It used to be, decades ago, the political left that believed in factual relativism. There are still a few examples today. But now factual relativism has become a characteristic of nearly the entire political Right. Truth is whatever they claim it to be, regardless of evidence: either the lack of evidence to confirm their beliefs, or encountering evidence that contradicts them.
The most famous recent example of this is that Donald Trump claims that he got more votes than Joe Biden. Despite a complete lack of evidence, millions of Americans still claim that Trump actually won the election. I have nothing more to say about this in what I wish to keep a short essay.
But recently, in rural Oklahoma where I live, a new example has surfaced. In McCurtain County, sheriff’s office audio recordings show law enforcement officials glorifying the old days in which they could lynch black people. So be warned: if you are a person of color and live in or come to Oklahoma, there is a significant minority of law enforcement officers who would be perfectly happy to see you killed. Thankfully, most law enforcement officers do not feel this way.
The reaction was swift. Protestors assembled outside the county courthouse in McCurtain County. Even the famously extremist Republican governor of Oklahoma called for these law enforcement officers to resign.
But McCurtain County had a different response. They claimed that the recordings were fake. Who made them? No answer. Who even could have made them? No answer. How could anyone have faked the recordings, giving them the voices of actual officers? It was simply some unspecified vague liberal conspiracy to embarrass McCurtain County racists.
As a scientist, I live by evidence. No society can operate, and no laws can be enforced, if evidence is just something that you can make up, the way the extreme political right is doing nearly all of the time.
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