Why we must all resist the post-truth society

Truth is an elusive and abstract concept. Maybe Pontius Pilate understood it best when he looked at Jesus and asked, “What is truth?” This past year has been an echo of that question. Last year was a time of ineffable emotion, like that of a disgruntled spouse who has bottled up her marital frustration for years. It was only natural that democratic decisions — Brexit, Trump — would be made in order to spite the political establishment. It was the year that statistics, journalism and facts were cast down from their thrones. The populace no longer looks to news in search of truth. Rather, we understand every news outlet to have a predisposed bias or slant, so we abandon the notion of finding objective truths.

Thus, millions find themselves in Pilate’s position, muttering to themselves, maybe out of irony, maybe curiosity, “What is truth?”

The Oxford English Dictionary’s 2016 word of the year is, naturally, “post-truth.” The definition is as follows: “Relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.” In other words, there is no lying in the public square, only subjective beliefs and personal truths. So what may ring true to me, though you disagree, could not be argued or disproven, because there would be no truth to which you could appeal. Pilate today would, I think, be utterly confused — he certainly questioned what the nature of truth was, but he never doubted its existence.

A post-truth age, though, does not even ask the question, “What is truth?” but affirms before the question is raised that no such thing exists. “You mean to tell me,” a post-truther would say, “that, even though I believe no truth exists, I am still wrong? That things are true no matter what I think, feel or believe? Nonsense.”

Imagine a post-technique NBA, where all notions of proper dribbling, shooting and rebounding have been denied. Any and all forms of playing are accepted and none are judged or open to critique. We might call this sport basketball as long as people aim to score and prevent others from scoring. But it would be a devolved form of what the NBA normally is. Is it right to say that kicking the ball into the hoop is just as good as Stephen Curry’s outside shot?

Likewise, a society which feels it has exhausted truth debases itself. In a post-truth society, all speech, thought and action collapses with the phrase, “There is no truth, only truths.” A person, according to this philosophy, can point to a dog and say it’s a cat, and I cannot correct them. I have nothing to which I can appeal and say, “I’m sorry, friend, but you are wrong.” The person is simply living out their inner truth. I think, however, that truth makes sense only when objectivity is assumed and agreed upon. We assume the words and phrases we communicate to one another mean something objective. All of human activity is organized around this assumption, namely that what I say or write conveys a message that corresponds to real things in the world, and this message is not dependent on personal preference. Being post-truth really is being post-thought, post-discussion, post-language — in short, it means being post-human.

The statement itself — the post-truth creed, “There is no truth, only truths” — does what it purports not to do: make a truth claim about reality. Not only does a post-truth society debase itself, but it also creates a contradiction. What can we speak meaningfully about if we cannot speak without contradiction?

Scott Stinson is a UF English and philosophy sophomore. His columns appear on Wednesdays.