In Ender’s Game there’s a subplot wherein Ender’s older brother and sister decide that there’s something wrong with the world, and they’re too smart to sit by and watch humanity edge its way to another world war. They jump onto the Internet and start talking on message boards using the  pseudonyms Demosthenes and Locke, just passing their views around. Both children — who’re barely into their teens at this point — start to amass followers, slowly at first, but then they’re invited to write for professional, upstanding establishments. By then, Demosthenes and Locke have built up their own cult groups, with polar opposite politics, and either one could say something no matter how outrageous and their followers would accept it unquestioningly.

(Please go and read the books.)

I wondered if that was possible today. Could two single people take to the Internet and split the entire populous of the globe into two separate groups. No, was my initial reaction, surely people can’t be that dumb, and sheeplike, that they can’t make their own minds up.

I mentally retracted that thought immediately. Manipulating people to your point of view isn’t that hard.

I’m a fairly intelligent person so figured I wouldn’t be bought around to someone thinking blindly, but I guess I over estimated myself. If you’ve been following my blog you’ll know that I’ve been playing with objectivism, and it actually fits into my political philosophy and general ethos really well. And then the whole health care thing kicked off in America and I felt like I had to pick a side. Yaron Brook – head of the Ayn Rand Institute – has so far been the guy I turn to for arguments and ideas which have always nicely fitted into how I feel.

So, this time I just decided to assume his stance without doing much research. National health care would enslave doctors, give substandard care, make patients spend years in queues just to be refused care because the government doesn’t think they’re worth saving. All things I agreed with (and some still do) and just accepted because Brook has always been a good source for me before.

But because it’s been such a large issue over at reddit, I’ve heard hundreds of arguments most of which I could just wave away. But some really hit home, and I couldn’t justify the capitalist system much longer. Only after a few days research into stuff (and a huge push from watching Sicko), I reluctantly started to realise that maybe universal health care isn’t that bad.

But most people won’t bother, or aren’t smart enough, to go and research how I did. They’d have just followed their mentor’s lead unquestioningly, like I almost did.

“I’m voting Labour because my parents voted Labour, and I’m working class, so there’s no one else I can vote for,” is something that I hear all the time. Regardless of their policies, people will stick with the party that’s gained their trust with catchy motos that sound cheery enough. Labour could unleash Three Waters, admit to it after most the population has been killed, and they’d still get votes from those loyalists.

You can get the general principle for this from watching The Real Hustle, or any heist film. You do something that makes your mark trust you, something honest, or even just something they want to hear. Your mark can be one person, or an entire country. Demosthenes did this by reminding the country of the imminent threat from Russia. Using fear to make them trust him. “You have to follow my ideas, because they’re the only way we’re going to avoid another world war in which you’ll probably die.” Locke did the same by being logical, calm, and rational. People ended up trusting both of them.

Shortly afterwards either of the pair could have said literally anything, and their followers would follow.

Today, I don’t think it would work out the way it would in the book. Once someone is hailed as a celebrity, they quickly generate circles in which they’re infamous, where people hate them just because they’re well known. My Chemical Romance aren’t  bad band, but when they blasted to success out of no where people started hating on them. Twilight isn’t an awful book, but it’s hated by people who have never read it for similar reasons.

This is the age of celebrity, where people are fickle. And so a two-party system will never work. There are far too many demographics that need to be heard and, yes, manipulated. So maybe not just Demosthenes and Locke, but throw in a Galiani, and a Lysias and I think it would work.

The moral here is that you need to actively disagree with everything you hear. It’s your moral obligation to question and judge things (there’s a little Rand for you). Find your own views and don’t just sit in labels like “socialist New Labour”, or “Christian”, or “Republican”. When our Shadow Work Secretary says, “Worklessness has become a generational problem” don’t just agree with her and then immediately go out and vote for the Conservatives. Go and research if she’s telling the truth (she obviously is in this quote), and then go and check their other policies.

Gosh, dammit people, think.