Reality Is What I Say It Is.

The Unreality of Trump's Time in The Spotlight

Both Art and History inform us. We should know that someone who speaks directly to our deeply held beliefs should be suspect no matter how out of touch those beliefs. But, we don't learn as we should from either Art or History.

The seed from which Trump's seeming total control over some portion of our citizenry is his insistence that the mainstream news is Fake News. From this trope -admittedly used by many in the right-wing, his power over many viewers' experience and common sense arose. Once cemented in the Fox News et al. viewers' minds, his fake news claims became an excuse for virtually any transgression. 

Understanding this disconnect from reality may require revisiting Orwell. So, we look at Art to instruct us. 

Orwell, in 1984 wrote: 

"Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense."

Common sense tells us that a man who failed at virtually every business he undertook is not a supremely successful businessman. It tells us that the only real success he had was pretending to be successful on reality television. We know that accusations of sexual harassment, including rape, to the extent they revolve around Trump are likely to be accurate at some level. 

Trump seeded the ground around all accusations against him by claiming "Fake News." Once this concept was firmly ensconced in the believers' mindset, nothing reported could or should be believed. While I would never ascribe brilliance to Trump, I would posit that this false claim was a flash of brilliance in his climb from failed real estate developer to reality TV star to President. 

In the world of the disaffected, dissatisfied Trump supporter, anything or anyone deemed as mainstream is guilty and worthy of their anger. The mainstream media does not reinforce what they already want to believe. So, it is a straight line from incongruent facts to "fake news".  

By claiming that, no matter what is reported, it is "fake," Trump and his sycophants can claim not only innocence, they can feign ignorance of what the reported news even is? Since Trump is now the Former Guy, we are now dealing with his sidekicks making the same claim. Rudy Giuliani makes statements that are legally non-sensical but "sound good" to the faithful. For example, Rudy has claimed that the raid on his apartment and office was illegal, even though a judge issued a warrant. Kevin McCarthy claims that "no one questions the outcome of the election anymore" even as thirty percent of responders and seventy percent of Republicans polled still say Biden is not their President? Representative Matt Gaetz announces his innocence every day, regardless of whether there is news about his situation. 

These political operatives have learned from Trump. Deny, disassemble and destroy truth. The most disturbing part of what we have been through in the past four years is this twisting and distortion of what the truth is. 

To restore some sense of order and recognize common sense again, we need to reject what the agenda-driven, right-wing media proposes as news and re-embrace our fourth estate for what it is. Imperfect as it may be, the legitimate media is our last, best hope for a return to a shared reality.