Archive for the ‘myth vs. reality’ Category
Plunged
Accuracy vs. Agenda — A fact is a fact and a stat is a stat, yes, but they can be ‘presented’ in ways not only misleading, they can be insulting.
Exaggerations and misleading statements by agenda-driven pundits are certainly not new, and they are everywhere, from the right and left, the read and blue, a spectrum that goes from Limbaugh and O’Reilly, to Stewart and Huffington, George Will to …… I’m staying away from the whole Limbaugh-and-college-student thing, because that was really about madness and hyperbole. I’ll also state that I am an occasional Jon Stewart viewer, a regular reader of the Huffington Post, an occasional reader of George Will occasional viewer — usually a few minutes max — of O’Reilly.
I watch Stewart because he’s funny, and I can’t find fault with his show’s approach of using news stories and current events as launch points for humorous response and reaction.
I skim the Huff Post every morning because it presents a aggregated collection of stories and news which includes lifestyle and media subjects that are of personal interest.
I would watch more of O’Reilly if he was less bombastic and if he weren’t so willing to lie and bully people (here’s a link to just what I mean: )
I don’t begrudge anyone their use of the English language to promote a particular point-of-view, but I find the use of presenting a fact in a way that makes it seem to be something it isn’t to be reprehensible. I came across just this sort of thing recently that was more local than the nationally-known examples above, and perhaps I’m overreacting to it in part because I know and like the writer. The content of the piece was no surprise because the writer’s political perspectives are obvious in every piece. What disappointed me is the blatant spin of a particular sentence. I take some solace in being able to use it as a way to show readers how to ignore a hyperbolic description and focus on what was written and why it was written in a particular way.
The piece was an editorial on the current administration’s push for increased tax rates for wealthy individuals and how that was a misguided, misinformed approach to fixing the economy. The writer included statistics in support of this point-of-view.
Statistics don’t lie; they are what they are. I’m certain this was the thought behind the writer’s approach. One set of statistics had to do with the number of millionaires in a particular year, and then what happened to that number the following year, and how that stat supported the notion that the number of wealthy tax payers was decreasing along with the tanking of the economy, and how this showed that increasing tax rates for the wealthy wouldn’t do didley for the economy…or something like that…
The insulting part was in the writer’s description of the decrease from one year to the next in tax paying millionaires: “…the actual number of millionaires plunged by 40%…”
Lawdy lawdy, those poor people, what a horrible thing!
Bite me. “Plunged?” Really?
That was it, that was all that was stated about the number of millionaires, and the rest of the piece went on its agenda-driven way.
Plunged. It’s a very evocative verb, plunged. It has a speed aspect, much stronger than the word ‘fell’ or the passive, soul-less ‘decreased’. Plunged makes you want to buckle up, hold on, get ready for a roller coaster dive.
That’s what pisses me off about it, though, is that its emotional power overshadows what a 40% decrease actually means, and in this particular case, what it may actually mean is completely hidden. Indeed, a 40% drop over the course of a year is pretty significant, but what’s left unexplained is the actual drop in the amount of money, and in the context of the writer’s ‘presentation’ of the statistic, this is an insulting omission.
If you earn $24,000 yearly and you have significant decrease in your earnings, you’re probably going to be hurting; a 25% reduction in your earnings will reduce your dough to $18,000, a pretty big hit.
If you’re annual million-dollar earnings take a 25% hit, you’re still bringing home $750,000. I’m not saying you won’t feel it, but I am saying you’re still getting by.
So what’s that mean, that plunge to below millionaire status? It don’t mean squat the way it was presented, and that’s the insult, because the writer knows that a more accurate, detailed description of that 40% plunge — people who might not be millionaires anymore but who are still bringing in a wide range of six-figure incomes — might not rev up the emotional “Yeah, look at that!” sense of agreement with the writer. That was obviously what mattered more than putting forth a reasoned, objective argument.
The word usage in that piece was right up there with phrases like job killer bill and death tax, descriptions that sacrifice accuracy for emotion.
I understand we all have agendas, beliefs, and perspectives, I just can’t stand people who know that the reality of their unadorned point-of-view may not be able to stand on its own, so they dress it up to evoke a response in the hope of avoiding close inspection.
Plunged indeed.
The toughest communication challenge
Convincing people to accept reality over belief may be the toughest challenge in communication. Even if evidence is presented that empirically demonstrates that a person’s notion or perspective on a subject is skewed or incorrect, it won’t matter a’tall. Often, the belief is related to a subject or situation that develops at a distance from the believer, something conceptually or literally too big to experience directly, so the believer relies on a variety of sources to inform, or inflame, their belief.
There are people who still believe there were WMD in Iraq, even though the architects that relied on the premise of WMD to go to war have admitted, on the record, that none existed in a form or manner that constituted imminent danger to other countries.
There are people who do not believe that our modern, industrial presence on the planet has altered the atmosphere in a detrimental manner, even though ninety-eight percent of the world’s climate scientist and researchers state or have research results that indicate our climate is already exhibiting changes that do not bode well for mankind.
And then there are the those who believe that welfare drug addicts are cheating our government, and, therefore, those addicts are actually taking advantage of the honest, hard working men and women who pay taxes and live by the rules. These welfare drug addicts need to be stopped, because while the rest of us have to bust-butt to survive in this country, those other miscreants and lazy bastards are getting free money to fuel their irresponsible, addicted lifestyles.
Good thing there’s the Internet and email to let me know about this situation.
Here’s the email that alerted me, a missive that many of you may have already seen in one form or another:
I have a job.
I work, they pay me.
I pay my taxes & the government distributes my taxes as it sees fit.
In order to get that paycheck, in my case, I am required to pass a random urine test (with which I have no problem! ).
