“Just the facts, ma’am.” This line is widely believed to have been made famous by the character Joe Friday, detective sergeant in the famous Dragnet television series. Actually, Friday never spoke the line. It was popularized by Stan Freberg in his parodies of the show.
Nevertheless, the line summarizes modernity’s fascination with facts. For the modern, if you possess the facts, then you possess the truth. Facts equal truth, and whatever is factual is necessarily truthful.
