Habits that we've picked from Politicians
With very limited information, we catastrophize whatever we see, read, experience and perceive.
Everyone almost has that favorite politician-turned-enemy that they don't like. You don't hate them because you’re bad. You hate what they speak, what they represent, what they do, how they pretend, how they defy constitutional traps, how they upend almost all the common logics. The general feeling is what they do is not for the common good. But, while we might be right, aren't we behaving like them also?
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The protests you are witnessing in Kenya is a mixture of many things. It's a mixture of ignorance, awareness, fake news, misinformation, public angst, rogueness, genuine concerns. It's hard to microscope the motive of every protester. But, this protest can be distilled in two-prong approaches; political climate and economic sense.
First, it sprung up as an organic leaderless, tribeless Gen-z and milenial protest with genuine concerns over the opulence of the political class. The political climate was more emotional rather logical. And, they were justified to feel that way because they needed nothing else other than accountability of public resources. Flaunting of ill-gotten wealth by a section of political class was a mockery to the hardworking Kenyans, and this has been triggering public outcry.
However, as they pushed the government to the corner, it later emerged that the woke had no specific grievances to take to the table. While its highly misunderstood financial bill was completely withdrawn yesterday, the group is slowly losing its mission, with blame games starting to emerge of who is to lead. Those who remain in the streets were left in dilemma with just no exit plan.
Secondly, from an economic sense, President William Ruto is trying to handle and oil too many moving parts; he's resetting the country from old decades economic mess despite the public outcry. He doesn't want to drive straight; he's turning around the steering, and in such a case, frictions in the form of protests are expected. Since he came into office, he has boldly made unpopular but right decisions at uncertain times. So far, Mr. Ruto has started repaying debt and decreased food inflation immediately he was elected by reviving pro-agriculture policies.
Nevertheless, as with any vision, it's uncertain. The leader only sees the vision; the followers aren't even privy to that. All they want is results. And this puts into jeopardy sacrificial slow processes leading to economic recovery and prosperity. This quagmire, we're in currently, is underpin by a combination of many multifaceted influences;
Using misinformation to reason
You can't walk to the newsstand and find something that's truthful. Truth is secondary. And it seems, we have accepted that way. Recently, mainstream and social media succeeded in diffusing misinformation backed up with posters showing fake news in every newsreed. No verification. No fact checking. Users consumed raw fabricated lies, and since we are allergic to the truth, we're lazy to counter check. I feel like while the protests were mobilized through social media, the same social media succeeded in rumour vitality.
Catastrophizing
With very limited information, we catastrophize whatever we see, read, experience and perceive. Our cognitive faculties have been distorted and primed to easily jump to worst possible conclusions. A constant pattern of negative exposure to news is spinning our thoughts out of control and further isolating us from the reality. Overexaggerations of simple happenings have driven many to despair.
Spending time on TikTok
TikTok is no longer TikTok. It's a ticking time bomb. It has and is currently churning out lost souls. Gen Z and millenials, Kenya, are the highest consumers; and you can know why they are leading this protest. The time for "how-to resources" is non-existent in this platform. Gurwinder, in his post, explained:
"Since the For You algorithm favors only the most instantly mesmerizing content, its constructive videos—such as “how to” guides and field journalism—tend to be relegated to the fringes in favor of tasty but malignant junk info."
We're television souls
We're television souls with newspaper brains. Charles didn't erred in this. All our souls are hosted by the media moguls, profiting from the division, conflict, ignorance, confusion. Every news hour, we assemble in joints, anxiously waiting for the things we want to confirm. We even switch channels to get more.
Black-and-White Thinking
We have superficial thoughts. We don't dissect issues in a 3D perspective. And, therefore, we easily attack divergent views. Social media is such an emotional garbage for dispensing hate, tribalism, dislikes. A normal, genuine post succinctly putting things to light attracts hateful, out-of-context responses. The social media wants to manufacture feelings for us. And, in turn, we dispense our standard, ready-made reactions to keep us in attention cycle.
Blogging for hire
Blogging here is not the normal blogging that you know. It's someone hired to misreport facts and alter truth to fit their own narrow narrative. They collect every garbage from the internet and dump on the soulness.
Our Reading Culture is lost
I know, for most of us, books were only a means to academics and careers. That's it. Book closed. The reading culture ceased after we stopped schooling. We aren't readers; our reading culture is essentially nonexistent. Affordability is just a nonsense excuse. We're just lazy. Book snobs by default. Even free books we might not avail ourselves to read. We don't engage beyond the surface of things.
However, while expressing our second-to-nature hatred for the political class, I think we have fallen into their trap; behaving like them. And, unfortunately, returning to our former selves is like swimming against the tides.
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Welcome to the 21st Century world, Edwin. We raised generations of 'I want it all and I want it now' We, people between 70 and 100, but especially in my age group born in the early 1930's who existed through the Great Worldwide Depression which led into World War 2, didn't want our babies to suffer, so we ruined them instead. Instant gratification to these generations in the expected norm.
And you are faced with the additional problem of colonialism. We, in America are fortunate we got rid of our colonialism early on.
The Europeans in Africa wanted to live as they perceived the monarchists to live in Europe. So now, your political 'leaders' perceive that as the way for civilized people to behave. Most (but thankfully not all) the Europeans saw tribal Africans as a bunch of illiterate sub-humans. They failed to see the value of tribes looking after their own, successfully. They failed to see the great beauty of native art.
Hopefully, some of your leaders will awaken to the error of the Europeans, accept that we are ALL one genus and species with only cosmetic differences.
Then those leaders will look around and see what is needed for successful civilization is for everyone to live well. We, Homo sapiens, may never achieve a classless society, but really we don't need to. If everyone has sufficient to live a comfortable life it doesn't really matter if some have more. The most important thing is that everyone has food, shelter, education, health care, and transportation, commensurate with their needs.