make that decision. A person could argue that in Madison’s time the average American was less educated, had less opportunities for a formal education, had less access to current news and topics of debate. But lately I’ve been concerned about the growing problem of people who act as sheep in our country and how almost anyone can use the internet to influence, not just a couple thousand, but an entire nation of people within minutes. Literally minutes.
Think about how far our country has come in the past 20 years. In that space of time, you’ve gone from having people find out their information through books, newspapers and magazines along with TV outlets to turning to Facebook and Twitter for their “news” source. It’s true that even the news affiliates can skew the news into whichever direction they choose. But the reality is that they had to report at least some facts. Today, someone can create a false meme, with incorrect information and a photoshopped picture and people will click like and share, literally millions of times, without ever checking the accuracy.
No, no, you say. This doesn’t happen. Wrong. This happens all the time. Every day. Multiple times a day, just on my Facebook alone. Now, I realize we are in an election year so that’s partially why I’m a little sensitive. I realize that this is a free country and people have the right to go around spreading erroneous messages about the president, the lottery, or even 52 damn thoroughbreds that got homes 5 years ago. But because you can, doesn’t mean you should.
Take this week for example. Apparently thousands of people liked and shared this meme:
Those people never took the time to do that actual math, or even think about the fact that it doesn’t seem remotely reasonable. I’m not a math genius and I can tell at a glance that the math just doesn’t work there. But people blindly liked and shared it around the world until some rational person took the time to say, “Hey, wait - something isn’t quite right here.”
The other day someone shared a photoshopped picture of Hillary Clinton shaking hands with Osama Bin Laden on my Facebook. Warning people to not vote for her because she’s friends with terrorists. When I posted a link to the snopes article that proved the image was false and photoshopped, did they take the image down? Did they become embarrassed and correct themselves? No, they deleted the comment. In doing so, propagated the lie and spread more falsehood. Now, I’m not the biggest Hillary fan, but if you’re going to attack someone, do it with the truth. It’s not like there isn’t plenty of actual ammunition against her without making something up.
The blatant falsehoods about Obama that go around, the misinformation and scare tactics about muslims and ISIS, the damn 52 thoroughbreds that do NOT need homes and are NOT going to slaughter, it just seems endless some days and so frustrating. I don’t want to be that person that has to post on every meme you share, “No Obama did not say that and, in actuality, do you really think the Founders meant for you to be able to buy a fully automatic weapon with your second amendment rights? Kind of hard for someone to go on a mass murdering spree with a musket that takes a minute to reload. Maybe gun control, not taking your guns away, is a good idea? After all, that is what Obama actually SAID.” I guess it would solve my problem because I would have a lot less “friends” in a short hurry.
Can we all just agree to do the responsible thing and take a second to read, think, double check and be respectful before we click “like” or “share”? Can we all agree to at least try? Hell, when people post ridiculous memes, there is a whole culture of people out there that have to try to get the truth out through “counter memes”. What does that tell you about sheep?
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