CommentsONE MAN’S OPINION-Although most people are too young to have heard these words when uttered by Oliver Hardy in a series of movies from 1929 to 1951, almost everyone has heard the meme.
It is classic projection onto another person, while taking no responsibility for one’s own role in causing “the nice mess.” The general plot of these “nice mess” movies is that Laurel had a good idea which Oliver fails to understand and when Laurel repeats his idea, he misstates it, but Oliver thinks he understands the garbled version.
The complexities of human communication and interaction were addressed long before Laurel and Hardy. Socrates, Plato and Aristotle as well as the philosopher al-Farabi contended with this problem in the discussion of esoterism, providing answers appropriate to the intellect and moral capacity of their listeners. During Passover Seder, we again encounter this perennial conundrum of miscommunication, but in a more detailed manner.
Passover’s Four Questions and Four Sons
First, today it must be the four children.
Second, the content of the questions is not material to our discussion.
Third, as with Socrates, etc. the answers are tailored to the ability of the child to comprehend.
Four, in order to provide appropriate answers, the person answering the questions must know the answers.
Five – and most importantly -- when the questioners want false information, everyone will suffer.
The Four Types of Children
- The child too young to realize that a question needs to be asked.
- The child too ignorant to understand a complete answer.
- The angry child who doesn’t want an answer.
- The wise child who wants accurate information.
Perhaps this year, the four children will press on after the obligatory questions about the Exodus and ask about Covid-19: “Why on this night are we isolated in our own homes unable to associate with our friends?” On the other hand, the children could paraphrase Oliver Hardy, “How did we get into this nice mess?”
Action vs Study
Most crises did not start happening just yesterday. Society has always needed a way to deal with dangerous events. One way to prepare for trouble is to ask which is more important, “action or study?” The answer is “both.” Action without study is like putting the ignorant child in charge of responding to a pandemic. The role of study is destroyed when the ignorant man-child abolishes the U.S.’s pandemic response team in order to cut costs.
Presidents, who are not “fucking morons” (quoting former Secretary of State Rex Tillerson), know that study is the basis for timely, proper action. Thus, one does not fire all the eggheads who have studied the problem in advance and then shoot from the hip because his grand uncle attended MIT. When all the smart people are gone, the morons decide what actions to take or not take.
We the People Bear Responsibility
A society that feeds on emotional memes devoid of facts has no basis to complain. The American public is far more like Oliver Hardy in its refusal to take responsibility for the Covid-19 pandemic than is the Chinese public. The Chinese live in an authoritarian society without a free press. Although we live in a society with a free press, it reports all the news “we want to hear.” The motto used to be “All the news that’s fit to print,” but those days are long one.
Both the Dems and the GOP Hunger for Falsehoods
Perhaps the most dangerous falsehood in Dem circles is that only the GOP has fake news. One reason for this inaccurate perception is that the GOP Fake News is like hardcore porn, while Dem fake news is like softcore porn. Historically, the Dem fake news has been by omission of vital facts, resulting in faulty analyses and atrocious public policies.
Garbage In, Garbage Out
One example of the rubbish that the Los Angeles Times (aka Pravda West) and the City of Los Angeles have been disseminating for well over a decade is the need to densify the core areas of LA. Even prestigious international organizations fail to provide the required factual detail for us to see the connection between densification and urban decay.
The fact that the City of LA and Pravda West follow the Garbage In, Garbage Out model has been repeatedly noted.
In December 2013 and again in January 2014, Judge Allan Goodman found that the City of Los Angeles uses “fatally flawed data and wishful thinking” in its land use decisions. Nonetheless, Angelenos close their eyes to their city’s deterioration, devolving into a third world city with homeless people literally dying on the sidewalk outside City Hall and typhus invading the building itself. But who -- outside of Daniel Guss, Dick Platkin and few other social commentators -- complains about the LA Times and its habitual offering of false news by omission and distortion?
We the People Are Ultimately to Blame
In a free society where we are free to ignore the LA Times as well as Breitbart, we bring disaster upon ourselves by supporting either. The media knows that we love our emotional memes, and that leads to more revenues for the press. “If it bleeds, it leads” encapsulates this truth. If it strikes us emotionally, we’ll respond, but the business of governing ourselves requires gathering facts and rational analysis – not endeavors that makes your blood boil.
Covid-19 Lies and Misinformation Followed by Defensive Obfuscation
Perhaps attorneys who are trained in cross-examination are a bit better at spotting the Administration’s BS. As of Wednesday morning, March 11, 2020, it is still lying about the availability of testing kits. It’s one thing to parse a question like Bill Clinton did when he said, “It depends on what the meaning of ‘is’ is,” but another matter when people are dying because we lack enough test kits for Covid-19. The same people who were enraged at Clinton, don’t care that the Administration persists in its falsehoods about Covid-19 and our national response.
Why Do We Get Lies and Falsehoods?
Because We the People do not hold the media or the politicos responsible for their decades of lies, deception, misinformation, disinformation, half-truths, and omissions, we have become a low information society. Let’s stop being like Oliver Hardy and blaming Stan Laurel. We the People have the power to demand a constant diet of facts over emotional memes.
(Richard Lee Abrams is a Los Angeles attorney and a CityWatch contributor. He can be reached at: [email protected]. Abrams views are his own and do not necessarily reflect the views of CityWatch.) Image: Harvard Gazette. Edited for CityWatch by Linda Abrams.
