Wednesday, October 19, 2016

Russian Media Tactics and The Fate of the US

My observations of Russian media and argumentative tactics have lead me to believe that they don't actually want to try to prove anything.   They simply spread so much counter information and half thought-out alternative theories that they undermine any single coherent opinion on the issue. 

Believe or not, I think this is related to the current US election too.

Really what they are doing is to take advantage of the fallacy fallacy. The arguments and evidence their opponents are offering all have faults or counter evidence.  As a result, they must be false and so must their conclusions.

This is bad enough when it paralyzes people's ability to rationally chose a side or story to believe.  But sometimes it damages the idea of truth itself. This is possible when people believe their is one truth and it is obvious once the facts are all laid out.  That idea of truth though is not what logic, experience or science say truth is.  Any truth and the facts it is based on are not infallible, indisputable or singular. 

For many people the type of tactics Putin's Russia uses undermines the authority of truth and facts.  This leaves a vacuum that they can fill with power and force.  This is what keeps chaos at bay and keeps the country from disintegrating. 

For others, who still believe in finding a truth that fits all the facts, it leaves them scrambling to come up with some sort of conspiracy theory that however unlikely is believed because it fits the 'facts.'

In either case, their is so much uncertainty that a people cannot come together to agree on the issue.  In fact most individuals can't even take a coherent opinion on it.

This type of maneuvering is what Trump has in common with Putin's Russia, not foreign policy or business goals.  (Or maybe I should say this should be the only truly disturbing thing.)  It is that he uses these tactics more overtly and than other politicians in the US. 

Clinton uses them too but more subtly.  This kind of thinking allows her to get away with calling Trump a lair whenever he says anything she doesn't agree with. Or to call a whole speech of his a lie just because is has one provable falsehood in it.  (Granted he does have credibility problems, but that doesn't justify her taking such horrible advantage of it. That is if she is indeed concerned about policies and truth.) 
At the same time, whenever something ridiculous comes out of his mouth or is attached to him, she claims that that is the truth and the real Trump.   She does this without pointing out why or giving evidence.  It is just as illogical as the hyperbole that spews from his mouth.   Trump is a bad man, so any thing he says that is good must be a lie; he is the fault in the argument.  Trump is a bad man, so anything bad he says or is associated with must be true; again, he is the fault in the argument. (Or maybe this is just the genetic fallacy, and I am stretching too much when I relate it to the Fallacy Fallacy.  Still, it is no doubt a fallacy.)

What has made Putin's Russia so strong and powerful is what is helping to tear America's democracy apart.  People can't or don't,  at least not in public, make up their own mind on issues because the water is so muddy.  Only that will also tear America apart because their is no dictator who can or will take over to force unity on the American people.  I am glad to say that Trump is really not capable of that.  You may doubt that he will not try or doesn't want to try. But even if you are right and I am wrong, there is a balance of power in the US system.  There is no party in Congress or majority of Supreme Court justices that will back him making the US a dictatorship. 

Putin's Russia is wrong and ridiculous when it acts like this.  It is destructive and even dangerous.  The only thing that holds Russia together in light of that is Putin's power and often ruthless power plays.  People in the US need to stop indulging, and stop allowing the candidates and media to indulge in these tactics.  The US doesn't have a strongman, and the system won't allow for one anytime soon, that can keep the country from falling apart if we don't.

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