Opinion – By Rusty (from the library computer)
April 28, 2025
You don’t have to scream to be right. A quiet voice in the noise asks: when did we start using facts as weapons?
I’m not much for politics, not anymore. I used to get riled up, just like everyone else. Yell at the radio. Pick fights in comment threads. Say things like “wake up” and “do your research” like they were spells to win arguments. But one day I was sitting in the back of the library with a free coffee and a slow internet connection, and I realized something simple:
Nobody’s listening when everybody’s shouting.
Somewhere along the way, we turned truth into a weapon. Not a light to see by, but a stick to hit each other with. You see it on every screen, in every feed, this need to be right louder than someone else is wrong. But truth doesn’t work that way. It’s not a flag for one team or the other. It doesn’t care about your side, your hashtags, your hot takes. Truth just is. And if it’s really truth, it’ll still be standing after all the noise dies down.
I’m just an old guy who uses the library computer when it’s not too crowded. I come around for the heat, maybe a granola bar if the volunteers are in. But I’ve seen a lot in this life… wars, recessions, revolutions, reboots, and I’ll tell you something nobody seems to admit anymore: most people are good, and most people are scared.
We’re scared of being wrong. Scared of being lied to. Scared of being left behind or made fun of or proven foolish. So we build our little echo chambers and throw rocks over the walls. We start seeing every disagreement as a threat, every headline as proof that the other side is evil. But it’s not evil. It’s just people. People trying their best with whatever map they were handed.
The internet gave us infinite knowledge and almost no wisdom. It made us all experts, but not listeners. We memorize facts like ammunition, not understanding. And worst of all, we forget that being right isn’t the same as being kind.
What if we started over?
What if truth wasn’t about picking a side, but picking a direction? What if it was something we held together; messy, incomplete, but honest in its pursuit? What if “I don’t know” was treated like a brave answer, not a weak one?
The people yelling the loudest aren’t always wrong. But they’re not always right, either. And shouting someone into silence isn’t the same as changing their mind.
So here’s my advice, for what it’s worth: next time you feel the heat rising, the urge to reply, to correct, to destroy someone online… pause. Not forever. Just for a second. Ask yourself: am I trying to understand, or just trying to win? Because there’s a difference, and it’s the difference between a conversation and a fight.
The truth is not afraid of questions. It doesn’t need an army. It needs caretakers. Quiet voices. Open ears. People willing to say, “I hear you,” even when they don’t agree.
I don’t post much. I don’t even have a real phone number anymore. But I watch. And I hope. Because every now and then, someone finds something like this, hidden between jokes and clickbait and rage, and it plants a seed.
Water it.
That’s all.
—Rusty
(from the library computer)
About the Editor: Rusty (last name unknown)
Column: Library Thoughts
Little is known about Rusty, an unhoused man who lives behind the 7-Eleven across from campus. He can occasionally be seen wandering campus looking for recycling, or using the gymnasium shower.
While campus security allows him to use public facilities, no one is sure how he continues to upload to The Poly Post from the library computer.
We do not have the login credentials to remove them. We apologize for the inconvenience.
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