Once upon a time there was town which had an apartment building and a jewelry store. One day, a fire broke out in the apartment building. The community leaders knew about the fire but did nothing because it was in a poor neighborhood. Instead the community leaders focused on the rich owner of the jewelry store. The leaders told stories about the owner's possession of illegal automatic weapons and links to the mafia. As the leaders told the community that that the evil owner was plotting to murder them as they slept, people in the apartment building were burning and jumping out windows. A few people in the community tried to point out that the apartment building fire was a more serious problem, but they were ignored. A few people demanded proof that the jewlery store owner actually possessed illegal firearms and links to the mafia before taking action against the owner, but their demands were drowned out by the majority who demand the evil jewelry store owner prove he didn't possess illegal arms and links to the mafia. Since proving a negative is a logical impossibility, the leaders were able to spin a lack of evidence to look like evidence of guilt. Most of the people never caught on that proving a negative is a logical impossibility and believed in the owner's guilt despite a lack of proof. Instead they demanded their leaders send the firemen and police into the jewelry store and lynch the evil owner.
As the firemen used their axes to break into the store and police traded shots with the owner, some jewelry store employees were inadvertently hacked and others were inadvertently shot. During the confusion, some employees stole jewelry and raped fellow employees. Eventually the firemen broke into the store and the police captured the owner, but they did nothing to stop the employees stealing and raping. Instead they began beating store employees as the community leaders helped themselves to the rest of the contents of the jewelry store.
Over time, some of the people began to notice their leaders wearing jewelry from the store. They became more become skeptical of their leaders' motivations and their original claims about the owner. These people demanded proof. All the leaders could prove was the owner used to own illegal weapons (confiscated years ago). But the leaders were able to describe legal firearms in a way to make them sound like illegal firearms. The leaders were never able to prove the owner had links to the mafia, but they did find evidence that once a jewelry store employee ate in the same restaurant as a member of the mafia. The leaders claimed that it didn't matter that everything they said previously was based on false information (lies). The owner deserved to be lynched because he was a bad man. He treated his employees poorly. (At least that was true, but what the leaders didn't say was that the owner treated his employees about the same as other store owners in the neighborhood, but those owners weren't a problem because they made regular campaign contributions to the leaders' re-election campaigns.) The leaders said they had acted out of a sense of community obligation.
Since most people are gullible, most believed their leaders yet again, despite overwhelming evidence that their leaders had lied and were lying again. The majority of the community who believed their leaders' explanations (lies) re-elected them.
That brings us to today. That apartment building fire? It eventually burned itself out, but its still smoldering. The jewelry store? As a result of the damage caused while apprehending the jewelry store owner, a new fire has broke out in the ruins. Firemen and police try their best to extinguish it, but the fire is now completely out of control, threatening to engulf the neighborhood or maybe even the entire community.
But majority of the community feels good about itself because they lynched a bad man and re-elected leaders who act out of a sense of community obligation. A happy ending... Because what's important isn't truth or justice, but feeling good about ourselves.
The End... or maybe the beginning... actually I don't think this story has a ending, oh wait a minute, it ends when the fire burns the town to the ground... But at least it leaves us all with a warm feeling...
