False beliefs about language and speech underlie legal precedents that allow jurors to be “assisted” by unreliable transcripts of forensic audio.
The Everett Collection/Shutterstock
Not all false beliefs arise from malicious misinformation. Some legal precedents rest on the status of everyday ‘common knowledge’, since shown to be false, but embedded in our law nonetheless.
Donald Trump posts a link to his very own ‘Real News Update’ on Facebook.
Donald J. Trump/Facebook
The best defence against post-truth politics is not ‘the truth’. Democracy should resist the political tyranny of claims to some immutable truth as a basis for governing the lives of others.
In Taxi Driver, Robert De Niro’s character, Travis Bickle, inhabits his own crazy paradigm, yet ultimately events frame him as a hero in the eyes of others too.
YouTube
As Orwell knew only too well, if the concept of objective truth is moved into the dustbin of history there can be no lies. And if there are no lies there can be no justice, no rights and no wrongs.
As a crusader for coal, Tony Abbott is an undisputed champion of the emotional logic of ‘truthiness’.
Dan Peled/AAP
There are telltale signs when regard for the facts of the matter is sacrificed to ‘truthiness’ to win a political debate.
So large are the nation’s daily greenhouse gas emissions that if yours is a typical Australian lifestyle you’re contributing disproportionately to climate change.
Carbon Visuals/flickr
It would take a lifestyle upheaval to drop most Australians’ household emissions to a sustainable level. Even many of us who urge equitable action on climate change act as if this doesn’t apply to us.
When Tony Abbott went too far in his advocacy for the coal industry, his government faced a public backlash.
Dan Peled/AAP
The undermining of environmental science, and the creation of lies and bribes to distort public policymaking, is as old as industries that know their products do harm, but lie to keep them in use.
Critics fear the merger of agricultural giants Bayer and Monsanto will drive an increase in use of pesticides.
AgriLife Today/flickr
Pundits have been keen to link post-truth to post-modernists, post-positivists or any other ‘postie’. They should turn their energy to forming a real popular front against Trump’s faux populism.
Public anxiety about the post-truth era inspired a New York Times advertising campaign.
Beneath simple labels like post-truth, alternative facts and fake news is a complex set of issues. Any debate about the problems needs to start from some common points of reference.