There’s much categorical reasoning about who disappears and why, and while here the government is not held up as the big bad bogey with a Gulag, there remains still a mystery attending each and every one of those lost souls.

It may be easier in the nature of things to account for fear and mistrust, especially where assessing information is concerned. Politically motivated agitation and propagand, censorship, and intimidation leaves new media viewers and old fashioned readers alike searching for verifiable reportage, and where it’s not to be found or a public has found that it has been misinformed, trust both in language and in people decays.

I wish I knew more about the development of common cause and trust across complex societies, especially as politicians and others develop power by siezing on and increasing the polarization between their positions, which they may do largely through suggestion and by making much of trivial differences between people.

Mobs don’t keep records but governments do, and over time the truth comes out in old memos, orders, purchase receipts, and rosters; where such do not come to light, one need not overestimate the powers of the state.

“You will see the power of the powerless soon”