April 05, 2006
The Fact Filter
Thomas Sowell has a new column out where he speaks to the issue of demagoguery by politicians and the media. He makes some extremely good points and reveals quite a few facts that I had not read before. But then again...I get my information from the news media.People who urge us to rely on the United Nations, instead of acting "unilaterally," or who urge us to follow other countries in creating a government-run medical care system, often show not the slightest interest in getting facts about the actual track record of either the UN or government-run medical systems.Nor does the media tell you that many people classified as "poor" are actually college students, or that many people classified as "poor" do not in fact stay poor, but move up in the world due to raises, job changes, economic booms - in other words, part of the natural order of progress. But these facts are never revealed, let alone debated in any meaningful way. It's too detrimental to the political establishments, the standard media lines, and sadly, many people's solidified preconceptions.Those who believe in affirmative action likewise usually see no reason to find out what actually happens under such policies, as distinguished from what they wish, hope, or imagine happens.
The crusade for "a living wage" that will enable a worker to support a family proceeds without the slightest interest in finding out whether most people who are making low wages actually have any family to support -- much less seeking out the facts about what actually happens after the government sets wages.
Facts that go against preconceived notions are likely to be ignored, even by many scholars. For example, slavery is an issue that is widely discussed as if it were something peculiar to Africans enslaved by Europeans, instead of something suffered and inflicted around the world by people of every race, color, and religion. Two books about more European slaves brought to North Africa than there were African slaves brought to America have been published in recent years. They are "Christian Slaves, Muslim Masters" by Robert Davis and "White Gold" by Giles Milton. Both books have been largely ignored by the media and academia alike -- and the first went out of print, less than 6 months after being published.The issue of slavery is a difficult one. Name one race in the history of the world that has not been subjected to enslavement over their long history. What has happened over that time to force a change in how slavery is perceived and talked about? Why does the entire world talk about slavery as though it were only an African-American issue? How many people are enslaved in the world today? In what way do free societies or the media or (God help us) the U.N. bring light to those people?
Well considering that many of the countries that further the sex slave trade, the servant trade, the illegal immigrant trade are in fact a part of the U.N. anyway, and that countries like Libya and Sudan have held prominent positions on U.N. councils for Human Rights, apparently nothing all that meaningful as far as the international community is concerned - unless of course they're condeming the U.S. for Guantanamo.
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