Category Archives: David Edwards (journalist)

David Edwards

If the propaganda model suggests that modern society will be flooded by a version of reality closely conforming to the requirements of state and corporate interests, then it is essentially suggesting that modern society will be flooded by a necessarily irrational version of reality. It comes as no surprise, then, to find that modern society takes a hostile position to the very existence of truth itself; if inconvenient ideas are dismissed as ridiculous, or ignored through an absence of comment, then so too will the search for truth itself. Today all truth is deemed to be relative. Any discussion of truth is made out to be a metaphysical concern, and the conventional wisdom is that anyone talking in terms of wanting to discover the truth is somewhat unsophisticated. This modern relativism is based on the extraordinary notion that all truth is somehow a matter of opinion and that it is not possible to determine, for example, what is good and bad for people, because everyone is different. Again, this involves a fantastic distortion of the scientific method (which accepts the impossibility of absolute certainty, but operates on the assumption that a good hypothesis is often adequate to the task).

David Edwards, Burning All Illusions: A Guide to Personal and Political Freedom, Boston, 1996, p. 55

David Edwards

[C]ertainly [people do not opt out of the system] because they’re smarter than other people. Maybe it’s courage, being willing to face the possibility that your life so far has been a waste of time. Maybe it’s faith in the idea that truth—however frightening it might seem—will always bring benefits.

David Edwards, ‘Nothing To Lose But Our Illusions’, The Sun, June 2000

David Edwards

Write about the things that truly inspire you, and do it for the benefit of others—to reduce their suffering and to increase their happiness. That’s my advice. If you do that you will achieve real ‘success’, real passion, enthusiasm and fulfilment, with or without money and status.

David Edwards, ‘Outside the Machine: How to be an Ethical Writer’