Pro Truth: A Practical Plan for Putting Truth Back Into Politics

Pro Truth is professionally written and an easy to read book that addresses the dynamics of how untruths and lies are created and maintained, particularly in politics, in corporate and social media. It is based on the Pro Truth pledge movement, the pledge which has been taken by over 1000 politicians, political candidates, pundits, and journalists. Its strongest points are in its defining various logical fallacies and the ways in which people are linguistically and emotionally manipulated into accepting falsehoods, exaggerations, and misstatements. At the end of each chapter is a glossary of introduced terms. The end of the book has a Glossary of Cognitive Biases, Mental Errors, and Other Important Terms. Another strength of the book is its guidance on how to thoughtfully and respectfully approach and converse with people who have adopted various false narratives into their belief system. The book admittedly makes no attempt to delve deeper into the psychological or psychospiritual underpinnings of fear, anger, and rage from which lying, group think, and self-deceptions arise. Rather it presents a pragmatic and scholarly evidence-based examination of the linguistic and rationalizing mechanisms used to make untruths take root and propagate. The last chapter provides suggestions and examples of how individuals can help correct today’s malaise of untruthfulness. Finally, it suggests taking the Pro Truth Pledge. Pro Truth may come across as having its own bias in that many of its detailed examples of falsehoods, fake news, conjured conspiracies, blatant lies, and misrepresentations are taken from the political right. While valid examples, this might be irksome to conservatives because there are few examples of the left’s own penchant for untruthfulness. This, I believe, may hinder Pro Truth’s appeal across the political divide. It would be helpful if Pro Truth turned its gaze a bit on the left, particularly the “woke” cultural left with its evidence-free beliefs and policies based on pseudo-scholarship, emotionally based reasoning, and opinions presented as fact (i.e. Critical Race and Queer theories, intersectionality, White Fragility, etc.) Truth is undermined on the left when diversity is defined by body parts, gender expression, and skin color but not by differing opinions and perceptions nor the findings of evidence-based research. Pro Truth can be a great resource for recognizing, examining, and describing various forms of biases, false narratives, and deceptions running rampant throughout today’s cultural and political landscape. The tools it gives for examining untruths are applicable not only in politics but can also be used to recognize one’s own predilections and biases in any area of life, thereby helping make the world a little more honest, one person at a time.

This book is a good resource for people looking to move politics in a more productive direction by holding politicians and other politically active people accountable for what they say. It makes a genuine effort to treat both major parties fairly and with respect, and presents examples of good and bad behavior all around. Even more importantly, it offers a path for us to engage with each other through courtesy and understanding. It walks through how to have productive conversations about politics, and presents a scenario illustrating how these concepts can be applied. If you're looking to learn how to work together with people to find shared values and get on the same page, this book is a good place to start. Full disclosure: I was for a time on the Board of Directors for Intentional Insights, a non-profit co-founded by Dr. Gleb Tsipursky, one of the authors, and did some work to promote the Pro-Truth Pledge described in the book.

The goal of Pro Truth: A Practical Plan for Putting Truth Back Into Politics is to convince the read, regardless of political affiliation, of the importance of truthfulness in politics, and for those who already think it’s important, to give them tools and avenues to become an activist. It breaks down two recent political events; In the United States, the Trump Presidency, and in the UK, Brexit, and uses them as a case study for post-truth politics. It also incorporates numerous other examples of post-truth events from other areas of the world, and uses behavioral studies to analyze why they’re successful, all while arming the reader against such techniques and explaining why they’re harmful to democracy. The book tends to end each chapter with a few short tools that the reader can use to help them in overcoming the issues talked about in the chapter, and also have a brief definition or restatement of key terms. Throughout the book, it references numerous behavioral studies, and uses them to explain how certain strategies by post-truth politicians work. Each study is properly referenced after the book conclusion for further reading. Though contemporary, the two main examples the book uses, Trump and Brexit, both are right-leaning issues. The book is careful to make sure that it emphasizes that it’s not affiliated with any political side or party, and that the concepts cross political lines, though most examples do come from conservative parties (Sometimes these or followed or led with left-sided examples of the same thing). With that in mind, despite the book explaining why conservative-sided politicians tend to use these strategies more, there is a possibility for the book to be polarizing if the reader comes in with a predisposed defensive position (which is also addressed in the book) Overall, I think this book, the topics and ideas covered in it, are vital for democracy worldwide, and have personally added it to my list of ‘must read’ books. Any citizen of a democracy cannot afford to be unfamiliar with the contents of this book to some degree, in particular if that democracy is threatened by post-truth politicians.