It seems that we as a country have hit an all time low in determining a collective reality. And much of this has to do with the pandemic we are in and the political reality of the time. I base this on the recent NPR article: Mississippi Is Pleading With People To Stop Using A Livestock Drug To Treat COVID-19. There seems to be a huge gap in the way people are interpreting the reality of this pandemic. The real effect of the coronavirus is the cognitive distortion or dissonance that it is creating in the masses that goes beyond science fiction.
According to NPR the state of Mississippi has seen “a jump in the number of calls to poison control that prompted an alert” from the “Mississippi State Department of Health about ingesting the drug ivermectin.” The poison control center said at least 70 percent of the recently received calls “were related to people who ingested a version of the drug that is formulated to treat parasites in cows and horses.”
The CDC says “a parasite is an organism that lives on or in a host organism and gets its food from or at the expense of its host.” Think of that blood sucking “skeeter” slurping away on your uncovered arm on a hot muggy night; or a roundworm making itself comfortable in your gastrointestinal tract. A virus is sort of like a zombie it is a living thing but not really. It needs a host, a body, to prey upon to reproduce and make more virus.
So maybe there is a short jump in logic from a parasite to a virus. But where did we get the idea that a livestock drug for parasites would work on a virus? Maybe from the same source that suggested we ingest disinfectants to clean the coronavirus out of our system. Or from people claiming that they have the right not to wear a mask–and then compare wearing a mask to wearing underwear. It is not what is coming out of our bottom end that is creating the problem right now. It is the misreporting and manipulation of facts. We keep moving further off into the deep end of mass confusion. I am not psychologist or sociologist but there is some real distortion of the facts and reality taking place in this country that goes beyond the normal “what was I thinking?” It is to the point of questioning the cognitive capabilities of groups of people. This is exacerbated by the belief today that feeling that one is right has now become a “right,” encompassed in the First Amendment. This despite and reasonable, logical and scientific evidence to the contrary.
PsychCenteral.com says: “A cognitive distortion — and there are many — is an exaggerated pattern of thought that’s not based on facts. It consequently leads you to view things more negatively than they really are…” And that is the problem. Our internal thought process is dialed into nothing but negative waves–amplified by certain news and social platforms. Squawking heads filter through facts painting them in black or white and then presenting them in an all or nothing manner with the “end is near.” Remember the Fiscal Cliff of 2012 when our government spending and tax policies would run us off the cliff and into the sea? Financial ruin was awaiting us. To quote the Doors: The future’s uncertain, and the end is always near.
“Our thoughts” according to PsychCenteral.com “have a great impact on how we feel and how we behave. When you treat these negative thoughts as facts, (facts by-and-large are not positive or negative it is the interpretation) you may see yourself and act in a way based on faulty assumptions.” Now this is written concerning one individual’s feelings, thoughts and behaviors. What happens when half the population of a country decides to run off the cliff and into the sea below; or people in one state start using a parasite drug to fight off a virus instead of a scientifically developed vaccine? We are dealing with some sort of collective emotional reasoning that our feelings reflect reality. We have taken Rene Descartes Cogito, ergo sum: I think therefore I am” to I feel therefore it is. Or better yet, As Curly of The Three Stooges once said: I am thinking and nothing is happening.
Who came up with cognitive dissonance theory?
Cognate dissonance was first investigated by Leon Festinger, arising out of a participant observation study of a cult which believed that the earth was going to be destroyed by a flood, and what happened to its members — particularly the really committed ones who had given up their homes and jobs to work for the cult — when the flood did not happen. (or an election that was lost but was believed not lost)
While fringe members were more inclined to recognize that they had made fools of themselves and to “put it down to experience,” committed members were more likely to re-interpret the evidence to show that they were right all along (the earth was not destroyed because of the faithfulness of the cult members).
By Saul McLeod, updated Feb 05, 2018 Simply Psychology
photo Frode Inge Helland
Oh, there is always something happening despite how we think or feel. The coronavirus has us looking for consistency or way back to normalcy. But what really is normal or consistent in a time pandemic? It is our natural quest for consistency that has crushed and pushed our beliefs or “the way it ought to be” to the limits. The only consistency in this mess is the coronavirus. It does consistently what viruses do–and without feelings and thought. The coronavirus has never read the Bill of Rights or voted in an election. It doesn’t care how you think or feel the way “things ought to be.” According to the National Human Genome Research Institute “Viruses must infect cells and use components of the host cell to make copies of themselves. Often, they kill the host cell in the process, and cause damage to the host organism.” The coronavirus has not only infected our physical bodies it has infected our ability to rationally reason what is and what ain’t. It has created a cognitive disconnect in our thinking.
I am not virologist or an epidemiologist but I do know that any road will get you to where you want to go. For instance, we can mask up and get the vaccine to reach herd immunity or we can follow some of the Southern governors approach that seems to be let the virus consistently do its thing because sooner or later we will reach herd immunity with or without a mask and vaccine. But we will never reach it by taking livestock pills.
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/04/the-illusion-of-reality/479559/
What Is Cognitive Dissonance Theory?
https://psychcentral.com/lib/cognitive-distortions-negative-thinking#types
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