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Misinformation Doesn’t Kill People—People Kill People
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This title is intentionally a play on the pro-gun faction’s slogan “Guns Don’t Kill People, People Kill People.” At a certain time before my social awakening, I was appalled by all of the gun violence in the US and elsewhere and therefore believed restricting gun sales and use (through more stringent registration regulations) might be a good idea.
However, I never thought that particular NRA slogan was nonsense as so many of my liberal friends did. It actually rings quite true. Yes, you can still argue (as the leftists do) that if there were not as many guns lying about, people wouldn’t use them to kill other people. To me, that is a rather weak argument.
I have known many gun owners, and I must say as a group they are the most responsible people amongst my friends. The people who use guns to kill others indiscriminately are typically mentally deranged and in need of psychological intervention. So, we either reach out and come up with ways to help these people, or we remove access to guns—for everyone. Which way do you think the agenda believes we should go?
That seems to me equivalent to removing all cars so drunk people don’t have access to them to kill other people with. I know, I know…those who would wish to argue with me would say “Cars have a useful value, guns do not.” It isn’t so much taking away the guns as material objects, it is taking away the right to have them.
Until we remove all government corruption, all crime on the streets, all violent mental pathologies, and have created a utopian, all-safe, society—guns, and owning them, and respectfully learning how to use them safely, have a purpose. When that utopian idyllic society happens, we’ll talk. But I won’t hold my breath.
I digress, sorry.
So, along the same logic lines, how will censoring all speech to weed out the “misinformation” stop crimes like what happened in the UK in early August? The authoritarian position seems to be that “misinformation” is causing much of the “insane” criminal activity in the world today.
First of all, that is quite a stretch. How could anyone establish that as fact? And even if it was a fact (that “misinformation” causes violence) how would one go about removing all of it without removing all free speech? And who would be burdened with the task of differentiating “misinformation” from “real information?”
Aha. Easy to see it now, eh? (Of course, anyone reading this knows this already.)
All this misinformation crap is a ruse to give the agenda the power to shut us all up. Any time they link misinformation with a violent crime they are telling us, erroneously, that if they could just have permission to censor the hate speech, then it would take care of the problem.
I have personally never understood all the hoopla around hate speech being so damaging to society. Sure, it is rude, and sure, it can hurt people’s feelings deeply. And yes, there is a possibility it could incite some lunatic to do horrible things. But do we give up one of our fundamental freedoms due to the few whackos who will get a rise out of “hate speech” and uncontrollably wreak havoc as a result?
I say a resounding “no!” And even if that was the initial intent of censorship—to avoid a lunatic from being inspired—it simply would not work. Best to deal with the lunatic first and not trash free speech just because they think he or she (lunatic) will hear it.
But that isn’t the initial intent. We are told it is, but clearly it isn’t. In fact, I would not be surprised if most of these incidents where misinformation is blamed were intentionally set up so the agenda has something to point at (I have to be careful with this statement, I don’t want to be sued as someone else we know was for saying something similar).
Information is information. Whether it is looney or not (or hateful or not) is up to us individually to determine. We are supposed to have the faculty to do such a discernment, and not require mommy or daddy to come to our rescue and tell the big bad bully to stop hurting our feelings. And again, I am all for living in a society that does not condone hate speech, sexually or racially degrading speech, or speech inappropriate for children (within reason of course, and not by censorship!). But, in my humble opinion, we must do this in such a way that we preserve the First Amendment right to free speech. Plain and simple. There is simply no other way.
What we see going on, however, is not in our best interests. Far from it. The fight against misinformation is not a fight against hate speech, sexually degrading speech, or inappropriate speech for children as they want us to believe it is. The fight by the agenda to remove what that agenda decides is offensive, or dangerous, information is pure and simply a fight against our rights in a free society to freely exchange information.
We have been hoodwinked into thinking this fight is a noble pursuit to silence deranged and mentally ill people, who will take this information to support their heinous attack on innocent others. That is not at all what they are doing. And what they are doing is one of the oldest tricks of manipulation in the books—disguise an action as something else, and then create a false flag to justify it. “See what happened? If only that killer did not have access to that misinformation, this would have never happened.”
So, if we don’t do whatever we can to limit hate speech and the like, then what are we to do? Raise our children with character, teach them how to think, and how to discern good from bad.
Teach them to question what they read, see and hear. Raise them with good and loving hearts so hate has no place to grow within them, nor have influence on them. And what about all of us who are already raised? Teach each other.
Make an example for others to follow. Walk the talk. And make love the most important tenet of your life.
Todd Hayen PhD is a registered psychotherapist practicing in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. He holds a PhD in depth psychotherapy and an MA in Consciousness Studies. He specializes in Jungian, archetypal, psychology. Todd also writes for his own substack, which you can read here
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