PUBLIC GULLIBILITY

Human beings choose to live in clusters and are basically a gullible species, and owe their evolutionary achievement to culture, creed and country they are born in, and repose trust, and develop faith, to believe and act, on fairy tales and fables, they obtain from scriptures and others, thus accumulating shared community view about the world with wrong conclusions, derived from beliefs that blinds them from reality.

It is amazing to see, how people get away with pretending by others, who believe what is being seen, told or read is a reality. Not knowing everything they see in media, they hear from others, or news they read is not necessarily true, maybe it is false.

Therefore, I would like to discuss ‘Gullibility’ as a topic of interest in the public domain, which has come in public gaze, due to the 'Citizenship Amendment Act’, the 'National Register of Citizens’ and the 'National Population Register’.

Gullibility, whether we like it or not, is one of the fundamental characteristics of human beings.

The cause and consequences of gullibility on the social psychological processes is very profound, suggesting the manner in which, our social and cognitive psychology contribute, to our understanding and how our judgment and decisions can be distorted and undermined so easily.

A gullible person is na?ve, he can be deceived or tricked easily, some are of the opinion that gullibility is in our DNA.

However, the most vulnerable people, who can be manipulated are students, women, the untaught, the jobless, the elderly, and poor people. Religious Leaders, Godman, Corporate Houses and Politicians are known to take them on a ride.

Gullibility is a failure of ‘Social Intelligence’, in which, people are easily used and tricked into a misguided course of action, and an ill-advised tendency to believe unlikely propositions that are not supported by any evidence.

To identify the role of reasoning processes in the ‘Gullibility of the Public’, we need to consider, the blind trust people put in their socio-cultural aspects or in some individuals or influential groups or political parties or the media print, electronic, social, and the impact of emotions and motivations, are some of the important features to examine mob psychology, conspiracy theories, vote bank politics, and the role print, electronic, internet media plays in promoting gullibility, and the failures of reasoning, that contribute to exploit, the innocence of the simpletons in India.

Fake or false reports masquerading as news, especially when the fabricator knows, the news is an invention of total lies. Besides, personal opinions, biased bulletins and denial of facts are some of the linked issues, in terms of how false info is produced and spread. Also, there are many other ways people are misled and fooled, for pecuniary or for petty political gains, over the common national interest.

A lie is a false statement used with the purpose to deceive people by the habitual liars. Lies and propaganda especially on religious issues, instantly spread like fire, to a receptive audience, which results in social disturbance, on expected course of incidents laid by the troublemakers.

Typically, the plan to provoke is often triggered by planting rumors by vested groups, possibly in this case maybe by the illegal immigrants, percolating to the activists, political parties, clerics, etc. Even the print and electronic media reporting isn’t fair.

Fake news has become a normal part of the political discourse, particularly among the supporters of the so-called populist movements. Fake reports are made with a deliberate intent to deceive people, it’s an intentional untruth intended to convey a false notion, under a secret plan, floated by unscrupulous people to do something unlawful or harmful.

Conspiracies are being hatched from the day human society was formed, it is powered by an evolutionary drive to survive, nothing has changed since then, men may come and go, but the basic nature of man will not change. Why? I don’t know.

A protest is turned into a movement to portray a struggle between the ruling class belonging to a religion in majority, and the oppressed class belonging to a religion in minority, making people believe that the people in majority are deliberately imposing wrong rules on the people in minority.

The gullible seem to believe these rumors. Why? Because in history, India has witnessed the partition of the country on the basis of a religion. The backdrop of a horrible holocaust provides a fertile ground for trouble-mongers to plot intrigues, connive conspiracies consisting of contriving conspirators working in coalition to create trouble, a strong social predisposition to divide people.

This deceitful trait humans had acquired, when they lived in caves as hunter-gatherers. Later, religions are holding the baton, and still, slowly and steadily struggling to convert the world into one religion. With a similar intent, the political ideology namely communism also surfaced with an identical agenda.

There’s a fine line between a healthy level of belief, and believing too much, a key trait of the gullible. So, to be less gullible, it’s important to have a realistic view of the whole issue, ignoring cunning and crafty people who have ulterior motives to take advantage of the gullible.

When confusion is created in the culture and the civilization of a nation, the innocent, good-hearted gullible tend to become uncertain. Then it is the right time to address doubts.

Does this anxiety come from a credible source? Is there any evidence to support it? Should we allow lies to poison our mind?

Innocent people believe in anything even plain lies. By trusting others easily, they become vulnerable. Therefore, they should be more skeptical, they shouldn’t jump to conclusions or rush into a decision, they should take their own time to reflect on the issue logically, and should not make decisions on others opinion.

The most susceptible are the youth, who are easily deceived. This must be resisted by all means, the nation cannot allow to sacrifice the future of our students on flimsy issues.

When we examine the issue, it is estimated that illegal immigrants in India, who have come from Pakistan, Bangladesh and Afghanistan, constitute 3% of the country’s population, roughly 40 million people.

Astonishingly, this is a huge size, which is larger than the population of Bosnia, Mongolia, and several others countries.

Now, visualize the massive number of these illegal immigrants, aren’t they a burden on Indian economy, in a country, where 25% of Indian population is living in abject poverty, and also in terms of increasing social unrest and acts of terrorism in the country.

Let us, for a while, overlook all political parties and others responsible for engineering social unrest, and honestly ponder on the issue without bias, purely as Indian citizens, considering national interest, then surely, we will find the right answer.

Therefore, we should keep ourselves away from all the trouble mongers, and beware they don’t want India to progress and become a developed nation.

The divide and rule policy of the British had led to the partition of India, now the polarization, to create vote banks by the politicians is a step in the wrong direction.

Remember the phrase ‘Fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me’, is a solemn saying, indeed.

So, let us recognize the people of India, as the citizens of India, and not on the basis of their religions.

After all, there are no in-betweens. Right is right and wrong is wrong.

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source: Creative Awareness Trust (CAT)

https://www.thereligionlessworld.com/