Cordelia Barber: The paradox of authenticity in the transparent society

The paradox of authenticity in the transparent society.

Everybody wants their politicians to be transparent and authentic.... Until they see the real human. Then it's "No, no, no; not like THAT".

In the transparency society, we not only crave authenticity, but we punish things that are not "smooth", and seemingly easy to understand. The harder an issue, the less we like it.

We live in an era where there is so much information, and we crave being able to sort and make sense of it as quickly and easily as possible because, well, we're all really rather busy. What we make time for in the world of today says a lot about us. What we absolutely do not have time for ends up now saying *more* about us, because it is the opposite of transparency or smoothness. 

When politicians refuse, deflect, or don't address something, it becomes a larger elephant in the room, even if only to those that it matters to. 

People on the right are stoked Carney isn't as focused on the environment as he began claiming he would be -- on the left, they're furious.

When inconsistencies arise, this is "roughness", or I'd call it more fine-grainededness or granularity. The more granular something is, the less likely we are to chew on it unless we have a really good reason to. It just goes unprocessed because we're busy. We overlook things that don't matter to us, and hyper focus on the things that do. 

This isn't "new", but it is increasingly more common to not be able to see the forest for the trees in politics. But everyone *insists* that the granular thing they're chewing on is one of the most important, or is an indicator, or is the heaviest thing in a weighted average.... Whatever it might be.

We've lost nuance, and politicians (especially the non-politicky ones) have a LOT harder time actually governing now (per the article) than they did before. Everything is about perception, because of the transparency society.

And what led us here, to this age of burnout, exhaustion, living in the swarm, in an era where Eros is in absolute agony, where love is disappearing to the margins?

Read some Byung-Chul Han. There's something in there for everybody, I swear.



Cordelia Barber is an outspoken Canadian-born citizen who has regularly volunteered and worked with political parties in Alberta and BC. Currently residing in Vancouver, she is beginning her career and will have her substack publishing about Canadian and world culture in 2026