None of the others are being duped?

MONDAY, OCTOBER 14, 2024

So suggests Charlie Warzel: Why are so many people going to vote for Candidate Trump? Over here in Blue America, inquiring minds do—but also don't—seem to want to know.

Back in 2020, 74.2 million people did vote for Candidate Trump. That's a very large number of people—but why in the world did they do that? 

We voted for Candidate Biden ourselves. In that sense, we may not be the right people to ask. 

If you want to know why all those other people voted for Trump, it might make sense to go and ask them! That said, many of us in Blue America have criticized major news orgs for asking such questions as that.

Please don't speak to the Others, we've heatedly said. We'd call that a deeply human impulse, but one which may not be constructive.

Along these lines, we were puzzled by something Charlie Warzel said in a new essay for The Atlantic. He starts with several things we agree with completely. Under a dual headline, his essay starts as shown:

I'M RUNNING OUT OF WAYS TO EXPLAIN HOW BAD THIS IS
What’s happening in America today is something darker than a misinformation crisis.

The truth is, it’s getting harder to describe the extent to which a meaningful percentage of Americans have dissociated from reality. As Hurricane Milton churned across the Gulf of Mexico last night, I saw an onslaught of outright conspiracy theorizing and utter nonsense racking up millions of views across the internet. The posts would be laughable if they weren’t taken by many people as gospel. Among them: Infowars’ Alex Jones, who claimed that Hurricanes Milton and Helene were “weather weapons” unleashed on the East Coast by the U.S. government, and “truth seeker” accounts on X that posted photos of condensation trails in the sky to baselessly allege that the government was “spraying Florida ahead of Hurricane Milton” in order to ensure maximum rainfall, “just like they did over Asheville!”

As Milton made landfall, causing a series of tornados, a verified account on X reposted a TikTok video of a massive funnel cloud with the caption “WHAT IS HAPPENING TO FLORIDA?!” The clip, which was eventually removed but had been viewed 662,000 times as of yesterday evening, turned out to be from a video of a CGI tornado that was originally published months ago. Scrolling through these platforms, watching them fill with false information, harebrained theories, and doctored images—all while panicked residents boarded up their houses, struggled to evacuate, and prayed that their worldly possessions wouldn’t be obliterated overnight—offered a portrait of American discourse almost too bleak to reckon with head-on.

It's true that the American discourse is currently driven by mountains of madness. In our view, it's true that these waves of madness create "an American discourse almost too bleak to reckon with head-on."

We completely agree with those opening judgments! But as Warzel continues directly, we find ourselves puzzled by this:

Even in a decade marred by online grifters, shameless politicians, and an alternative right-wing-media complex pushing anti-science fringe theories, the events of the past few weeks stand out for their depravity and nihilism. As two catastrophic storms upended American cities, a patchwork network of influencers and fake-news peddlers have done their best to sow distrust, stoke resentment, and interfere with relief efforts. But this is more than just a misinformation crisis. To watch as real information is overwhelmed by crank theories and public servants battle death threats is to confront two alarming facts: first, that a durable ecosystem exists to ensconce citizens in an alternate reality, and second, that the people consuming and amplifying those lies are not helpless dupes but willing participants.

Once again, it's true! As matters stand at the present time, it's true that "a durable ecosystem exists to ensconce citizens in an alternate reality."

But why does Warzel go on to offer that second assessment? Why does he say that "the people consuming and amplifying those lies are not helpless dupes but [are] willing participants" instead?

Why in the world should we draw that sweeping conclusion? As Warzel continues along in his essay, we can't see that he ever explains.

It's true! Thanks in large part to the so-called "democratization of media," American citizens are now exposed to an unrelenting stream of false and misleading claims. The question we ask is his:

Many people do end up repeating such claims. But why should we assume that none of those people are being duped? Why should we assume that all those people are "willing participants" in the spread of misinformation, as Warzel seems to claim?

Being human, we inhabitants of Blue America are strongly inclined to drift in this direction—to drift in the direction of assuming and asserting the worst about all the Others, not excluding the 74.2 million people who voted for Trump last time.

In the circumstance described by Warzel, is it really true that none of those people do, in fact, believe the false claims and are, in that sense, "dupes?" Is Warzel saying that all the people who repeat false claims are doing so in full knowledge that what they're saying is bogus?

Easy to be hard, we'd say. Also, we'd be inclined to say this:

Given the way we humans are wired, we're strongly inclined to draw such sweeping conclusions about those very bad people, the Others. Especially at tribalized times such as this, such assessments are bred in the bone.

In a similar vein, why do people vote for Candidate Trump? 

Back in 2020, more than 74 million people did! If you want to know why they did, you should possibly just go out and ask them.

Some of their answers won't make sense. On the other hand, some of the answers they give you might not necessarily seem to be totally nuts. We'll be puzzling about this matter all through the course of the week.

Charlie Warzel's a good, decent person. We'll admit that we were puzzled by what he apparently said.