I have seen discussions where people claim they are coming from a neutral perspective, when they comment on an issue. In certain cases that might be true. But in many cases its hard to decide if your opinion is truly neutral.
Taking my own example, at the time of writing this article, there is a lot of attention to the Israel Palestine dispute. There are equally passionate people on both sides. As a thought experiment, I imagined myself being born as a child in Gaza. I grow up in a very restricted environment with very limited (if any) chance to a lead a happy life. Food is scarce, not even clean water to drink. My people get shot with little provocation. The lives of my people don't seem to matter. I can't imagine a circumstance where I would say my people are wrong and Israelis are right.
Another thought experiment. I am born as a child in Israel. While in school I learn about how my people were persecuted for hundreds of years, just for being Jewish. The discrimination ultimately reached such a stage where the hatred towards my people, led a hateful man to lock up my people in gas chambers and murder them by the millions. There is no place on earth besides Israel that my people can call their own. I grow up seeing a mostly united 1.6 billion Muslims working as a team against my country. I don't see Gaza or Palestine as the few million helpless people who live there, but as a group of people who get support from over a Billion Muslims around the world, to destroy us and kick us out of our only home.
In both these though experiments, I feel strongly for my people.
But of course, your perception also depends on the narrative being set by the media. If the mainstream media's narrative says one group is wrong and all people look down on them, are the good people. Then regardless of anything else, most people get swayed in that direction. Think about this, there was a time when Jews were portrayed as long nosed money minded people in the western media. And back then, there was nothing wrong about a person who held such an opinion.
I have also seen people who used to openly criticize Muslims for not doing enough to stop terrorism coming from their community. This was back in early 2000s, after 9/11. At that time mainstream liberals like Bill Maher used to routinely and openly call Islam as a mother load of bad ideas. Hollywood movies would almost always portray men from middle east as evil (now they portray Chinese as evil). A lot of people who thought of themselves as fair and against racism, bought into that narrative. But later something changed and now speaking against Islam is seen as racism. The same people who used to criticize Muslims, now attack anyone who does that. The only thing that changed was the narrative set by the media.
So I have ultimately concluded that mainstream media vs your own life experiences, decides right vs wrong. If you are not personally affected by a situation, then almost always, you believe what the mainstream media wants you to believe.
Taking my own example, at the time of writing this article, there is a lot of attention to the Israel Palestine dispute. There are equally passionate people on both sides. As a thought experiment, I imagined myself being born as a child in Gaza. I grow up in a very restricted environment with very limited (if any) chance to a lead a happy life. Food is scarce, not even clean water to drink. My people get shot with little provocation. The lives of my people don't seem to matter. I can't imagine a circumstance where I would say my people are wrong and Israelis are right.
Another thought experiment. I am born as a child in Israel. While in school I learn about how my people were persecuted for hundreds of years, just for being Jewish. The discrimination ultimately reached such a stage where the hatred towards my people, led a hateful man to lock up my people in gas chambers and murder them by the millions. There is no place on earth besides Israel that my people can call their own. I grow up seeing a mostly united 1.6 billion Muslims working as a team against my country. I don't see Gaza or Palestine as the few million helpless people who live there, but as a group of people who get support from over a Billion Muslims around the world, to destroy us and kick us out of our only home.
In both these though experiments, I feel strongly for my people.
But of course, your perception also depends on the narrative being set by the media. If the mainstream media's narrative says one group is wrong and all people look down on them, are the good people. Then regardless of anything else, most people get swayed in that direction. Think about this, there was a time when Jews were portrayed as long nosed money minded people in the western media. And back then, there was nothing wrong about a person who held such an opinion.
I have also seen people who used to openly criticize Muslims for not doing enough to stop terrorism coming from their community. This was back in early 2000s, after 9/11. At that time mainstream liberals like Bill Maher used to routinely and openly call Islam as a mother load of bad ideas. Hollywood movies would almost always portray men from middle east as evil (now they portray Chinese as evil). A lot of people who thought of themselves as fair and against racism, bought into that narrative. But later something changed and now speaking against Islam is seen as racism. The same people who used to criticize Muslims, now attack anyone who does that. The only thing that changed was the narrative set by the media.
So I have ultimately concluded that mainstream media vs your own life experiences, decides right vs wrong. If you are not personally affected by a situation, then almost always, you believe what the mainstream media wants you to believe.
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