I really lead a sheltered existence. Although I spend half my life reading about the current generation of FOX-News MAGA-heads and the kind of conspiratorial substitute news that has apparently taken hold across the country, it actually walked up my stairs in the form of a large middle-aged southern-accented appliance repairman yesterday about 6:45 p.m.
As Judy Woodruff began to introduce a PBS NewsHour piece on the American atrocities at the Mexican-American border I hear “They're all ISIS, you know.”
“Excuse me?” I said. After all I have had trouble getting enough oxygen to the brain lately. Maybe it's the ears too.
But no. The deluge was about to begin. In shock, I caught maybe every third word or concept because I had apparently stumbled into the belly-of-the-beast- and that belly was my own living room.
“They're all young men- no women or children.... notice, they're all under 30. It's all paid for and staged.” he said, pointing at the refugees seeking asylum which he no doubt saw as the invading Caravan chock-full-of “bad hombres.”
Still not being quite ready to push my reporting brethren under the bus, I had to ask. “You mean they're all making it up? PBS, CBS. CNN, NY Ti...”
“Of course they are.”
I was unable to formulate the words quickly enough to ask if he, thought maybe there was some secret corner closet in the US Capitol where they and Adam Sorkin gather to write today's script- i.e. the mainstream media news.
The pundits say that the country is divided and tell stories about “unfriending” 25-year acquaintances. Funny- I've never had any actual “friends” I needed to ditch like that. Apparently we picked each other well at the time
And I'm not likely to come across one unless it's a friend of a friend, usually of someone I don't even really know. And I intend to keep it that way- by ignoring them.
I've apparently unconsciously- or maybe super-consciously, spent 66 years weeding these people out of my life as, not just traditional “friends” but new “social media friend” as well.
Something in the back of my click-clacking lizard brain I know I should have friends with differing political bents. And I have “true conservative” friends I've loved and still do.
But I've begun to realize this is not just another political view. This is a whole new brand of troglodyte and it's the job of his or her friends and family that helped them achieve such a stunning lack of media literacy in the first place to help ease them back to reality.
It's not mine if I want to maintain the bones in my nose in their current alignment .
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