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| CFI Library, Amherst, NY |
Attributed quotes are meaningless unless fact checked. And checked again. And the checkers authenticated. And everything sourced.
But that's not the malleable part.
As people seek to derive power from an authoritative source they redefine and mold others' words, ideas, and situations to conform to what they want to express. Realities are bent to the speaker's will and then out spews memes and what's now being called 'fake news'.
Don't even get me started on plagiarism.
In this new era of high alert skepticism, a sense of reason forced me this morning to offer a correction on a social media site for a meme which misquoted Thomas Paine. I don't usually bother trying to fix social media but the poorly paraphrased quote bothered me.
The misquote equated the futile behavior of arguing with an unreasonable person to administering medicine to the dead.
Common sense on its own, but it's not what Paine said.
While it may have conveyed the writer's thought its brevity lost much of Paine's meaning. And despite any good intention, it was just one example too many of mob mentality groupthink fakenews alt-fact as malleable reality.
Ironically that post had several hundred comments which expressed overwhelming agreement, and as of this morning shared over 5,000 times.
The camel's back, she broke.
Here is the actual quote, which I will be thinking about for much of the day:
“To argue with a man who has renounced the use and authority of reason, and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt, is like administering medicine to the dead, or endeavoring to convert an atheist by scripture.” -The American Crisis: Lancaster, March 21, 1778, Thomas Paine to William Howe
The phrase "and whose philosophy consists in holding humanity in contempt" was completely missing from the meme but it is crucial to the message.
Motive matters.
A philosophy which holds humanity in contempt is soulless.
Paine goes on to tell Howe to enjoy his "insensibility and reflecting." He equates that decision to "the prerogative of animals" and ends his opening paragraph by telling Howe, "no one will envy you these honors, in which a savage only can be your rival and a bear your master." (sick burn TP)
But don't quote me.
Read it for yourself: The American Crisis: LANCASTER, March 21, 1778, by Thomas Paine
Motive matters.
A philosophy which holds humanity in contempt is soulless.
Paine goes on to tell Howe to enjoy his "insensibility and reflecting." He equates that decision to "the prerogative of animals" and ends his opening paragraph by telling Howe, "no one will envy you these honors, in which a savage only can be your rival and a bear your master." (sick burn TP)
But don't quote me.
Read it for yourself: The American Crisis: LANCASTER, March 21, 1778, by Thomas Paine
-Reb