What I do have a problem with is the distribution of my taxes to people who don’t have to pass a urine test.
So, here is my question: Shouldn’t one have to pass a urine test to get a welfare check because I have to pass one to earn it for them?
Please understand, I have no problem with helping people get back on their feet. I do, on the other hand, have a problem with helping someone sitting on their BUTT —-doing drugs while I work.
Can you imagine how much money each state would save if people had to pass a urine test to get a public assistance check?
I guess we could call the program “URINE OR YOU’RE OUT”!
Pass this along if you agree or simply delete if you don’t. Hope you all will pass it along, though. Something has to change in this country – AND SOON!
Sigh.
Like so much other crap that circulates around the ‘net labeled “This is True!” and “The real story behind…” I would normally dump this and not spend any time on it whatsoever. But, this came to me — twice — from people I know, and who know me and my communication-obsessed personality.
And soon thereafter I read several public assistance-related news stories, and I realized it was time to communicate on this, because: states are already passing drug test requirement programs for those on public assistance; candidates for political office are including it as part of their campaign platforms; and otherwise rational people who I know personally believe this approach to be a good idea.
What may be the most significant reason to comment on this situation, though, is to offer and point to some relevant reality to offset the momentum of personal-but-skewed belief, like with this from Huff Post reporter Arthur Delaney a few weeks ago (edited for brevity, with nothing taken out of context):
Indiana was among the states where Republicans pushed laws requiring drug tests for various government benefits in 2011, and the state GOP successfully passed a version requiring unemployed workers to undergo drug tests for unemployment benefits or to participate in the state’s job training program. Anyone who didn’t pass such a test, the law stated, was considered to have “refused an offer of suitable work.”
In the immediate wake of the laws, little evidence has emerged that they were necessary. The first round of drug tests on those participating in the job training program, in fact, yielded just a 1 percent rate of failure, the Huffington Post’s Arthur Delaney reported today:
[A]ccording to the state’s Department of Workforce Development…of 1,240 job applicants tested from July to December, only 13 failed the test. Three additional people refused to provide a urine sample and seven submitted urine that was too watery.
Though government data suggests that those on benefits are twice as likely to use drugs as those who aren’t, outright evidence from the states has thus far yielded little evidence. In Florida, only 2 percent of welfare recipients failed the first round of tests, meaning the program isn’t likely to save much money, if any at all. If the 1 percent numbers hold up in Indiana, it isn’t likely to save a significant amount of money either, and like in Florida, the cost of the program could actually outpace the savings from it.
Occasionally the reality vs. myth communication challenge is best served by both reality, like the example above, and a point-of-view that might not be considered by those blinded to objectivity.
We are all entitled to our beliefs, just as we are all entitled to reveal what kind of person we really are by what we do and how we address our own temporary ignorance.
And so, my response to the random urine test email is this:
For the sake of discussion, let’s take this whole thing up a notch. Let’s say we all have to take government-mandated urine tests, for everything from credit card applications to mortgages.
Now, since nothing is infallible, if there’s a mistake on the urine test — because the government doesn’t do everything right or they wouldn’t just be giving free money to lowlife addicts on public assistance — and the test comes back positive, what will you do then?
Ask to have another one?
If you’re a teacher, for example, will you be alright with the week, or two, or month, or more that a database somewhere flags you as having failed a drug test?
And, of course, all the other teachers will believe you when you say it was mistake.
Think that’s just an exaggeration? Ever had to have something corrected like a bill that’s wrong, or something on a credit report.
Was it always easy?
Did it always get fixed with one short phone call?
So imagine if you had to take a government supervised urine test, and it was wrong. Imagine what you might have to go through to get a mistake corrected.
The mindset that the vast majority of people on public assistance are sitting around smoking dope and shooting up is trite, inaccurate and, frankly, un-Christian. The tens-of-thousands of people who can’t find work in this economy (including people you may know, I’ll bet) would probably take issue with the notion that because they’re not working and need to feed themselves and their kids they should be forced to take a urine test to qualify for public assistance.
Most prefer to be working, and many who blame the current administration for their lack of employment would have plenty to say about putting their good citizen reputation under the control of someone who worked for the very government that can’t get them a job.
And is the urine test going to test for weed, cocaine and heroin, or is it going to also include alcohol? Of all those, which is the more abused? Ask the Georgia state representative how he feels about all this now since, shortly after co-sponsoring a drug test bill for public assistance, he was popped for DUI just two weeks ago.
I’m not saying that there aren’t people on public assistance who do drugs, but I am saying that before we go right to “Throw the bums in jail,” there are other ways to work things out.
If anyone thinks that the country is full of public assistance drugies sucking the money out or our pockets, they should get their own butts down to a food bank or charitable kitchen on a holiday and see how many families show up to get their kids a holiday meal…because the family can’t afford to buy one and have it in their foreclosed house…
I suppose my attitude and views are what people might call “bleeding heart”, but with the whole urine test thing I’d say that it’s more about seeing all sides of a situation. I’d also say there’s a reason that many images of Christ focus on his heart, glowing or bleeding. I’m not anything close to being a mainstream Christian, but I do know that JC was a guy who embraced the leper when no one else would, and the “he who is without sin cast the first stone” dude.
And here’s what I imagine the conversation would be if he were around and someone said,
“Hey, these lazy sons-a-bitches who are living off the government should be forced to take a drug test to get their money.”
“You mean the Medicare and social security recipients?”
“No, the public assistance bums.”
“The unemployed?”
“No, no, those other people, you know…”
“Huh. Not sure; can you describe them for me?”
“Oh, never mind.”
Finally, that little bit at the end of the email — “Pass this along if you agree or simply delete if you don’t” — gosh, guess that means there’s only one way to look at this issue. Didn’t realize there could be only one obscenely misconstrued side of the story.
