The Oxford Dictionary has declared "post-truth" as word of the year for 2016.
Other candidates were "latinx", which is the gender neutral alternative for "latina" and "latino", and chatbot, the computer programs that has us in stitches in attempts to converse intelligently. "Adulting" also almost made it, the word we are supposed to use when we do adult tasks or chores, stuff we just dread doing like doing the laundry or paying bills, but we have to simply because we're no longer kids.
What's post-truth? Well, the experts have defined it as an adjective “relating to or denoting circumstances in which objective facts are less influential in shaping public opinion than appeals to emotion and personal belief.”
Quite a mouthful, but in simpler terms, it means the public is less concerned about what the truth is rather than what they want the truth to be. Cases in point, Brexit, which was triggered by xenophobia and jobs being lost to migrants, and so the voting public believed all the evil things supposedly happening in Brussels, and Trump's victory, where Republicans simply seized on all the ugly lies and misinformation they were fed about Hillary, because they were so eager to find something to criticize her with.
Here in the Pearl of the Orient Seas? Perhaps we see that in the way Senator Leila de Lima is so quickly excoriated by netizens, even for those private matters which we probably should leave in the bedroom. A sex video made her unfit to become senator, but multiple wives apparently has no effect on voter appeal of male senators. The truth is, this is a double standard being applied, but do the voters care? Does it matter to them? Post-truth!
Not long after winning the accolade (and I mean, just this January), the world of post-truth has spawned a cousin: "alternative facts".
Springing from Donald Trump's swearing in ceremony as president, Trump mouthpiece Kellyanne Conway began mounting her alternative facts offensive. Disputing all the "factual" tidbits thrown her way, the apologist began creating her own narrative of the Donald's ascension.
And to think, it was only about the shallowest of issues: the number of people who attended Donald's inauguration. Press Secretary Sean Spicer claimed it was the highest number ever, but photographs and statistics from the metro train passenger ridership disproved the claim by hundreds of thousands. And yet, Donald's attack dogs couldn't just shrug it off and move on to more important matters of state, like the jobs they were elected to create or the national security they had vowed to protect.
Instead, they had to devote considerable time (and political capital) waging the losing war of inauguration numbers: Trump attracted the biggest crowd and amazed the highest television audience. Ever! This, from the lips of the Press Secretary, the official conveyor of information about the Presidency, whom the American public (and the rest of the free world as well) is supposed to listen to, take cues from, be inspired by, and even obey.
Trump is so obsessed with being the best and the greatest, he has to resort to "alternative facts". In a post-truth world, this tactic fits right in.
How are we supposed to believe in a Commander in Chief and the head of state if the words from his mouth (and his mouthpiece) are going to be (and let's be honest here) lies?
Yes, as a salesman, Trump could have engaged in half-truths, hyperbole and sales pitches. He could have marketed his ritzy towers and felt entitled to cover up oppressed Chinese contractors and Scottish farmers. And as a television host, he could have created content meant for the audience, content that existed very far from the reality that reality TV is supposed to portray.
But he isn't a business man anymore. He is a president. So what kind of reality is he trying to weave in his alternative world?
Probably the same reality I woke up to this morning, safe in my castle. I must ponder on this conundrum while I review reports from deep cover agents that global warming was created by the Chinese.