One day, Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt were sitting around a campfire. After a lively discussion about world politics, there was a pause which was broken as Fear began:
Fear: I am probably the bad’ist badass amongst us. When people get Fear they are scared … really scared. Not scared like in the sense of being scared of a mouse, I mean scared to death. They get into a panic but can’t hide anywhere ‘cos I’m always around - Fear, Goddamn, I’m omnipresent! People take me with them wherever they go. I can pop up out of the blue, no warning suddenly I’m there. And there ain’t a goddamn thing anybody can do about it!
Fear broke out into a maniacal laughter that brought a shiver down the spines of both Uncertainty and Doubt.
Uncertainty thought about this and it did truly seem that Fear was a damn hardcore badass. But Fear never realised how evil Uncertainty was until he began to explain:
Uncertainty: Fear, goddamn you are a badass but, I fear (yes pun intended) that I am more of a badass than you. You see people who have fear also have a source of that fear, you see Fear, you are very focused on specifics. A person can have multiple fears but they all have a source. Fight the source, the fear is gone. I on the other hand am like a fog, a fog that makes everything seem evil and bad and suspicions. When someone is uncertain, they simply don’t know anything for certain. Everything seems unclear, nothing is sure, everything is covered in a thick slushy sticky mire of unsureness! People who are uncertain don’t trust anything and can’t do anything about it - who do they trust to help them to get out of uncertainty? I, Uncertainty, destroy trust and friendship!
With that Uncertain and Fear gave out wild cries of evil laughter and high-fived each other. Fear congratulated Uncertain on truly being the biggest badass amongst them … except … what about Doubt?
Both of them suddenly turned to Doubt. Doubt was staring into the fire with a look of crazed insanity.
Doubt looked up and began to stutter. But the words didn’t come out. He dropped his gaze back to the fire. He paused a moment.
Suddenly he grabbed a gun out of his pocket and before anyone could do anything, Doubt had shot himself through the head.
With that both Fear and Uncertainty knew who the bad’ist badass amongst them is or rather was.
The moral of the story is that doubt is a far worse state to have than either fear or uncertainty. Doubt is internal. You doubt yourself. You doubt the things that are happening to you, you don’t trust yourself.
Getting out of doubting is very hard. It’s a self fulfilling prophecy that prevents escape.
It is a very bad omen that the worlds media are playing on FUD. Fake news causes uncertainty, lies cause doubt and finger-pointing causes fear. Be aware of FUD and fight it wherever you find it.