Just Gimme Some Truth

"Emancipate yourselves from mental slavery;

None but ourselves can free our minds."

–Bob Marley 

An open mind is not just a novelty, it is a path to truth. So many people go through life completely absorbed with the status quo, believing wholeheartedly the lies they are told and tell themselves everyday. So much of our society is structured around deceit and manipulation, it can be a formidable task to even find the truth. We exist in a time where news outlets feed us their bias and spread misinformation like a cancer.

Go home Mr. Trump

Bullies and radicals fill the airways, praised for their hatred. We live in a world where nations are not lead by philosophers, scientists or engineers, but instead slick lawyers and greedy businessmen. We are crushed by debt and controlled by wealth, all under the illusion of economic freedom. We live our lives on timelines with manufactured moments and suffocating milestones. We see beauty as a cookie-cutter image created by photoshop and maintained by shame. We still live in an era where rape and murder can be seen as a justifiable act and violence is a daily occurrence. 

We blame victims and destroy habitats, fear change and build walls. The biggest lie of all is that is just how the world has to be. The idea that nothing can change defeats us before we even have the chance to face the problems at hand. The wrongs of our society are not any less terrible because they are commonplace. 

We may not be able to fix everything all at once but each of us can make an impact, affect change. The first step to evolving culturally must come from within ourselves. If we are to alter the norm it has to begin with rejecting what we have been conditioned to think. In my opinion one of the worst things we are taught to do is devalue others. Many of the most horrific deeds people have carried out have, at the root revolved around the notion that someone else is inferior or somehow less human.

Bit by bit we should learn to erase this collectively internalized way of thinking; destroy the practice of minimizing people based on their weight, gender, sexual orientation, physical/mental ability, skin color, believe system or amount of wealth.

Another major stride towards change is through knowledge. We live in an age where we receive massive amounts of information on a daily basis, unfortunately not all of it is truthful. Whether it's from a news station, newspaper or newsfeed, it is important to be willing to dig a little deeper. Everyone may not have the same amount of time or patience to fact check every story but we must do our best to not further spread false information. 

Just because you see something on Facebook, FOX News or CNN does not mean it's true or worth sharing. Blindly believing everything we are told leaves defenseless against the onslaught of lies and control. The revolution must always start in our thoughts. Question the norm, free your mind, open your heart and never ever stop learning.