Since I was young, I learned to take all sources of news with the proverbial grain of salt. When I was 15 or 16, I occasioned a foreign newspaper that documented US jets engaged in military activity overseas. The article appeared simply factual, with no agenda, but I was skeptical, since I watched the news and read a lot back in those days, and had seen nothing about it here.
About two weeks later, nearly the same information was published here, with one notable difference. Dates. Our papers read that the activity happened on the prior day to US publishing. Even the photos were the same as the ones I saw earlier. It was then that I realized we were being fed limited information. The incident made me wonder how many other issues there might be with the press.
I decided to hunt for news more fervently from a wider variety of sources.
Fast forward maybe ten years. I was fishing through some old books in a library and found a hardback, titled, The Nerves of Government. The pages were yellowed, and it was rather aged. What I found quite striking was the information about the dissemination of information in the US. Literally, things were written about there as if it were a discovery, except they said the information was uncovered decades earlier. It had to do with technology and the use of data to control populations. I REALLY WISH I STILL GAD THE BOOK so I could be more specific.
ANYWAY, I read so many news items from here and abroad, from as many sources as I could, in an honest effort to make up my own mind in a Big Picture sort of a way. I applied experience, intuition, common sense, and a boatload of prayer in a search for truth and meaning.
I know I'm not a genius about stuff or even particularly smart at all for that matter when it comes to many issues, but I was told by a professor that it's OK to not know something. He said it IS important to know how to find out what you don't know. Hence, the question is maybe more vital than the answers when it comes to acquiring food for thought.
Another professor I heard on The Great Courses maybe 25-30 years ago, said that the courage of one's convictions pales next to one's COURAGE TO QUESTION one's convictions.
As an afterthought, again in my youth, I remember feeling it was critical to not silence hippies and those on the fringes of society because I somehow believed that Freedom of Speech belonged to us all. Today, it is clear to me that few people believe this or are at least unwilling to stand up for it...for everyone's POV.
I think this is partly why I started The Incomplete Skeptic. I want to UNmarginalize EVERY opinion. IMO, NOT LISTENING is a mental disease and defect, usually fueled by fear or anger. Yeah, I know I talk too much about God Stuff, but where there is no Love, there is something else filling that void.
Take what you like and leave the rest. Here’s a thought from my favorite poet, ee cummings: “Whenever you think or you believe or you know, you're a lot of other people: but the moment you feel, you're nobody-but-yourself.”
“Freedom is what you do with what's been done to you.” Sartre