Lies are Still Lies

Lying to the American people to cause harm used to be wrong and immoral. The toxic inundation of lies and disinformation on the dominantly right wing corporate media and Internet began in earnest when the Republican Reagan ended the Fairness Doctrine in 1987. Since then, so-called news outlets such as Fox and OAN have literally taken over our once public airwaves to flood it with fake news. I maintain that purposeful manipulation of the public by corporate America is not pro-American in any way.

There is a blatant lie still parroted by Fox that the January 6, 2021 Republican coup was not an insurrection. Maybe is was just a minor “peaceful” attempt to stop President Biden from taking office after the disgraced Crooked Donald lost his election by 7 million votes. Maybe the terrible pandemic that began in March 2020 that will kill over a million Americans in two years was just a flu like Fox has proclaimed. Maybe vaccines and masks don’t really work as Fox has claimed again and again even though dentists and surgeons to stop the spread of infection routinely use them. Repeating GOP lies are lies no matter how many times you say them. The fact that so many Americans purportedly listen to and believe the lies makes these facts even worse. 

Most of us who follow the principles of science have no problem recognizing the lies. Reported information is corroborated by visual observations, verifiable data and independent sources of reporting of news and events. Verification also involves the use of some common sense when we can’t directly prove what we are hearing is actually true. We all need to take a little effort to pay attention, use science and help to challenge and stop spreading the lies big and small.

–David Siegel, Castro Valley