On June 22, 1941, Hitler, breaking his non-aggression pact, launched a massive attack against the Soviet Union. In less than three months, German forces had swept through much of the country, taking as many as 800,000 prisoners, and destroying half of its industrial and agricultural capacity.
One could think of this as a surprise strike were it not for the fact that, for over two years, right up to three days before the attack, Stalin had been receiving intelligence reports indicating the likelihood of such an assault.
What kept Stalin from taking those reports seriously, thereby averting a colossal disaster? The most likely explanation is that Stalin had a world view that distorted the meaning of the data. According to David Murphy ("What Stalin Knew: The Enigma of Barbarossa") - Stalin, as a committed Marxist, was convinced that the capitalist powers cared more about destroying the Soviet Union than destroying Nazi Germany. Therefore all those intelligence reports, experienced through that lens, were evidence of British plans to turn the two allies against one another. Every new report was simply more evidence of British deception.
It is the power of such world views to blind us to what is right before us that fascinates me. We don't see our world views, yet they shape what we do see. And we take what we see as how things really are.
Recent media studies indicate that rather than challenging our world views we actively reinforce them, reading newspapers and magazines and watching television commentators who feed our world views rather than confront them. All of which serves to simplify the world for us and assure us of the correctness of our views. Unfortunately, most matters are neither simple nor subject to obviously correct answers.
If our goal is to face the true complexity of the issues before us, we would do well to be curious about our world views, to be willing to face them and challenge them. One first step - a painful one - would be to devote some time each week to immersing ourselves in the opposition: read their papers, watch their commentators. Let all of that in. Be as skeptical of their world views as we are of our own. It may be that, out of the tension between the two, we can come closer to glimpsing the world as it really is.
Barry,
If you missed it, you'll enjoy Aaron Freeman's Commentary, Agreeing with a News Viewpoint, on NPR yesterday. Available at:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4705031
Regards,
Ralph
Posted by: Ralph Katz | June 16, 2005 at 03:53 PM