There has been a lot in the public discourse lately about fake news and its a paradigm that should be studied but its nothing new. Fake news has another name and its one we all know as propaganda. Whats different today is that in order to recognize fake news we must first assume that there is real news somewhere and its getting more and more difficult to distinguish between the two. Real news is something that is reported professionally and objectively based on facts and verified sources. Propaganda is disinformation and misinformation used to inculcate the masses with a false notion of reality. The danger here is when the people begin to prefer fake news to real news. In the wake of our last election a lot of questions are being asked to ensure the credibility and qualifications of the president-elect and his choices for department heads. Everything is under a microscope and journalists are leaving no stone unturned to investigate those qualifications. This appears to be a good thing but it raises a question. Where was all this investigative journalism when a man with seemingly no past appeared on the political scene and ran for president? There are not many humans in this world that can live an entire life of academic achievement and have practically no one who remembers them with scant documentation that can attest to the fact that they even exist but we just had one in the White House for eight years. So the question we should be asking ourselves is how was this pulled off? The answer is that news reporting organizations in our democracy abandoned objectivity and authentication practices to publicly display an image of an individual that fit the media-friendly narrative of political correctness- a sparkling academic and the first black president. No media investigations were launched into his past and the watchdogs for the people made no efforts to verify anything. In fact legal roadblocks were thrown up and the favorite tools of propaganda, mockery and ridicule, were used to prevent anyone from doing so. Now we come to the President-Elect who is the antithesis of political correctness presenting himself as an actual person with a verifiable past that fosters a very different narrative -the first real president in many years. He is in fact so real that he is treated like a hostile witness by factions in his own party many of whom like the opposing party have spent decades draining the public coffers to personally enrich themselves at the expense of regular taxpayers. The political establishment is replete with backstabbers like John McCain who, like Barack Obama, has never had a real job in his life. The losing party was so sure that they had fooled the American people with the propaganda of political correctness-the first woman president-that they are unable to come to grips with the fact that the people were not fooled. So they are resorting to another propaganda tool-McCarthy-era politics to discredit and smear the incoming administration with the label of a secret fellow-traveling communist operative that conspired with the enemy to overthrow our election. It just never occurs to them to do it any other way so they have gone from the sublime to the ridiculous which works quite well with the lowest common denominator that eats propaganda like popcorn. Buzz feeds absurd reasoning that the people should make up own their minds in the face of character assassination with no evidence would be like one of your neighbors accusing you of molesting children with no proof and no victims. Just the accusation would follow you for the rest of your life and your reputation would be destroyed. But thats what propaganda is all about. Its not to disseminate truthful information its to destroy and stigmatize someone who doesnt think like you do. The American people need to take a long, hard look at their media, their intelligence organizations and their political establishment. In a democracy the people need to see and hear the truth. They dont need a media that wants the people to believe what it says while they ignore what they actually see. This does present a pretty picture to the rest of the world.
Impartiality is not possible and can never be possible. There are two types of reporting: Verbatim distribution: If you give the full and complete text of the thing you're reporting on, impartiality is not in question because you are not interpreting anything. Eg: when reporting on a book you post the complete text of the book. Interpretation: In any other case, interpretation is required. You take a long series of phenomena and condense them into a concise report. But the act of interpretation inherently introduces biases. The big one: the truth. You try to interpret the facts according to what you consider to be the truth. Unfortunately, your perspective on the truth is not always the correct one. You are a slave to your perception of reality. Then there are of course other more serious biases: political, religious, ideological, etc. That's a whole nother topic. These biases aren't entirely avoidable either, because they influence your view of the truth. If you try to eliminate them in favor of your perception of the truth, you just end up subconsciously back to your old self. [hr][/hr] So our efforts should be focused on 3 things: Encourage journalists to, to whatever degree is feasible, give us the complete verbatim event. Where this is not possible, to report honestly their perspective of the facts, while making their biases known to all to the best of their ability. To encourage free speech and as much variety in reporting as is possible. Please note that it is the responsibility of the reader to be critical about what information they consume. You cannot delegate this responsibility to others, least of all those giving you the information. Keep your head screwed on, take nothing for granted, accept no authority or credentials as evidence, be fiercely independent.
Fake news is hoaxes, not propaganda. Hoaxes can be a type of propaganda but propaganda doesn't often report flat out falsehoods and things that didn't happen. Propaganda is mainly "spin" if I understand that term aright. And the above is a really good example of propaganda. Nothing it says is entirely untrue but the emphases, the partisanship, the "spin" is fairly obvious. Obama was not a complete unknown, he was a New Man, someone who had not been on the scene for long, but his achievements in that time were far from inconsequential. I recall a friend of mine, about the staunchest conservatives I know, saying how well Obama's speech at the 2000 Democratic Convention, (unsure of that date) had impressed him. Donald Trump's father was one of NYC's most well known real estate tycoons. Donald increased his substantial fortune exponentially, but he's still not exactly a rags to riches story And just about everything you say about character assassination applies in SPADES to Hillary Clinton. Besides the email accusations, which just about everyone who investigated them said were inconsequential, not ONE of the other accusations against her were based on anything but complete and utter lies and slander, and this was proven by the most exhaustive investigations I have ever seen placed on anyone for anything. According to all this she is probably the most thoroughly PROVEN honest politician in American History, yet even most of her supporters did not really think so; the power of propaganda indeed.
