OPINION: Turning up the volume won't solve our problems

Oct. 24—You're driving along listening to the radio when all of a sudden your car starts making a concerning noise.

Often this happens when you're in the middle of nowhere. You listen, hoping the noise — be it clicking or grinding or whistling or whatever — will just stop.

But of course, it doesn't.

So what do you do?

Most of us in this situation — including me — have at least once or twice in our lives decided to just turn the sound up on the radio.

In our heads, of course, we know that isn't going to fix anything. But if we can't hear the noise, we can at least pretend there isn't a problem for a while.

That approach seems to be increasingly prevalent in our world these days.

Take, for example, the COVID-19 pandemic version of turning up the radio.

I've seen more than a few people suggest that if we just stopped testing for it, there would be no COVID-19 virus.

It's understandable after all this time to ponder whether a testing halt would make the problem go away.

Trust me. I yearn for the day we no longer report the numbers of COVID-19 tests, hospitalizations — and deaths — on our website and on our print pages.

But we can't stop testing or reporting those tests and hospitalizations and deaths before the numbers dwindle much further. If we did, two things would almost certainly happen. More people would get more seriously ill from the virus and more people would die from it.

Then there's Facebook. The social media giant has apparently come up with its own version of turning the sound up on the radio.

It's apparently going to change its name.

A report came out Tuesday night from reporter Alex Heath in a story on the tech website, The Verge, that Facebook plans to "rebrand."

According to that story, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg plans to talk about it at the company's annual Connect conference on Oct. 28.

"A rebrand could also serve to further separate the futuristic work Zuckerberg is focused on from the intense scrutiny Facebook is currently under for the way its social platform operates today," Heath wrote.

Yup. That's gonna do it.

Just change the name. That will make everybody forget what former employee-turned whistleblower Frances Haugen told Congress about Facebook spreading misinformation and hate on its platforms — which include Instagram, WhatsApp and Oculus — in the quest for ever-increasing profits.

Then again, maybe they're on to something here. Some probably already have forgotten about Haugen.

Maybe there's enough who simply want all the noise to go away that a new name will be just the ticket. (How'd that work out for "New Coke?")

The ultimate example of turning the radio up to hide something that's obviously broken is the people — including many elected leaders — who perpetuate "The Big Lie" that the 2020 presidential election was stolen and who also assert that the insurrectionists at the Capitol on Jan. 6 were misunderstood protestors and tourists.

Some of the same people whose lives were threatened that day have got the sound turned up so loud it's hard for the rest of us to hear ourselves think.

But think we still must. And think we will still do.

Because in the end, no matter how loud you play your radio, your car is going to need to be repaired.

Unless of course you just want to let it ride until the whole thing breaks down beyond repair.

Email comments to dlyons@dailyitem.com.