Everything isn’t political spin. Every event isn’t seen through a prism of ideological preference. Some things just are what they actually are. If the Electoral College chooses a President who was selected by a minority of American voters, that’s exactly what is happening. If I find that troubling, it isn’t because I’m politically aligned with the losing side. It’s because 54% of Americans chose someone else. 10.5 million more people voted for someone other than the man who will be sworn in, yet sworn in he will be. I find this disturbing for the factual reasons, i.e. the United States will live under minority rule for the next 4 years, not because my political feelings have a boo-boo.

US Intelligence has found compelling evidence to suggest that the hacking of private government email accounts, and the releasing of that information to Wikileaks, was done by Russian agents, in what appears to be an attempt to influence the US Presidential Election. I find this troubling not because the Democratic candidate was the one who seems to have been affected by these actions, but because Russian agents interfered in a US Presidential Election.

Taken to the extremes, these ideological prisms we see things through result in a complete refusal to accept objective reality. Take the case of Alex Jones of InfoWars. This man doesn’t accept the objective reality that on December 15, 2012 in Newtown CT, at the Sandy Hook Elementary School, Adam Lanza shot and killed 20 children and 6 adult staff. He believes it was fabricated by an elaborate government conspiracy for the purpose of advancing a gun control political agenda. So he and his followers are so politically influenced, they see only political maneuvering in the mass murder of kids by a lunatic, and choose to ignore the bloody reality to make it fit their preconceived political ideology.

The human mind is burdened with consciousness layered atop the ancestral brain developed over billions of years of natural selection. Our minds are fundamentally flawed, seeking patterns where none exist, fearing the other from outside of our tribe, holding fast to deep-seated beliefs when contrary information makes us uncomfortable. We seek shelter from the storm with others who see what we see. I get it. But the spin cycle we’re currently in, exacerbated by the interconnected world we live in, with online means of aligning ourselves with like-minded people, and the simple, instantaneous way of spreading information (true and very untrue information) is creating chasms of separation, distrust and resentment unlike any in our lifetimes.

There are things that are objectively, factually accurate and represent only the things they actually represent. Someone wearing boots, or sporting a beard, or wearing flannel isn’t political. Starbucks trying out new colors for their paper coffee cups isn’t political. This madness has to stop because while we’re all busily complaining about whether our feelings got hurt, the people newly elected to power are hell bent on enriching themselves and their families for generations. They’d love nothing more than for the American populace to focus on Facebook memes, Twitter rants and arguing among themselves over who’s to blame for everything that bothers us rather than focus on them, and what they will actually do with their newfound weapons of mass enrichment.