A hoax is what happens when 4chan guys make up a story like golden showers gate because they know the establishment and the tools that worship them are desperate and will run with it. Lot of lol for those guys.
IMO, this is an objective appraisal of where we are, the reality we are living in. Our form of gov't demands a reasonable degree of education in our voters, notably Civics, some historical knowledge and an objective news source, devoid of all propaganda. And we have none of these requirements in place. MSM is a part of the establishment political system, supporting it, being its prostitute and no longer speaks truth to power unless it is driven by partisanship.
Truer words have rarely been said. The MSM, and their protection of every misdeed performed by Obama/Clinton over the past eight years, has bastardized the truth to the point of it being unrecognizable. At least to those still blinded, hurt and angry over the results of the recent election. One can only hope that the pendulum will begin to shift in the coming years.
Seems to me that Trump worshippers have in fact invented a foolproof plan to deflect from any legit criticism of Trump and his administration. Basically, if and when he fails, his low information supporters will shriek "Fake News!", while they continue to fawn over their orange president. The bad thing about it all? Everyone else gets screwed, while Trump and his minions live inside their "safe space" free from the EVIL media supposedly spreading "Fake News" about him.
As the previous poster stated, this is beyond projection. Publishing a dossier that's been circulating in the shadows for months and that nobody (news organizations or intelligence agencies) has been able to verify is Fake News. Reading how the DNC tried to interfere with the election by cutting Bernie Sander's legs from under him is Real News. Do you understand the distinction, or do you need more examples to strive toward high information status? BTW, you're hijacking the term "Safe Space". It's a term coined for leftist liberal college students who are terrified to confront the real world as it actually exists. People who have to psychologically live in a progressive cocoon to get up and function on a daily basis. I'd save your concerns for these poor souls when they're forced to exit into the real world.
That has yet to be proven false. What we know to be nonsensical garbage consumed in earnest by the political right are Obama is a muslim, Obama isn't a citizen, Obama didn't actually go to college, Death panels in Obamacare, Obama tried to infect the country with Ebola, conservatives would be put in FEMA camps, Obama and the UN would initiate a new global world order, Hillary ran a pedophile ring out of a pizza parlor, Hillary deliberately wanted Benghazi to kill Americans, Hillary was on death's door unable to handle the presidency, etc.... We could go on and on about the right wing nonsense that is the berock of the fake news movement, but there simply isn't enough space here. For a detailed accounting of what passes as fake news (or as conservatives put it, current events) just go to infowars, breitbart, fox news, or any other right wing hate media outlet.
Propaganda uses anything true or false to support those of your political ideology, and demonize your enemies. Hillary and Obama have almost universal support in the Leftist Mainstream Media, while Trump is bashed. This is almost to the same degree that Ilya Grigoryevich Ehrenburg worked in support of Stalin and Communism. http://www.ihr.org/jhr/v08/v08p507_weber.html
Is it "fake news" when the President-elect started a "fake" college? Just curious. And is it "fake news" with him on the Billy Bush video admitting to grabbing women's "private parts"? Just curious again.
Seems to me you are making excuses and projecting your own insecurities onto others. BTW, I didn't "hi-jack" anything. You guys are in fact parroting the "fake news" talking point your messiah and his minions are feeding to you, thus building yourselves a "safe space" that hides any legit criticism of Trump and his administration. Basically, anything that doesn't come from pro Trump propaganda sites such as Breitbart, InfoWars, The Blaze, etc, will be deemed "fake news" by Trump's gullible voting base.
Nice flowery language. You danced around the very specific example I gave showing the very real difference between fake and real news. So the reality is, you either don't understand it or don't want to confront it. I don't have tine to address either. I'm all for discussing legit criticism of Trump and his Administration. But he doesn't have a confirmed "Administration" yet. More important, he hasn't assumed office yet. At a practical level, there isn't a lot to criticize. That is, of course, unless your only agenda is to find fault and sling mud to satisfy pure left wing partisanship. He is what he is -- bombastic, thin skinned, prone to exaggeration, and politically incorrect in too many ways to list here. But if he accomplishes half of what's he's committed to do, I don't care. The people who voted him in as the next POTUS don't care. People want real solutions. Boot him out in 4 years if he doesn't deliver. In the mean time, all this crying and belly aching about his demeanor and tweets are useless noise. We've been fed 8 years of relentless dishonest propaganda. Hillary as Obama's third and possibly forth term was a non-starter. Get used to things being different.
