Candace Owens, Trump, the truth about COVID vaccine and itchy-eared conservatives | Smith

• Columnist Cameron Smith is a Memphis-born, Brentwood-raised recovering political attorney raising three boys in Nolensville, Tennessee.

Candace Owens’s recent interview with former President Donald Trump didn’t go as planned. Instead of sharing in the commentator’s skepticism of COVID-19 vaccines, the former president noted their efficacy and encouraged Americans to get them.

Owens quickly dismissed Trump as old and disconnected. The Apostle Paul predicted such reactions to sound advice in his second letter to Timothy.

“For the time is coming when people will not endure sound teaching,” Paul wrote to Timothy. “But having itching ears they will accumulate for themselves teachers to suit their own passions and will turn away from listening to the truth and wander off into myths.”

In the age of the internet, wandering off into myths is a daily reality. If we don’t appreciate what a writer has to say, we keep scrolling. When a pundit confirms our views, we shout it from the social media rooftops.

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Trump: ‘People aren’t dying when they take the vaccine’

Between all the clicks, swipes, and likes, the most advanced computers in human history reinforce our fantasy world to a point where we can’t imagine anyone disagreeing with our righteous perspectives.

“Look, the results of the vaccine are very good, and if you do get [COVID-19], it’s a very minor form,” Trump explained to Owens. “People aren’t dying when they take the vaccine.”

Owens immediately eroded Trump’s support of COVID-19 vaccines by directly appealing to internet myths. “I don’t believe that Trump is on the internet or that he necessarily uses the web to try to find obscure websites,” said Owens. “I think that he just relies on typical mainstream sources.”

Americans should talk to family physicians, nurse practitioners, or even pharmacists administering vaccines about their efficacy and importance. Even if those sources are unavailable, “mainstream” information from the CDC, for example, is far superior to the “internet” or “obscure websites.”

Conservatives should be able to oppose vaccine mandates, be skeptical about the motives of pharmaceutical companies, and still effectively differentiate between truth and conspiracy theories.

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Owens and Jones defy the man who made them famous

Owens reached a personal conclusion about vaccines. Trump confronted her with a dose of truth. She wanted affirmation, he didn’t provide any. Her only conclusion was that he’s too old to know where to find the truth.

She wasn’t the only one. InfoWars’s Alex Jones got in on the act. “This is an emergency Christmas Day warning to President Trump,” said Jones. “You are either completely ignorant about the so-called ‘vaccine’ gene therapy that you helped ram through with Operation Warp Speed, or you are one of the most evil men who has ever lived.”

It took Jones and Owens all of five seconds to bail on Trump who directly bolstered both of their careers. Owens simply happened to be more polite about it. It couldn’t be that both are deeply mistaken about the efficacy and utility of vaccines. Such views wouldn’t fly with their respective followers.

We should recognize the truth-compromising pattern by now: Make a bold claim. Get confronted with reality. Cite some random source unearthed from a corner of the internet. Argue that those who disagree are rubes who aren’t in the know. Wash, rinse, and repeat.

It’s exhausting to tack itchy-eared folks down because they’re not actually interested in finding the truth. They have redefined it altogether. Truth is now a battle of wills instead of an unyielding reality. The louder and more aggressive position wins. As a result, viewpoint alignment routinely trumps addressing challenging views in good faith.

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Three solutions for getting out of your echo chamber

So what’s the answer?

• Step one: Get over yourself. The itching ears Paul mentions are a symptom of arrogance. Some of us can’t accept that any of our views are wrong. We feel strongly about them, and, thanks to modern technology, we always find enough people who agree with us. Our passion and truth may align, but that isn’t always the case.
• Step two: Look around. Once we’ve accepted our own fallibility, we should check out the views of the people and personalities we engage. If all the trusted voices in our lives affirm what we already believe, we aren’t righteous. We’ve merely created our own echo chamber. We should seek out those who disagree with us on a wide range of issues. It’s a safeguard to help us sharpen correct perspectives and discard those which can’t survive scrutiny.
• Step three: If we still fancy ourselves as possessing omniscience on par with God himself after the first two steps, repeat step one.

Our irritating cultural malady will only be addressed by humbly accepting that we might not have it all correct. We must constantly be willing to seek the truth even when it doesn’t give way to our personal preferences.

Our temporary discomfort is a small price to pay for truth that doesn’t bend the knee to our emotions or partisan wishes. In time, our inflamed ears should stop itching as well.

Columnist Cameron Smith is a Memphis-born, Brentwood-raised recovering political attorney raising three boys in Nolensville, Tennessee, with his particularly patient wife, Justine. Direct outrage or agreement to smith.david.cameron@gmail.com or @DCameronSmith on Twitter

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