The Critical Commentator

 I have spent the past 48 hours listening to people hammering the tech bros for making these products and the governments that failed to regulate them. Anyone in fact, but the principal culprits. You. Me. Us. Yes, the tech companies are bad. I don't dispute it for one moment; have said so for ages. But let's be honest: we knew. We knew the damage these platforms were doing. We could see our children staring mindlessly at their phones, reaching for their phones, seeking validation from their phones; we could see how the algorithms were reaching into their souls, undermining their capacity to think, to sustain attention, to develop social faculties that were supposed to be part of the odyssey of adolescence . Responsibility Hugh Cameron (1835-1918) Photo Credit:  Aberdeen Archives, Gallery & Museums [Public Domain] We could see how they were being wounded by getting de-friended (a horrendous term); how they were missing out on unstructured play ; how when they met their fri...

Socrates unknown artist Photo Credit: Harris Manchester College, University of Oxford [CC  BY-NC] The evangelicals laid hands on Donald Trump in the Oval Office earlier this month, eyes closed, faces contorted into supplication to the Big Man. I have no idea whether the president believes or merely pretends to believe, but there is no doubt that we are witnessing something remarkable not just in America but beyond: 300 years after the Enlightenment, there is an accelerating influence of fundamentalist religion in the decisions that affect our world. We already knew about this about the Middle East, of course. We knew that the ayatollahs believe they have absolute truth.... But while we castigate these fanatics, I think we should at least pay attention to a milder form of this disease seeping back into the West. Look at Pete Hegseth on Friday telling Americans to pray for US troops "on bended knee with your family, in your schools, in your churches, in the name of  Jesus Christ...