Who or What is Your Charlatan?
Who Have You Given Your Power to?
"One of the saddest lessons of history is this: If we've been bamboozled long enough, we tend to reject any evidence of the bamboozle. We're no longer interested in finding out the truth. The bamboozle has captured us. it's simply too painful to acknowledge, even to ourselves, that we've been taken. Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back." — Carl Sagan
I was always taught as a child that I had to obey authority figures. For example, Preachers or Ministers, Teachers, Police Officers, Parents, Bosses, Government Leaders, Doctors, Supervisors, and more. With that teaching came an assumption that our authority figures were moral, honest, and had nothing but our best interests at heart. As working-class children in Northern England, we were told to "be quiet" and "do as you're told." As you can guess, critical or independent thinking was not taught or encouraged.
Why do I mention this? Because many people have a predilection or predisposition to be taken advantage of by "authority figures" because of their childhood training or lack thereof. But indeed, our authority figures would not abuse our trust, would they? The issue becomes more problematic when being drawn in or groomed to a particular viewpoint; the longer we believe, the harder it is to change that belief. No one wants to feel they were wrong, do they? So it's easier to carry on believing even if it feels wrong.
What happens in our not-so-fairy tale world is that we double down when we discover we may be wrong. Instead, we become ever more fervent in our beliefs, leading eventually to fanaticism, especially when we believe what we believe because our parents and authority figures say so. After all, most people we know are smart, intelligent, friendly, and good people. They are certainly not the type of people to lead you astray deliberately, right?
I don't believe most reasonable people would do so. I guess the question is, if you were to be placed on Earth as a being from another planet, how would you view what we take for granted as being true? Because a man drew a border on a map, that means people are not the same and are now enemies? Because a man stated his "people" are chosen by God and are better than everyone else, that gives them the right to cause genocide. Because a man could not accept living on the Earth without suggesting an amazing life afterward, he created a God in his own image. Supernatural superheroes belong in the movies.
So here's the deal, as Carl Sagan pointed out, "Once you give a charlatan power over you, you almost never get it back." And we are not just talking Amway, or other get rich quick, get fit, lose weight, get abs, and various Ponzi schemes. So, where do we find these scammers? Charlatans are seen in Presidents and politicians, Prosperity Evangelicals, Religions of every kind, Quacks, Snake-oil salesmen, and every other if it seems too good to be true scheme, it is too good to be true.
Sometimes it pays to be a doubting Thomas.
