Tuesday, January 16, 2018

Some thoughts on the free press and truth telling

I was reading this article tonight ( https://www.biography.com/news/king-louis-xvi-and-marie-antoinette-execution-anniversary) about the real Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI, because I was curious if a movie about them was actually historically accurate. From what I read, the movie actually seems to be. However, as I read the article about what Marie Antoinette and Lousi XVI were actually like, what was really disturbing to read were all the lies the press of that time told about Marie, and how easily the public in France just believed it. I am not saying Marie Antoinette was an angel by any means, but nor was she a devil. All of this made me think of President Trump. Honestly, I don't agree with the way the man often communicates nor do I hold him up as a paragon of Christian virtues. He is a man with both virtues and vices, just like Obama was. What really bothers me is how willing people- and most especially the press-- seem to be to not just to report the true facts of what happened, but to exaggerate facts to suit political agendas. Marie Antoinette never said "Let them eat cake" but unhappy people were swept into a fervor of emotion, accepted it as fact that she did say that, and used it as a contention point against the aristocracy. What resulted from all that fervor was the French Revolution, both bloody and cruel. Reading this article and finding disturbing similarities in America's political climate gave me pause. I have come to a place that I would wish that all of us, whether Republic, Democrat, or Independent, will strive not to just post angry rants, and not to use anger as an excuse to stretch the truth into lies which suit our own agendas.