Survey This

A survey reveals that 75% of Us don't trust Our police.

And the other 25%? They're either lying or don't want the police to hear their truth.

Now here's My objection to all this: Why the hell is a survey being done and trumpeted in the first place?

Given the hideous run of police-related events in the past year, is a survey really needed to tell Us what We already know or can figure out? Doesn't the survey serve only one purpose: To kick the downtrodden police image further into the gutter? Isn't the survey, in fact, salt in a wound rather than even a pale shadow of what passes for journalism here?

The survey follows a long line of similar such moronic fare, such as the ones done when gas prices shot up (We were against the high prices), when taxes were imposed (We didn't like it) and when the government shut down (We blamed the politicians.) The intent is never to inform, but to inflame; never to reveal, but to revel. It's not journalism, it's business; the difference is the difference between probity and profit.

But why complain? It's not like I run or work for the pissy rag that does these surveys. It's not like I do the stupid surveys or even participate in them. Why complain when it really has nothing to do with Me?

I complain because these stupid surveys are more often than not the only mirrors We think We have to see Ourselves in. When the mirror is simply distorted--manipulated, even--it doesn't matter how many times We look into it for the image We get will always be of falsehood. The reductio ad absurdum of these surveys is an injury to Our soul, and the insult to the injury comes when such lies are coated in the guise of truth, as in "what Puerto Ricans think and feel."

No, these surveys don't really reveal what We think and feel: They only reveal what We say when confronted with a particular question, a feeble, biased and incomplete question that purports to encompass a complex issue. To do this is a demagogue's game, a politician's trick foisted from what should be the respectable bastion of the Fourth Estate. Demagoguery and political shenanigans are a Fool's Paradise that journalism--responsible, professional, ethical journalism--never engages in.


The Jenius Has Spoken.