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Some of the loudest, most proudly ignorant guessing in the world is going on in Washington today. Our leaders are sick of all the solid information that has been dumped on humanity by research and scholarship and investigative reporting. They think that the whole country is sick of it, and they could be right. It isn't the gold standard that they want to put us back on. They want something even more basic. They want to put us back on the snake-oil standard.

Kurt Vonnegut#208

PoliticsTruthMediaLeadership

About this quote

What does it mean?
Leaders prefer simple, misleading narratives over complex facts, catering to a public tired of hard information.
In plain terms
Politicians like simple lies more than hard facts because people are tired of truth.
What can you take from it?
Simplistic myths often win over complex reality.

Where it applies

  • political campaigns
  • media consumption
  • public policy

Putting it to work

  • demand evidence
  • critique rhetoric
  • promote literacy

Questions to consider

  • Why do voters prefer simple stories?
  • Who benefits from misinformation?

Another view

Some people prefer straightforward answers even if they are incomplete.

More from Kurt Vonnegut

  1. Socialism is no more an evil word than Christianity. Socialism no more prescribed Joseph Stalin and his secret police and shuttered churches than Christianity …

    Permalink to quote #207
  2. The highest treason in the USA is to say Americans are not loved, no matter where they are, no matter what they are doing there.

    Permalink to quote #209
  3. I think that novels that leave out technology misrepresent life as badly as Victorians misrepresented life by leaving out sex.

    Permalink to quote #206

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