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We Don’t Need Honesty. We Need Truth!

What we need right now is truth. Truth from our politicians, truth from our government, truth from our health departments and healthcare professionals, truth from our education system, our teachers and professors, and truth from the media.

There is so much twisting and spinning and skewing and straight out lying happening that it makes it difficult to discern the truth. It doesn’t help when so called “experts” present something as fact and then weeks or months later present the exact opposite as fact. Well, which is it? And, were you lying then or are you lying now? And, it begs the question: Are there hidden agendas? Are lies being perpetrated to manipulate and control the people?

What makes it challenging is that some people honestly believe what they are saying is truth. But is it really? Honesty and truth are not the same. Someone can be completely honest and totally untruthful. A schizophrenic can be honest about their fear of the monster standing in the corner of the room when, in truth, there’s no monster standing there.

An anti-gun advocate declares with all sincerity that all guns should be banned. Why? Because he believes that if guns were banned then criminals wouldn’t possess them. Honest? Yes. True? No.

In 1998, then president Bill Clinton said, “I did not have sexual relations with that woman.” Was he being honest? Some say yes, because he believed that his actions did not fit the definition. Clinton later confessed that he did have an “improper physical relationship” with Monica Lewinsky, a 24-year-old White House intern.

Years ago, I had conversations with a woman who adamantly denied that any abuse happened to her child  because she loved her husband and could not believe that he could beat his own, her own, child. Hard to imagine that kind of selective memory? Imagine it. It happens. She wanted to believe that her husband had never abused her son. But was it true? No, he bloodied their son’s nose on more than one occasion.

So, why do people believe the lies?

For some, it’s because they have been taught the lies from a very young age. They don’t know any different and they don’t want to face the reality that everything they know is a lie. So they cling to the lie and refuse to accept the truth even when it is presented to them.

For others it’s because they hate the “other side” so much they will easily believe anything their side says.

For still others, it’s because they’ve been told that not believing somehow makes them a bad person. In today’s society, just disagreeing with someone will quickly get you labeled as something horrible. You will also be shamed, publicly humiliated, and possibly assaulted. It’s hard to stand your ground against such violent and ugly behavior. It’s better just to go along and believe. The problem with this is that the more we stay silent and listen to the lies, the more we actually do start to believe them. To our subconscious mind, silence means we condone it.

For yet still others, it’s because the lie was presented in a way that sounds truthful. It was presented earnestly by experts in the field. It sounds heartfelt or like it’s the product of judicious unbiased research. How can someone who says they are looking out for us be lying to us? And when the lie is repeated over and over by multiple people, we can’t help but start to think it’s true. So many people can’t be wrong. Or can they?

Truth is an accurate representation of reality

Truth is reality. Truth is fact. Truth is logical and makes sense. Truth does not change because our needs change. No, truth is truth. Two plus two will always equal four.

Truth is not about what you believe. Truth is not about what you want. Truth just is and it can be harsh and unforgiving. Truth is real. Truth is brutal. Truth is irrefutable.

But the truth is not what we’re getting. We’re being lied to by people in power who want to control and manipulate us, and who want to keep their power. Many are abusing their power and, just like the Wizard of Oz, they do not want us to see what they are doing behind the curtain.

For many of them, the ends justify the means, meaning they will do anything, go to any lengths, they will lie, cheat, steal, and even murder to get what they want.

We need the truth and, more importantly, we need to trust that our politicians, our government, our health departments and healthcare professionals, our teachers and professors, and our media are all telling us the truth. We want to trust. We need to trust. We need to trust that the people we have placed into positions of power are telling us the truth. Because unless we can trust that we are being told the truth, it’s all just lies, all of it, and it doesn’t matter who you are. Without trust, there cannot be truth, and without truth, there is nothing.

Are You Wanting to Jump Ship?

Tired of Big Brother controlling what you can post or what you can see on social media? You don’t need permission to leave Facebook or Twitter and there are other fish in the social media sea.

Censorship is not new, but recently it seems, the social media giants have become quite full of themselves and are on massive power trips and are censoring conservatives like never before. Their CEOs believe themselves to be gods and, as such, are untouchable. They feel they can dictate what you can or cannot see. The level of filtering, censoring, throttling, and removing of conservatives and republicans is at an all time high. How many of us have been in “jail” or had our pages or groups removed or our accounts restricted or deleted?

 “Twitter and Facebook are engaging in biased editorialization,” argued John Matze, Parler CEO. “Once you start content curation and you start fact-checking, you’re introducing bias and I don’t think that there’s any perfect group without bias, so in terms of being a platform for transparency and free speech, they’ve gone way too far,” Matze said.

Keep in mind that when you do decide to leave Facebook and delete your account, you can uninstall the app on an iPhone, but you can’t uninstall the app from your Samsung smart phone (we checked our phones). You can “disable” the app, but that’s not the same as uninstalling the app. But you shouldn’t let that deter you if you want to jump ship. So, if you are fed up with censorship, where can you go?

