Humans prefer fantasy over reality

 Given a choice, do you watch drama or documentaries? Do you read fiction or non fiction? Would you prefer a film based on real life or one that tells a great story created in the writers imagination. Judging by viewing numbers, book sales and box office receipts, most prefer to spend time in the world of fantasy rather than reality.

Conspiracy theories are common on social media, and despite the attempts to control are impossible to stop. Posts telling us that Organisations and Governments have long running programmes to control us, Aliens have been visiting us for years, climate change is made up by scientists to get more research funds etc etc are frequent and unavoidable.  Why are these expressions of “free speech” so common and popular. Well, I think it’s because they are so much more interesting and easy to understand  than boring old reality, about which you have limited data and so little understanding. It sounds feasible and attractive that Governments are not made up of well meaning incompetent people struggling to improve  the world for the better, but cynical master planners, who in their secret elite privileged world control everything so you are enslaved to do what they want with out you even noticing. It's a fantastic story, but I don't think our leaders are that clever. And in posting this “truth“ the status of poster goes up, makes the reader feel very important (so important that the Government needs to control you) and the reader also gets a juicy story to pass on to others.

However, when it comes to making decisions, such as at elections, when we need to decide who is best to improve the reality of the world, the fact that the boring far from simple reality of the world is not promoted to anything like the same degree as the  fantasy, means many base their decisions on the fantasy and the biggest fantasist gets elected. Who will vote for someone who says "elect me, I will try something different than the last guy, but who knows if it will work?" which is what they should truthfully be saying.

“I can stop the war in 24 hours, I can solve the immigration problem, I can make every one rich, I can make your country great again, climate change is nothing to worry about, I can restore the Empire, We can create the socialist utopia” cry our fantasists and many are unthinkingly attracted.

If only it were true.

The reason for war isn’t that simple that it can be solved in a day, cutting immigration will not improve your life, everyone cannot be rich, no single person can make a country great or turn back the clock to a world that no longer exists, or make a dream of utopia a reality.

The reality that we don’t want to  face up to is that the world is harsh, boring, requires unbiased analysis and most problems cannot be solved, only managed. And keeping up with constant change is damn hard work. If you ignore reality, you might be alright for a while, but eventually, the divergence of your fantasy from the real world gets bigger and bigger, until the inevitable happens and reality comes crashing down upon you and leaves you with no other option than to accept your world view was wrong all along (or continue looking increasingly foolish)..

So my advice for a successful life is to base your decisions (as best as you are able) on reality. If you do you will have a great advantage over the fantasists. And don't listen to people who say the world is complex. It only appears complex when you do not understand or lack information that brings the understanding. If you understand a problem, the solution is obvious.