When Everything Is Entertainment, Even the Truth Gets Dismissed
By Krystena LuCastro · Originally published on Medium May 2, 2025
I had an epiphany today that helped me understand something that’s been bothering me for a long time: why so many people struggle to tell the difference between fact and fiction, truth and propaganda, reality and entertainment.
We live in a screen-dominated world. Nearly everything we consume is edited, curated, and designed to entertain us. Reality TV made everyday people into characters. The news became another form of performance. Documentaries are mistaken for just another “angle,” rather than records of reality. Even when the content is factual, it looks like a show — so it gets processed like one.
And in that blur, something dangerous happens: people stop seeing others as real.
Public figures become characters in an ongoing drama. Politicians morph into celebrities, rehearsing soundbites and playing to a base rather than serving the people. The more they’re seen, the more they become familiar, and familiarity breeds fandom — not accountability. Eventually, they’re no longer expected to change real lives. They’re just expected to entertain and “win” the narrative.
Even everyday individuals — especially those who go viral or speak out — become fair game for critique, mockery, or trolling. Why? Because they aren’t seen as people anymore. They’re seen as content.
So when someone shares their pain, it’s received like a monologue.
When someone is vulnerable, it’s seen as weakness — or bait for commentary.
And when someone presents truth, it’s dismissed as just another scripted narrative.
This is what happens when everything is consumed through the lens of entertainment. Empathy erodes. Accountability feels optional. Facts lose power. And real people become characters in a story they never agreed to be part of.
But reality isn’t a show. And truth isn’t supposed to entertain.
It’s supposed to ground us.
How do we fix this? Can we?
Read the published version on Medium