Alternative Facts

087/365

As entertaining as they are, they still pose a danger…
-VQ

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True ignorance is when you know the truth and still choose to ignore it to push your own agenda. I could never comprehend why people present their opinions as facts just because they want to make them so. All the will power in the world will not change what is real. This, my friends, are what we refer to as “alternative facts”. My grandmother is my favorite culprit. Since as long as I can remember she has been altering and structuring reality to suit her needs, and although it was a source of great confusion as a child, as an adult - I must admit- it is quite hilarious.

Long story short, we have a cousin who was suffering from throat cancer. Being a cigarette smoker herself my grandmother has always defended the filthy act chalking it off as “not that bad” and saying things like “at least I don’t do drugs” in her sassy Spanish accent. She also loathes marijuana for reasons unbeknownst to me besides the fact that almost everyone in our family smokes it. She describes the smell as “disgusting” and “foul” as she takes long tokes from her nasty death sticks.

We were discussing the cousin (let’s call her Carla) one day and she says to me nonchalantly with all the confidence in the world, “You know Carla went to the doctors and they told her that it wasn’t the cigarettes that gave her cancer, it was the marijuana”. I almost spit my drink out as she said it. Seriously grandma?? I said it and she just shrugged at me “That’s what they said”. Oh grandma, you sound like the brain washed robot that this country wants you to be. What a perfect puppet. I just sighed and laughed it off, but I can’t ignore the dangerous impact that her words can have on naive beings.

Cigarettes will never NOT be cancerous deathly concoctions made and pushed by society for monetary gains (double negatives for a doubly negative habit). From purchasing them and from treating the sickness that comes along with their use. I, myself, used to engage in the horrible practice until I was so repulsed by their seducing effects that I quit cold turkey refusing to touch them ever since. It has honestly been one of the best decisions I have ever made. And even when I was smoking I did not go around spreading alternative facts about their effects. As I’ve stated before, the truth is undeniable and preaching anything else is simply irresponsible. So please people check yourselves before you wreck yourselves (and others in the process). Keep your alternative facts to yourself, get educated, and spread real knowledge instead.