by Lehua La’a
Kellyanne Conway, an advisor to President Donald Trump, was meme’d for her embarrassing defense of “alternative facts” pertaining to Trump’s inauguration. On Jan. 22, during MSNBC’s “Meet the Press” with Chuck Todd, Conway sprung to the defense of Press Secretary Sean Spicer. Todd was ripping into the Trump Administration for Spicer’s deceptive first press briefing which Spicer bluntly stated “[Trump’s inauguration] was the largest audience to witness an inauguration, period.”
Although Spicer’s statement was completely false, Conway said that Todd was being dramatic and that Spicer was giving “alternative facts.”
That’s right, President Trump’s leading advisor is now calling false statements ‘alternative facts.’
Are we allowed to implement ‘alternative facts’ in our daily life? Are we now allowed to tell our professors ‘That test question was not wrong, it was just an alternative fact!’ Are we allowed to use Monopoly Money as ‘alternative payment’ for textbooks at the Maverick Store? Can we use ‘alternative speed limits’ in school zones and hand in our Mavcards as an ‘alternative driver’s license?’
Or how about the large number of alternative government agencies that have appeared overnight in the Twitter-sphere?
President Trump has ordered a media blackout for government agencies such as the Environmental Protection Agency, the Food Drug Administration and the National Park Service. These organizations can no longer communicate frustrations with the media or public. In fact, every study or press release from these agencies must go through the White House before they can publish their results to the rest of society, according to Spicer.
A couple of weeks ago, anything with “Alt” in front of their name was synonymous for a hate filled political party. Today, we’re finding unofficial government agencies popping up everywhere. Alt-National Parks Service (@AltNatParkSer), Alt-Food Drug Administration (@alt_fda), Alt-NASA (@altNASA) and a Rouge NASA (@RougeNASA) tweeting pictures of scenery, scientific facts and facts about climate change.
The Alt-US National Park Service famously tweeted “Can’t wait for President Trump to call us FAKE NEWS. You can take away our official twitter but you can’t take away our free time!”
So with all the hype of alternative facts and Twitter accounts, are we going to implement the use of nonsensical ‘facts?’ Will we be forced to use scientific findings from a ‘resistance Twitter’ or exclusively private companies? One thing is for sure, the use of an alternative driver’s license will inevitably end in the back of a police car in ‘alternative bracelets.’
