​The mermaids of politics

One evening not long ago, at a recent family vacation by the beach, my grandmother, cousin and I lay sprawled out on a bed, mesmerized by my computer screen. We were watching “Mermaids: The Body Found,” a documentary about how the government hides the existence of mermaids from the public. Our necks craned and our eyes wide, we listened as the marine biologists explained “aquatic ape theory,” played incredibly intricate sonar recordings of an unknown, underwater species and spoke of Southeast Asian divers who can hold their breath for twenty minute intervals. There were holes in the scientists’ evidence but their argument managed to convince us anyway—me, a Duke University student, my pre-med cousin and our grandmother who started college at 16 years old.

The truth is, we wanted to believe the marine biologists. We were brimming with excitement because these fairytale creatures—which adults had told us were make-believe when we were just little girls—really might have been out there, migrating with whales and hiding from humans in underwater grottos.

When the documentary ended, we googled it to learn more and found out that the entire story was a hoax. We were overcome with annoyance: we’d wasted an hour and a half of our time watching the film, we felt stupid for believing in this “hoaxamentary” and, most of all, we were disappointed that the only place these fish-tailed humans would ever reside was in our imaginations. Later that night however, I couldn’t help comparing our naivety—our desire to trust the scientists—to many Americans and their blind faith in politicians and the media industry. I thought of liberals watching NBC or conservatives watching Fox, itching to believe their desired version of the truth, as divided newscasters report from their respective parties’ perspective because they so desperately want their ideation to be right.

If you really think about this logic, it’s a bit narcissistic, isn’t it? It’s rather stupid to just read one newspaper, listen to one television station. How can a person understand the news, let alone be confident that reporting is indeed true, when there is nothing else to compare it to?

I also considered politicians and their infinite promises—Bernie Sanders and his guarantee that an increased minimum wage will decrease funding for food stamps, Hillary Clinton and her insistence that sending classified information on non-secure email servers was harmless and Donald Trump with his promise to make Mexico build a wall that will keep out illegal immigrants. I reflected on the frustration that bubbles out of me each time I listen to politicians debate: “Who’s telling the truth?” “Who’s lying?” “Who’s right?” “Who’s wrong?” Of course, every American citizen has their own idea of what the government should do. It’s not always a question of which politician’s strategy is right or wrong so much as it’s a question of which politicians' facts are true.

The issue is, many Americans don’t know who’s telling the truth. They don’t know how to validate a “fact” (other than perhaps visiting Politifact). They devote themselves to that one candidate who most closely aligns with their political views and watch the same partisan news stations, read the same partisan newspapers, every single day. They become like my family and the mermaid documentary: they want so badly to believe that they view issues through a particular hue of light, blocking out all the other hues.

In this column, I plan to investigate the different ways we can expand our political knowledge. One primary way I’ll be doing this is via my study abroad trip. On August 17 I’ll fly to Madrid, where I’ll spend exactly four months living in a homestay and traveling throughout Europe on the weekends, while my home country undergoes one of the most heated presidential elections in its history. I’ll be precisely one transatlantic flight away from the first presidential election I’m legally allowed to vote in. While this situation may seem an inconvenience, I view it as a rare opportunity to study the presidential race from an entirely new perspective. I’ll compare American media coverage of the election to European coverage of the election. I’ll gain locals’ thoughts on the different political candidates and I’ll contrast Spain’s political system with the United States’ system. My hope is to gain valuable insights on both politics and the media in the U.S.

And so, I invite you to join me on this both political and geographical journey, by way of my biweekly column: an American, abroad in an election year.