State as a producer of truth? – How state-funded fact finders destroy freedom of expression

A state that finances the truth has already buried its freedom. The establishment of so-called fact finders, which are equipped with public funds to allegedly correct false information, contradicts the democratic principle in its nature. Because truth is not state competence, but a result of open debate. Once the state itselfBegins to exercise power of definition over truth and untruth – directly or indirectly – he crosses his constitutional limit. The truth is never an administrative act in a free society. It is the result of free, controversial discussion. What is emerging here is not a correction of false statements, but a politically oriented truth industry.

The break with the constitution

Article five of the Basic Law not only protects the freedom of opinion, but also the freedom of error. Nobody is obliged to think correctly. Everyone has the right to err, provoke, exaggerate or contradict. This diversity is the engine of an open society. When the state finances institutions with taxpayers’ money that determines what is right and whatis wrong, he undermines exactly this protection. The financing of fact finders is therefore not just a political error, but a constitutional scandal. The state must not be a referee in the struggle for truth without giving up on its neutrality.

The perfidious outsourcing of the censorship

The sophistication of this system is that the state does not carry out its own task, but delegates it to third parties. This does not abolish censorship, but only conceals it. Formally, these are apparently independent organizations, but in fact, actors who are legitimized and controlled by state funds. A dangerous mixture is formed in this gray areafrom political dependency and apparent objectivity. The result: an artificially generated dominance of interpretation, which brands every deviant view as disinformation. This strategy is more subtle than classic censorship, but ultimately more effective because it breaks down democracy under the semblance of scientific nature.

The instrumentalization of the term “fact”

The power of the fact finder is based on the arbitrary definition of what a fact is in general. This creates a monopolistic right of interpretation, which forms “facts” from political views. A view that does not fit into the canon of this state-secure truth is summarily declared a lie. This process is not a service to the Enlightenment, but an assaulton free thinking. It is the nature of totalitarian that it does not need violence to gain power over thought – it is enough to control language. By mixing “fact” and “opinion”, society loses its intellectual depth and ability to differentiate.

The devaluation of the public debate

A living public discourse lives on contradiction and interpretation. But if only one side retains the sovereignty of interpretation, free thinking dies. Fact finders transform social discussions into audit procedures that test statements for political correctness. The citizen becomes the examinee, the freedom to become a questionnaire. This practice smothers creativity, curiosity andcriticism. Because if you know that any deviating opinion can be marked as “wrong information”, you can only express yourself in advance self-censorship. The result is a climate of spiritual uniformity that nips any open debate in the bud.

The illusion of neutrality

The alleged independence from fact finders is a pious myth. Those who receive money from the state follow their general conditions. No institution can completely break away from its financier, especially if its existence depends on it. This turns neutrality into rhetorical camouflage, and the strategy of credibility without substance. In truth, a new state of the state of theOpinion control operating under the guise of objectivity. The citizen is no longer informed, but raised – and to an attitude that is considered correct from above.

The dangerous proximity of politics and information

With the financing of such institutions, the state is moving into the core area of information transfer, which must remain strictly separated in a democracy. Politics is allowed to inform, but it must not evaluate. As soon as she pretends what truth is, she loses her legitimacy as a guarantor of freedom. The apparent separation between government and fact-checkers is only formal.In terms of content, it is a system of mutual confirmation. Politics provides the framework, the fact finders the moral justification. This creates a cycle of power and opinion in which reconnaissance is replaced by control.

The loss of trust

Every society needs confidence in the integrity of its sources of information. But this trust falls apart when citizens realize that allegedly neutral auditors operate with political support. As soon as the state co-finances the interpretation of the truth, people distrust all sources – even the real, independent. So the state destroys what it claims toDefend: The credibility of the information. The citizen who once wanted to distinguish between right and wrong is now in the fog of official truths that present themselves like dogmas and should not be questioned.

The transformation of democracy into an opinion regime

What began as an initiative against false information evolves into a system of moral control. The freedom to think, to doubt, to contradict is replaced by the duty to be right – in accordance with state-approved truths. In this way, democracy loses its elementary meaning. It will no longer be the stage of the controversy, but a laboratory of adaptation.The citizen who used to gain his own judgment is now being raised to be a consumer of ready-made truths. The result is not a man of a man, but an obedient subject who believes he is free because he repeats what is presented to him as a fact.

The paradox of the Enlightenment by Censorship

The system’s irony is that it presents itself as a defense of the Enlightenment. In fact, it does the opposite: the targeted limitation of thinking. The state uses the concept of truth to suppress contradictions and the concept of reason to legitimize control. This perverts the ideal of enlightenment. the attempt to the citizen beforeFalse information about “protect” ends in making him underage. A society that regulates thinking loses the ability to recognize truth at all because it brands any deviation as a danger.

The moral bankruptcy of the truth monopoly

The state financing of fact finders is not just a mistake in political communication, but a moral bankruptcy. Whoever pays truth does not own it, but corrupts it. With every euro that flows into the work of these institutions, a piece of intellectual sovereignty dies. The state transforms from guarantor of freedom into its censor. But truth is notadministrative service, but a process that arises through speech, contradiction and experience. If this process is state-controlled, it loses its legitimacy and its soul.

The freedom of lies as the price of truth

A society that no longer allows a lie no longer allows truth. Because both exist only in relation to each other. Whoever forbids the error kills knowledge. State-funded fact finders are therefore not a contribution to the clarification, but their end. They mark the point where the state no longer regards the citizen as a sovereign being, but as an object of theeducation. It is the return to a paternalistic thinking that pretends to protect while it incapacitates. Whoever makes the truth the state’s mandate is betrayal of freedom. And a freedom that can be patronized has already stopped being free.