Facts? Meh…

 

 

I watched an old Star Trek Voyager show about a week ago.  Season 4 Episode 23, “Living Witness” 

The plot was about how things we think we know about (in history) may not have happened exactly as portrayed.  No big surprise there.  Unless we personally witness something ourselves, or if the media shows it to us in real time, what actually happened is really a product of hearsay.  We are depending on others to “tell us the story.”  

Second-hand information always leaves the door open for possible biases, glossings over, taintings, indeed, what I call “juicifi-cations.”

Knowing of these information pitfalls conjures up, in my mind, the saying, “History is written by the victors” (i.e., winners, controllers of the narrative, most skillful story-tellers, etc.).

Let me ask you to think about that for a minute; “the telling of the story.”  Now, here are some questions to consider:

1. First, do you believe in the adage, “History is written by the winners?”  According to the internet, Napoleon called it “a fable agreed upon.”
2. If yes, how much of history do you suspect was written/reported accurately. 100% 99% 98%...   Or does it depend on the category for you?  In other words, generally speaking, do you tend to give some subjects more “room for error/latitude” than others?  And if yes, why?
3. Do you believe historic exaggerations ever happened?  If yes, does anything (any history in particular) “get your goat?” (piss you off)
4. Do you believe that, what we today call “Dark Free Speech,” ever got into the act (story)?  (I.e., an attempt to manipulate the narrative in someone’s (the winner’) favor, in spite of how things actually turned out.  IOW, lie for the sake of “the story.”)  Or, to quote a great line from “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance,” “When the legend becomes fact, print the legend,” meaning when the story of what happened is a better tale than what actually happened, print the tale.”
5. Juicifi-cation isn’t only relegated to the “hard” history books (American History, World History, etc.), but I suspect in religious histories as well (e.g., think Jesus, God, Allah, Koran, Tora, Bible, etc.).  How believable to you are these such religious histories? 100% 99% 98%...?

As a believer myself (that history was written by the winners), what better proof can I give than to have you look at how today, in real time, humans are still guilty of all these juicifi-cations that I’ve pointed out? People are people, yesterday, today, tomorrow. Are we any better today (more meticulous in our reporting) than the people of yesteryear?  I don’t think so.  

Granted, we do have better recording devices.  So there IS that.  IOW, it’s easier to catch people in a lie.  But there are modern day ECC bandages to take care of those nasty cuts. 😉  We can try to bandage the truth with DFS, but it doesn’t seem to have stopped the bleeding. 🤷‍♀️

(by PrimalSoup)