BY BRIAN MONTEITH
Can we stop freaking out and just choose for ourselves?!
Are the waves of collective hysteria that wash across social media from smart phones and tablets making us lose our marbles? Does the heightened sense of immediacy and intimidating volume of comment undermine our sense of proportion and ability to reflect before we are tempted to react?
From politics to personal finance to public health, our loss of trust in established sources of authority gives us cause to question the most revered and respected figures and institutions. Nature abhors a vacuum and our cynicism towards traditional trusted sources of information is matched by a sharp steer towards alternative sources of ‘authority’.
We never required fact-checking before (or at least we never thought we did) because we knew there was such a thing as lies, damned lies and statistics, but now we have to contend with supposed fact-checking being wilfully polluted by those seeking to use fact-checked facts to influence our reasoning. This inevitably forces us to ask who checks the checkers?
Where a healthy skepticism once existed, it appears an ever-increasing number of us will believe any old nonsense peddled by ‘influencers’ online so we have to be doubly skeptical and interrogate claims and counter claims. Some of us would rather just sup a pint or quaff a fine Chateau Musar than travel down a rabbit hole that eventually brings you out somewhere in Australia’s bush. But dig we must!
The outcomes are not good. All sorts of claims appear on the web and the regiments of bots and counter-bots form their orders of battle in support, leaving us punch drunk about what to believe.
Retirement nest-eggs are apparently being lost to crypto – or are they just old-fashioned fraudsters simply using new tools to confuse the unsuspecting, like the ‘Nigerian e-mails’ once did?
As a result of disputed claims and counter claims around the efficacy and safety of Covid vaccines any trust in Big Pharma or national and international healthcare institutions like the WHO are now instantly questioned. The result: falling vaccination rates for once near-obsolete childhood diseases, some of which are now making a comeback. The pushback: President Trump has taken the United States out of the WHO. (I had already formed that view when I found how the WHO is campaigning to prevent me supping my pint or enjoying Chateau Musar.)
Whatever one thinks about the value of the Covid vaccines, the handling of their introduction, the lack of rigour in testing, the mandates to take them or lose your livelihood and then the obvious suppression of damaging effects have raised significant doubt about all vaccines where it never previously existed. Some of us warned such problems with public confidence in health policies would happen, but we were ignored or shut down.
Health scares are particularly notable for their regularity on the internet, no doubt because we all have an interest in them (if not for ourselves then for those we care for). The consequence is a series of ill-conceived ‘health crusades’ where complexity and nuance is lost.
Artificial sweeteners are called a ‘cancer risk’ when generally the alternative is, er, refined sugar; perennial concerns around mass fluoridation of water; alarms raised about artificial preservatives and colourings poisoning our children’s breakfast cereals and sweets. Every week there’s a new product or additive thrown into the cocktail mix, fuelling a new kind of hypochondria diagnosed by sincere activists or online cranks – but how do we know which?
This is not even a partisan issue. Some on the Left fret about the health and climate impacts of seed oils; some on the Right freak out about pasteurised milk – and then the positions become so blurred that ‘bully state’ laws from uni-party centrists become the new extreme. Encouraging people in the Netherlands to smoke cigarettes to avoid vapes is the latest absurdity (WHO has a lot to answer for).
If an issue is not started by X or TikTok it is most likely to be turbo-charged by them. Soon the respective bugbears of fringe minorities quickly spiral into full-blown moral panics. Such collective freakouts don’t just shape our choices and beliefs, they erode societal trust and well-being.
Ten years ago milk was, er, milk (Jersey, full fat, semi-skimmed and skimmed) – now there is a kaleidoscope of milks to satisfy every desire or prejudice, does adding another ‘medicated’ variety cause a problem so long as we know about it and have alternatives?
In the comparative scale of health concerns, questions over the risks from food dyes appear another set of exaggerations too far. In the US the FDA has now followed the EU and banned Red Dye No.3 from foods (it was already banned from lipstick) all the while admitting the evidence of causing cancer is not conclusive.
Risks had been reported as low, especially when eaten as part of a healthy, balanced diet, yet like other scares activists ensure the fears never quite go away. The campaigners are coming next for Red Dye No.40, apparently mice force-fed huge amounts developed tumours. Funny, I never considered trying the Red Dye Diet – does anyone?
Often it is the incoherence and inconsistency that contributes to the cynicism. I recall when in the name of protecting our sensitivity from listing Cochineal (obtained from the eponymous scale insect) authorities insisted it had to be called E120 or carmine. It was the red colouring of foods and drinks such as Campari – so Campari simply stopped using it. Now the same institutions are approvingly telling us that we should eat insects and accept insect flour as a viable ingredient.
Is it any wonder such contradictions might leave people questioning what to believe and doubting the honesty of authorities?
I know it is not going to stop, all I ask is for letting us choose for ourselves. I want to be left to continue sucking on my bag of Kola Drops, raise a glass of my (sans-Cochineal) Campari & Tonic, savour my raw steak tartare with a fresh egg yolk – without fear – and devour my favourite Neapolitan ice creams with a Cochineal-coloured glacé cherry on top.
Social media scares won’t change me. I’ll weigh up the evidence and take a questioning view – I shan’t be bullied into abandoning my Sugar Puffs.
Brian Monteith is a former member of the Scottish and European Parliaments, a senior adviser to the Tax Reform Council and an international public relations consultant.