Photo by Marco Da Costa

In November 2024, I wrote an article for Canadian Dimension titled “Truth takes a side,” in which I argued that the intellectual defenders of capitalism are obligated to distort and falsify reality in order to conceal both the exploitative nature of capitalist society and its short span in human history.

At the same time, I suggested, those who defend the interests of the exploited and oppressed, especially if they promote anti-capitalist perspectives, have every reason to base themselves on an honest appraisal of unfolding events. Our side in the struggle doesn’t need to distort reality because, as Malcolm X once put it, “Truth is on the side of the oppressed today, it’s against the oppressor. You don’t need anything else.”

A year and a half has passed and I still contend that honesty is the best policy for the political left, just as lies and deception remain the weapons of choice for the right. This does not mean, however, that the truth is plain for all to see. It is often concealed in ways that are complex and confusing, and bringing it to light is no straightforward matter.

Before we can look for the truth, we have to first deal with a vast barrage of lies that blocks our way to it. This is all the more important because we are living at a time when the promotion of falsehood seems more pervasive and brazen than ever before.

Last June, Common Dreams took stock of the “wall of deception” that had been built by Israel and its enablers within the Western establishment in order to conceal the Gaza genocide or, at least, to hamper as much as possible the ability to grasp its enormity. The article justifiably pointed to “a global system complicit in sustaining Israel’s habitual lies and systematic deceit to cover up a starvation and a livestreamed genocide.”

I’m sure many of us had very few illusions about the corporate media’s commitment to truth long before the horror in Gaza began unfolding, but their dogged determination to deny a years’ long genocidal onslaught, even in the face of overwhelming evidence and a mountain of expert confirmation, has been beyond anything that could have been anticipated.

This calculated denial may break new ground but it is only part of a long-established and deeply entrenched process of falsification.........

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