April 6, 2007
April Fooled Again
By Stan Dyer
Every April Fool's Day, I think back to an incident that happened to me a few years ago. I was listening to National Public Radio's
All Things Considered on the first day of April, but the date did not even cross my mind as the host began a story about a man with an incredible ability to produce sound effects using only his mouth and vocal chords. In my defense, I was working and only "half" paying attention, but I really should have seen the bait hanging precariously before my eyes before I took it, hook, line and sinker.
I don't remember either the host's name or the name of his guest, but I certainly remember what happened next. The host asked his guest to sample his talent for the listening audience. I stopped working and listened intently as the guest went into his first impression. It was an impression of crickets in the night. The impression was so perfect I could almost smell the summer flowers. My jaw dropped with amazement. I was expecting something good, but not that good. Then, the guest produced another, even better effect. It was a moving train complete with the Doppler effect and the "thumpity-thump, thumpity-thump" of the wheels moving over the rails. I really thought I witnessed something remarkable. It was about a week later that the host revealed the prank, and I felt silly, but I knew I was not the only one to take the bait.
Maybe I am gullible or too trusting, but it was, after all, NPR. Whom can you trust if not NPR? Then, it occurred to me how much information not only I but many others as well willingly accept at face value simply because it comes from a trusted source. In many ways, we all face conditioning for this type of behavior at varying degrees from a very early age.
As young children, we hear stories of Santa Claus, the Tooth Fairy, and the Easter Bunny. We believe the stories because we believe our parents and other adults as trusted sources of information. Some of us take years to discover that our parents and their peers are not always reliable when it comes to worldly knowledge. The "foolery" continues when we enter school.
In school, students learn stories of George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, and the Founding Fathers. The spoon-fed information is so pasteurized, processed, filtered and buffered that barely any of the truth remains for consumption. Schools do this to keep parents happy and present the version of the information most acceptable to the largest number of parents. For the students, they have to wait until they get to college to learn the real nitty-gritty of American history. Yet, even when students aren't in school, they face the bombardment of the media and the secondary bombardment of their peers.
Television ads, newspaper ads, radio ads, and billboards constantly flood the minds of the public with information and try to influence opinions. Even though the people in the ads are perfect strangers, their messages are taken like live bait, hook, line and sinker. When the ads aren't after them, it's their peers pressuring them to conform. It is not gullibility so much as a simple result of training. When people learn the childhood stories already mentioned, they are also learning to recognize and trust authority figures. It's like indoctrination into blind faith. Yes, people have access to more complete information, but few take the time to research, and, if they did research, they would discover the diverse points of view available from various sources serve more to confuse than clarify. It is easier and less confrontational to stand in land and accept the customary spoon full of sugar.
Later, leaving school after completing a "whitewashed" education, people discover the most important things they learned from school were how to show up on time, do as they are told, give the perception of competence and accept paychecks. School teaches people to pursue jobs, teaches them to be employees, and teaches them to work for others. When people talk about the "perfect job", it occurs to me that the perfect job is any job that is a stepping-stone to real independence. Americans used to be independent when they built their own homes, made their own tools and clothes, and grew their own food. Now, Americans are more like trained animals in a huge corporate circus. No one should be surprised when anyone graduating from such an intense training program would believe an April Fool's joke coming from a trusted source.
In the 70's, Roger Daltrey and "The Who" sang, "...we don't get fooled again". Either I wasn't listening, or my training was too complete. For me, April Fool's Day is almost redundant. Many of us are fooled on a daily basis, and we don't realize it even after being informed. I guess even knowing the truth can't always save us from our training. Sure enough, I'm as trained as they come, and you can bet when April 1 rolls around next year, I'll be April fooled again.