{"id":31951,"date":"2020-06-07T01:52:14","date_gmt":"2020-06-07T06:52:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=31951"},"modified":"2020-06-07T01:56:58","modified_gmt":"2020-06-07T06:56:58","slug":"briefly-dumbed-down-public-discourse-means-reason-is-dead","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=31951","title":{"rendered":"Briefly: Dumbed-down public discourse means reason is dead"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Dumb-meme.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-31952\" src=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Dumb-meme.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"460\" height=\"258\" srcset=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Dumb-meme.jpg 460w, https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/06\/Dumb-meme-300x168.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 460px) 100vw, 460px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The decline of modern culture can be seen clearly by looking at what passes for public discourse. There was a time when people who wanted their ideas accepted made rational arguments. It was assumed that most people were bright enough and rational enough to evaluate those arguments \u2014 and a surprising number of them really were. Today, the arguments are made in the form of irrational and simplistic graphics called \u201cmemes.\u201d Because these graphics can\u2019t convey complex or nuanced information, they present dumbed-down presentations of positions which are stunningly juvenile and seem designed to offend rather than to convince. We have regressed from books and dense pamphlets to a level more like that of angry kindergartners making crayon-scrawled hate notes to send to other children. Reason no longer plays a role in public discourse, and this signals the coming fall of this society.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The decline of modern culture can be seen clearly by looking at what passes for public discourse. There was a time when people who wanted their ideas accepted made rational arguments. It was assumed that most people were bright enough and rational enough to evaluate those arguments \u2014 and a surprising number of them really <a href=\"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/?p=31951\" class=\"more-link\">Keep Reading<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[556],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-31951","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-briefly","7":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1x9iR-8jl","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31951","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=31951"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31951\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":31955,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31951\/revisions\/31955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=31951"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=31951"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/davidmcelroy.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=31951"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}