Ramón de Campoamor wrote it in his poem Las dos lanternas and it has become such a popular saying that it is already another saying: “And it is that in the treacherous world / there is nothing true or false: / everything depends on the color / of the glass through which one looks”. The poem was an undisguised criticism of the pessimists embodied in the figure of Diogenes and his lantern or lantern, but the color of the glass through which one looks has ended up defining the relativity and blindness of the opinions of each one, which in these times that run have been promoted and endorsed by the network of networks.
We don't stop right now to talk about artificial intelligence and its sudden revolution, but for years now the fate of the algorithm has led us to only read and listen to what the machine and its technological owners believe to be part of our interest group. The diversity of opinions and judgments, in the Internet universe, is tremendously limited by our own prejudices and biases, so we all end up listening to what, even unconsciously, we want to hear.
Is this serious or worrisome? Of course! Because one of the evident forms of the evolution of criteria and thought is to attend to the arguments of others, even if it is to reject them. But that supposed diverse and inclusive society is nothing more than well-intentioned talk as soon as it enters the domains of the network. There, each sheep looks for his flock and the shepherd will know what he does with his algorithms up there, on top of the mountain.
You will tell me, and rightly so, that this had always happened. And that the newspapers are an obvious example: each one had its editorial line and its reference columnists, and saw the news through the color of its glass. It is undeniable, although there are still exceptions that opt for an informative line not governed by militancy in any political creed. The readers of this newspaper already know that, with the nuances they want, they can find published opinions for and against the same ideas. And that's good, or so I think.
But let's not get carried away by complacency and let's look a little at the current media landscape: the majority is not that they have a clear editorial line, it's that they are militants on some side. And they do it, it has already been written many times, with the same subtlety and abuse of anything goes with which the sports press has used mockery and insult to refer to the rival team. These are times, yes, not only of confrontation, but of polarization, the new buzzword.
Let's imagine this scene for a moment: Pedro Sánchez is giving a campaign rally in the Retiro Park in Madrid and, suddenly, he gets off the platform, goes to the pond and begins to walk on the water. I want to think and believe that La Vanguardia would headline the news with something like "Amazement in Retirement" or something similar, but I can guess other headlines and, if they accept my game, you can also join in thinking about what paper would say on the cover: " Sánchez flees from his own rally" and which would be titled "One more trick from the president". It could be that someone else, much more favorable, opened the page with a Berlanguian "Miracle in Madrid" and that another, curling the loop, accused him like this: "Sánchez takes a bath and ignores the drought." But I am very clear that a medium that I do not name would give extensive photographic coverage to the improbable walk on the waters to end up with the headline: "The president does not know how to swim." We go like this…
