Unknown Artist: Color Reconstruction: Ahuramazda in the Winged Disk
21st century reconstruction of 5th century BCE original)

Gallery Text
Carved from brownish limestone, the Persepolis sculptures were painted and sometimes further enhanced with gold overlays as well as blue inlays imitating the semiprecious stone lapis lazuli. The color reconstruction you see here, made of plaster with acrylic paint, is based on close examination and scientific analysis of the original relief fragment (1943.1062) displayed immediately outside this gallery [in gallery 3460].
The incised star patterns are revealed by “raking” light, which illuminates the surface from a low angle. Traces of bright red cinnabar (mercury sulfide), green malachite a copper carbonate), and Egyptian Blue (the oldest synthetic pigment) are visible with the naked eye. Similar depictions, notably on glazed brick reliefs, provide further clues, but the reconstruction remains partial and speculative. As proposed, the coloration of the winged disk recalls inlaid gold jewelry. This may well have been the intended effect, heightening the splendor of what is most likely a representation of the god Ahuramazda.

Harvard Art Museums/Arthur M. Sackler Museum, Museum Collection
Object Number
1943.1062.X
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"I work much harder now, trying to become informed."

The few decades between when broadcast television supplanted radio as this country’s primary news source and the proliferation of first cable, then social media-based outlets replacing broadcast TV, the content of what passed for news changed. More properly, the content of what passed for news transformed into what Walter Cronkite could not have claimed represented anything even remotely resembling “the way it is,” if, indeed, it ever had. I fear expectations failed to shift in unison with that change; however, so many people continue to believe that what passes itself off as news today resembles what used to pass muster as news. It doesn’t. A slow erosion of reportage was replaced with what I might most generously label Speculation. Explanations of what just happened were supplanted by descriptions of what might occur and what might have occurred: reportage became Speculation.

When Faux (Fox) News branded itself as “news”, new ground was broken. Newspapers had for eons featured some publications that were little better than scandal sheets, classified as news but containing little of it. These were published as entertainment, but video had not previously dabbled in such desecration. Radio had begun creeping more deeply into similar territory with Rush Limbaugh souring those airwaves, but aside from late-night junk “religious” broadcasts, video still observed the separation of information and speculation. It was dog bites man, and man bites dog back, until Rupert Murdoch, an Australian scandal sheet publisher, created Faux News. It was an immediate hit among those more attracted to entertainment than actual reportage. Murdock’s addition of the tag line “fair and balanced” completed the illusion. Ta Da! A new kind of news was born.

Faux delt more in propaganda than anything. It soon became the chosen media for the vast right-wing conspiracy that had been trying to undermine Democracy ever since the Tories lost the war for independence. They wanted kings and tax breaks, and railed against innumerable imaginary enemies like socialism, liberalism, abortion, and secular schools. Anyone raised on actual news could see right through the transparent manipulation of information they engaged in, but, again, many sought entertainment over understanding. These were willing victims. They routinely voted against their own best interests and blamed whichever opponent their “news” outlet suggested was behind their misfortune. Few ever figured that they were the authors of their own destiny, they and their poorly informed choices.

An alternate media universe emerged from Faux News. People broadcasting what decent people would not have dared whisper in public beforehand. Hate speech became a significant portion of the available spectrum. Traditional news struggled to compete with such entertaining Speculation. The way it is became a matter of opinion, and not a well-informed opinion. Regardless of the ageless wisdom that one might be free to choose their opinions but not their facts, it became fashionable, if not obligatory, for people to insist upon choosing their facts, or having their chosen entertainers choose which facts they should choose for themselves. Reality proved to be remarkably fungible. People could and did inhabit fantasy bubbles where liberals conspired to ruin real lives and begrudgment against imaginary enemies fostered ever greater animosity.

Eventually, with the internet undermining even local advertising, The News shrank in relative importance. It couldn’t afford to compete with the ever more popular made-up shit it was forced to compete with. The propaganda and the Speculation attracted advertising dollars, too, because they attracted so many more viewers. Slanders from well-positioned politicians helped encourage a belief that reportage was usually just “fake news.” This encouraged ever more fake news outlets to insist that they represented fair and balanced reportage until it became nigh on impossible to distinguish between bullshit and reliable information. This fragmented public opinion, and more people bought into the idea that freedom bestowed the obligation to make up one’s own facts as well as opinions, until it became impossible to definitively determine the way things were.

The disturbing part of scrolling through what might serve as news must be that there’s little distinction between information and speculation. I have my trusted sources, though these definitely no longer include the NYTimes and the WAPost. A series of citizen reporters has replaced what institutions once provided. CBS News was publicly compromised. Few can afford to maintain a cadre of foreign correspondents. What might have once been news has been replaced with, at best, well-intended Speculation. Nobody seems to possess an adequately global perspective. I trust my sources, but I also understand that they’re not anything like infallible. I access them more to keep me watching than to necessarily settle anything. I understand that their scope might be just a little broader than mine, but that together, we might better understand.

I do not mourn the days when Cronkite could definitively proclaim the way it was. He didn’t know what came next, either, which made even his certain plumbline reporting just another form of Speculation. I tuned in to anticipate that by learning the way it is, I might better foresee the way it might be next. This urge exactly mirrors why I scroll through my more speculative social media feeds. I tell myself that at least I haven’t been duped into believing Faux News was ever fair and balanced. Declaring fairness and balance must be the most self-disclosing tell that you’re neither. Those who actually are fair need not proclaim it. Balance probably seems obvious to anyone actually interested in experiencing it. I work much harder now, trying to become informed. I have no way to determine whether I actually am or not. Only more time will tell.

©2026 by David A. Schmaltz - all rights reserved

Tags: #Unscrolling, #PureSchmaltz