Koz and Effect

Idiots make poor suggestions, news at 11.

There are few days that go by that I don’t read something along these lines: A person, group, or entity, offers a motion that, for reasons of ignorance or greed, is stupid.

This usually results in numerous news articles proclaiming how our liberties/freedoms/lifestyle/cable TV selection are in immediate danger of coming under the jackboot of Fascism.

Buried in the fine print of the article though, you’ll see that often, these things don’t make it past the suggestion phase. An introduced bill, a letter of support, a submitted brief. Formal methods no doubt, but all carry the weight of some guy standing on a street corner proclaiming that the end is nigh.

Nevertheless, I can’t help but wonder if we’d be better served to ignore these things and get on with our lives. Stupid people say stupid things, with surprising regularity. Many media personalities have achieved larger-than-life statuses simply by proposing outrageous ideas that are attractive to all but a token few. Is focusing more attention on these things in our best interest if it stands that they’ll get ignored in the end anyways? Why lend any more credibility than is deserved?

It could very well be that it’s the reactions to these proposals that ensures their demise in the first place. I often wonder if this is the case in the areas of public policy; where a lot of bills and recommendations are posted, often without going anywhere. If there were people who might have considered some of these items in the slightest, many would rethink this in the face of so much uproar.

But while these items rarely make it past even one round of scrutiny, the comments and feedback that pour forth often seem to indicate that people think that these policies have been adopted or are on the verge of being so, convincing them of the downward spiral of their country/state/ISP. This fuels the cynicism even more, and mostly because of a poor understanding of systems that are often designed to weed out these bad polices in the first place.

That’s not to mention many proposals where a single line or component may be taken out of context. By itself, a phrase can indicate a grave danger to our traditional way of doing things, until it’s viewed in the larger context of it’s surrounding mitigating language. Suddenly it has no teeth. Yet it’s often that singular phrase that’s reported on.

Advocacy and special interest groups I feel are sometimes guilty of this. To an extent, I can see why: It is their mission to be passionate about their chosen issue. Advocate and watchdog groups serve a role in paying close attention to a particular issue in a way the populace cannot. (I can hear the multitude of persons saying that “people should be educated on the issues”, but I challenge any one of them to stay abreast of all of the “important” issues in the world and still have some semblance of a life.) However, while it’s important to raise awareness, it does not do favors to scare people into thinking that something is worse than it is.

There isn’t a realistic fix for this problem. In the end, critical thinking and common sense is the only cure from panicking needlessly at every little thing. Whether or not this has a high chance of uptake in the face of so much sensationalism however, I’m not holding my breath.