Recently,
Senator Richard Pan of the California State Legislature introduced
legislation entitled ‘False Information Strategic Plans,’ a bill that
would task all social media sites that have a physical presence in
California not only to have a plan to fully distinguish between the
truth and falsity of all
the content they publish and share, but also to
“mitigate the spread of false information through news stories,”
presumably through some remarkable discipline of self-censoring, or by
“placing a warning on a news story containing false information.”
Where do we even start with this one?
For us to believe that Mr. Pan actually
harbours expectations that the state could succeed in compelling social
media sites to make the enormous effort to implement such a plan is
ludicrous for so many obvious reasons.
Arbiters Of Truth
To begin with, fully distinguishing what
is true from what is false is the stuff of spiritual masters who have
reached enlightenment. Few, if any in our society, are in a position to
be arbiters of truth. Those of us who are earnestly seeking to find the
truth are muddling along slowly but surely, improving our discernment
along the way.
Authentic truth-seekers do not have the
least desire to censor that which is false, even if this falsity is
blatantly deliberate; rather, they see falsity as an opportunity to hone
the very discernment of truth that marks their progress. Conversely,
those who want to limit or control the unfettered proliferation of
information and opinion are not searchers of truth; they are agents of
control.
The Legislation Of Control
As so often is the case with legislation, it is not so much about what it is asking us to do as it is about what the State gains the power to do if, based on their own subjective definitions, we do not comply with the regulations.
To the casual observer, the ‘False
Information Strategic Plans’ Bill does not seem to contain any
overtly oppressive measures. It is simply requesting social media sites
to help in the effort to protect the public from the perils of fake
news. The deception is by design. The introduction of this bill is an
attempt to lay the foundation for unmitigated powers of censorship and
suppression of information in the hands of the Deep State.
Imagine, if you will, a website—Collective Evolution
(California branch), for example. And they publish a story—say, a story
that criticizes Deep State efforts to gain more control over freedom of
information. Well, if the bill introduced by Richard Pan became law, it
could very well give the state the power to shut down the website
entirely, based on the state’s subjective assessment that the social
media organization had not conformed to the requirements by law to
“mitigate the spread of false information through news stories.”
1984 All Over Again?
The parallels with the dystopian state of George Orwell’s 1984
are unavoidable. Richard Pan’s legislation portends the eventual
creation of some form of state-run ‘Ministry of Truth’. And as has been
the case for decades, invoking the famous novel as a prism through which
to assess our current level of enslavement at the hands of our
governing body is instructive.
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However, there is no longer a need to
fear or despair the revelation of such parallels. It’s not 1984. It’s
2018. We as a collective are not the suppressed and alienated citizens
of Oceania; we are a formerly sleeping giant whose awakening is well
underway.
We no longer succumb passively to
state-sponsored dictums such as ‘Ignorance is Strength’. We grasp ever
more immediately the irony inherent in the proclamations of those who
would ‘protect’ us by limiting our freedoms.
Rising Perspective
And so, as we turn our attention to a
matter such as this, we can quickly discern Senator Richard Pan for what
he is—a stooge of the Deep State, an object of ridicule. Note that he
also introduced a bill to eliminate parents’ ability to prevent their
children from being vaccinated via the conscientious objection. It’s
second nature for us to imagine how much Big Pharma contributes to his
campaign.
From our rising perspective, we can
identify efforts like his as desperate attempts of a dying beast that
has been backed into a corner. In fact, the whole ‘fake news’ narrative
appears to be backfiring on the Deep State, allowing Donald Trump to
lead the way in suggesting how much mainstream media has employed
selective, misleading reporting to control our perception all along.
Continuing to shed light on shadowy initiatives such as Richard Pan’s
bill–one of our main responsibilities as alternative media
journalists–will only increase our collective perception of what is
true, and move us closer to a tipping point where we are able to create a
world in which only truth prevails.
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