Your Lying Ears

 Backstory:  when Rasty watches TV, he likes to listen through headphones that give him clearer sound than the built-in speakers.  The headphones keep sounding when the speakers are muted, so a click of a button on the remote will let him keep listening while nobody else in the living-room hears anything.  This explains why I came into the room a little while ago to see Rasty steaming and muttering in front of a silent -- to me -- TV screen.  He was watching, as usual, MSNBC with occasional forays to CNN. Both of them were covering the big pro-Trump rally in Washington DC that's been announced for the past week.

What I saw was a bunch of mostly-middle-aged people bundled up in winter jackets,  hats and masks -- even in DC this is early January, and it's cold -- either plodding around the Capitol Building or standing on the steps, holding or waving flags.  There were no rocks or bottles flying, no fists raised, no clubs swinging, and no fights visible.  At one point a camera showed a broken door and people climbing through it.  Another view showed the floor of the Senate, with a few protesters strolling through it;  papers were still on the desks, not the floor, and none of the chairs were so much as disarranged.  None of the Senators were present, and the protesters simply walked through.  Another quick shot revealed a single protester, looking somewhat bemused, sitting in Pelosi's office taking a selfie with his phone.  A  text-banner at the bottom of the TV screen claimed: "Pro-Trump rioters storm capitol".  

Riot?  What riot?  

What my eyes saw was a large and somewhat sloppily-arranged crowd standing on the capitol steps or strolling around on the lawn, holding flags, holding signs, and taking pictures with their phones.  Yes there was a single-file line of police standing at the top of the steps, doing nothing, with a good strip of space between them and the protesters.  Eventually a group of yellow-vested police threw some tear-gas and marched across part of the lawn, driving some of the protesters ahead of them.  The protesters duly trooped away, several taking pictures with their phones, until they were gone.  I've seen sale-shopping frenzies at Wal-Mart that were more "violent" than this.

Then Rasty took off his headphones, turned on the speakers, and...  Hoo-hah!  Talk about disconnect!

The voices of the TV news reporters panted breathlessly about "mob rule!" "Violent protesters!"  "Storming the capitol!"  "Attack on Congress!"  "Assault on democracy!"  "Clashes with police!"  "Insurrection!"  "Shots fired!" "Rioters attempt to overturn the election!" ...And of course "Trump refuses to condemn violence!"  

I've never seen a greater difference between what I was seeing and what the Official Voices were telling us we were seeing.

It's clear that the media think they can talk us into disbelieving what our own eyes see.  I think they've gone too far, especially since the media-flacks have changed their stories and contradicted themselves so much.  When it comes to a choice between what you're told and what you see yourself, what are you going to believe, really?  The best propaganda machine in the world can't gaslight even the majority of the people into doubting their eyes.  

I suspect that the media-flacks figured that out too, because as soon as the 6 PM curfew came on in Washington, and the protesters walked away, the stories -- and the images -- began to change and contradict each other.  Quick shots appeared, showing the Capitol police aiming rifles at the protesters, while voice-overs questioned why the DC police "allowed" the crowd to get into the Capitol building.  Other voices wailed about "the halls of Congress littered with trash and rubble" while actual footage showed clean floors and undisturbed desks.  Other voices claimed that "protesters came armed" and "shots were fired and a woman was killed", followed by another announcement that the woman was a protester who was shot by police.  Images of protesters obligingly walking away from the police were interspersed with video-clips -- clearly taken during the summer, in another city -- of mobs having truncheon-fights with police during real street-riots, while voice-overs claimed they were both happening here and now.  

Only at the end of the 6 o'clock news did one commentator -- ironically, from Fox News -- note that one reason for the public's disgust with politicians is that the media can't be trusted to tell us the truth.

The best solution I can think of right now is to watch the TV news twice: the earliest reports with the sound turned off, studying the videos with a critical eye, and the later news with the sound turned on, and comparing what the talking-heads tell you with what you've already seen.

--Leslie <;)))><