Social Media Options

If you’re looking for something like Twitter, then you’ll want to take a look at Parler (web, Android, iOS), pronounced “par-lay,” which has attracted conservative users because they felt disenfranchised by other social media platforms. Over the summer it has boomed as more and more conservatives have gotten fed up with being censored. Just this week it jumped to most popular app as conservatives rally support to leave Twitter and Facebook. Currently, it is the number one most downloaded app in the world. Parler claims to moderate content based on American Federal Communications Commission guidelines and Supreme Court rulings.

If you’re looking for something like Facebook, you have a couple of options. Currently, we are “test driving” MeWe (web, Android, iOS) and Connect (web). Both have no ads, spyware, targeting, political bias, or newsfeed manipulation. Both are very similar with one notable difference. Connect allows you to create groups and pages.  MeWe allows you to create groups, but if you want a page, it will cost a small monthly fee.

MeWe is an American online social media and social networking service owned by Sgrouples, a company based in California. The service touts its commitment to user privacy and control as its outstanding feature. “You own your content. You control your interactions. You design your level of privacy. MeWe is where you can be your authentic self, the way you are in your real life.”

Connect is just starting out and is, therefore, smaller in comparison to MeWe, but we think it has promise. Started by Many Are One, “Connect is where patriots can network with their fellow patriots in this battle against those who want to silence us. On Connect, you can create your own account, friend other members, start a group, and make a business page, or one that fits your needs just like on Facebook. You can post and share anything you wish, as long as it’s not illegal, promotes violence, or is pornographic. Just keep it clean, informative, and fun. A little snarkiness is fine too, of course.”

Something to Keep in Mind

In our effort to exit Facebook and Twitter, we are all scattering and we will end up divided, which may or may not be a good thing. If we all migrate to one or two platforms then we are all together and can create a united front; however, those platforms may become targets of the Left. If we establish smaller pockets across multiple platforms then we won’t look as united, but won’t appear to pose a serious threat either. The key is: No matter where we all end up, we have to maintain our connections across all the platforms so that we are, in fact, united. So, if you’re looking to jump ship you have options. So, go ahead. Jump! And go find your peeps!

Big Brother is Watching and Listening…and Nudging

Big Brother has been listening to us for quite some time. Our phones are listening. Our televisions are listening. Our houses are listening. They even have names like Alexa, Cortana, Bixby, Siri, and, of course, “Hey! Google!”

How creepy is it to have a conversation about wanting to buy a widget and, without doing any online searching for widgets, suddenly, widget ads start appearing in your Facebook feed?!

Big Brother has been listening to us for quite some time, but has not always been content to just listen. In the last decade, maybe longer, Big Brother has been working to modify our behavior because, clearly, we just aren’t compliant enough.

During the Obama administration, the Washington Times reported that the White House was pushing for a team of experts to “nudge” or sway American behavior. This was just one of several federal projects aimed at influencing how Americans react to certain policy reforms, going so far as to solicit behavior experts to join a “Behavioral Insights Team” to help nudge voters into accepting key political programs. This is just one step away from outright brain washing!

A document on the government program, obtained by Fox News, stated, “Behavioral sciences can be used to help design public policies that work better, cost less, and help people to achieve their goals.” Would those be our goals or the government’s goals?

The document, also called for applicants to join the federal government’s behavior modification team. This we found particularly disturbing. At what point will we be required to modify our behavior and will that involve shock therapy?!

According to Fox News, the main thrust of the White House-backed group was to “experiment” with ways to control, sway and tweak Americans’ behaviors so they do everything from saving more money for retirement to curbing energy uses and trimming energy costs. So, it’s not enough that our government thinks we’re idiots who are too stupid to know what’s best for us and our families, but they think we’re nothing but guinea pigs to be experimented on!

The new program had already been used in conjunction with Department of Health and Human Services and Department of Agriculture policies, Fox News said. And it hailed from ideas discussed years ago, most notably on the heels of publication of a 2008 book written by President Obama’s former regulatory czar, Cass Sunstein, who referred to such government actions as “nudges.”

Advocates say nudging helps move the political process along, absent regulation. But detractors say nudging relies on inaccurate data to drive Americans into compliance.

“I am very skeptical of a team promoting nudge policies,” said Michael Thomas, an economist at Utah State University. “Ultimately, nudging assumes a small group of people in government know better about choices than the individuals making them.”

But hasn’t our government been telling us that for years? “They” (aka Obama, Biden, Pelosi, Bloomberg, Cuomo, Shumer, Shiff, and others) know what’s best for us right down to how many ounces of soda pop we should drink? After all, we didn’t need to know what all was in Obamacare, we were told just to pass it. Many of them have openly stated that we the people can’t be trusted to make “right” decisions so they must take our decision-making power away from us.

As my granny would say, they’ve all gotten way too big for their britches. She’d also say they’ve gotten way too uppity and full of themselves.

We need to reboot our government back to a smaller, simpler, less invasive and intrusive government. A government that doesn’t watch us, doesn’t listen to us, and…doesn’t nudge us.

We need to reboot back to 1776.