Dogs in the microwave (and politicians in the freezer)

The former Polish Prime Minister and current opposition leader, Jarosław Kaczyński, stated at a press conference that Péter Magyar, the triumphant winner of the Hungarian elections, had killed the family dog by turning on the microwave with the puppy inside. He attributed it to the memoirs written by his ex-wife, but it turns out that neither the ex-wife has published any book nor is there any record of Magyar cooking dogs like one prepares microwave popcorn. It all stems from a news report from a media outlet created just two days before this scandalous fake news was launched, which analysts link to one of the groups that carry out these types of operations for the Kremlin. The act of saying your enemy devours pets is known to yield good results, as Trump demonstrated a couple of years ago, with a Facebook post claiming that Haitian migrants in Springfield (Ohio) were capturing and eating neighborhood pets.

Shouldn't there be a consequence for the politician who engages in such crude poisoning? A public servant is expected to exhibit a series of exemplary behaviors, but, curiously, not truthfulness. It is assumed that their job inevitably involves twisting the narrative. It would be interesting to study why citizens do not punish such deception. The main difficulty, theoretically, is being able to distinguish simple error or ignorance from conscious malice. Kaczyński justified himself by saying that he was only repeating what he had read in the media. But it is a poor excuse, because behind it there was no minimally solvent and consolidated news source. The case shows the danger of the devaluation of the concept of truth and how we consider it impossible, amidst the noise that certain politicians – and pseudomedia – fuel. And we owe ourselves a collective reflection on why we punish some venial behaviors so much and lies so little.