Trump is the greatest man who has ever lived. So any news article that says something negative about him is fake news. SQUAWK fakenews
I saw your "example", and my response is "so what?" Your messiah and right wing pundits spread "fake news" on a daily basis. Difference between that "fake news", and the left wing "fake news" you complain about is purely partisanship in your eyes. Actually, there is plenty to criticize about Trump, even though he hasn't assumed office yet. That you don't want to hear any legit criticisms about him is on you. Considering he is going to be the face of the country on Friday, his demeanor is very relevant. The more he embarrasses himself, he also embarrasses the country. Things may not be all that different as you want to believe, especially since your hero is not only failing to "drain the swamp", but in fact building a whole new swamp filled with the same misfits he bashed during his rallies.
First can you stop with the "my messiah" nonsense? As a conservative, Trump wasn't my guy. I'm on record here from several months back that the man is a clown and that John Kasich was my choice. Not that I have to justify anything to you. But repeating that over and over is childish attempt to delegitimize opposing thought. If Trump is so offensive, the Democratic party should have put forth a candidate that was electable. Messiah?? Yea, right. But to the Fake news thing. I gave you a concrete irrefutable example of fake vs. real news. Your response is to spout generalized nonsense about right wing fake news on a daily basis. Give me an example with some teeth. I'm honestly perplexed about what this fake news is. Enlighten me. Legit criticisms are what interest me. We know that before assuming office, he's already saved close to a thousand jobs are Carrier, has commitments for tens of thousands of new jobs from other companies, and has commitments for billions of dollars of capital investments. This is all real. I'm not interested in criticisms that he uses Twitter too much, bullies people who attack him, or other nonsense about his boorish behavior. That stuff is left wing noise spouted by those who only want to undermine him. If you have "legitimate criticism" related to his bread-and-butter POTUS job duties, I'd like to hear. Your opinion, and you're entitled to it. I too would like to some tempering down of his demeanor, although I'm not as alarmed by it as you are, and even if he does, his detractors on the left will dredge something else up. We've just experienced a POTUS who expertly plays identity politics to appease his base, but within his duties to protect our country, sets red lines and then refuses to enforce them. That's the real kind behavior that embarrasses (and endangers) our country. Again, projection without any basis of fact. I'm not aware of any POTUS who has built a cabinet much like Trump is building. Trump had to slay 16 or 17 other candidates to get the Republican nomination. He wasn't going to get there without being unconventional. He didn't have the luxury that Hillary had of running under the protective bubble of the DNC. Now that he's been elected, your seeing the real Trump seriously reaching out to those who he battled with. Think of how much more this country could have accomplished if Obama had done the same?? If you get this, maybe you'll start to get Trump.
Anybody can accuse anyone of anything. That doesn't mean that all accusations are meritorious and should be automatically believed and investigated. Most experts agree that the dossier should never have been included.
Twenty years of Faux News, Rush Limbo, Michael Savage, Matt Grunge, Alex Jones and Breitbart, and look what that has done to public discourse. Talk about your fake news...their fans now live in an alternate reality. The rest of the worried is plainly worried, and they should be.
Well, if they are about the president, they most certainly should be investigated. You still have crackpots on the right who don't believe Obama is a citizen. Thank the idiot trump for that one as well. I like how you left out all the examples of fake news and conspiracies the right lived off of while the black guy was president. Now, we're supposed to unite behind one of the biggest supporters of conspiracy theories and trust that him when he says fake? I don't think so.
Actually, I agree with you that Kasich was the best choice from BOTH sides this election cycle, and that the Democrats screwed up badly by putting up essentially the only candidate who is even more disliked than Trump. The right wing does spout fake news on a regular basis, including your hero Trump who has lied through his teeth repeatedly. http://www.politifact.com/personalities/donald-trump/ So for him, who continuously spouts nonsense over and over again, and flat out making up drivel, to complain about "fake news" is laughable. There are plenty of legit criticisms about him. That you don't want to hear it or attribute to "left wing noise" is on you. I mean hell, your own party thinks he's a piece of garbage. That's your biased and partisan opinion on Obama, and you are entitled to it. Trump used the powerful tool of race baiting to get where he's at today, which all started with the whole birther issue in 2011 when he was thinking of running for the presidency back then. Trump is a fraud, period. The guy spent the majority of his life supporting liberal positions, only to then around 2011 suddenly pretend to be some faux champion of conservatism. And considering how for the last 8 years the right wing noise machine has been rambling on about how Obame is a foreign born muslim who hates white people, hates the police, and wants to flood the country with "illegals" who are living off welfare/stealing people's jobs, it's no wonder Trump with his "Build that WALL" rhetoric got where he's at today. You guys passed up someone like Kasich, who had potential to be a good president, for some bloated reality T.V. star who has no business being anywhere near the oval office. BTW, with regards to Obama, again you are entitled to your partisan opinion.
After Hours, a lot of information to respond to in your last post. I'm glad we agree on Katich. But while I appreciate the time you took, but you still didn't provide answers to my major requests, being: 1) Show concrete examples of right wing "fake news". You didn't. Bringing attention to some of Trump's outrageous statements is not "fake news". The press and prominent liberals latching onto a questionable dossier that hasn't been successfully verified after several months of circulation is fake news. I was asking for an equivalent smear campaign perpetuated from the right. You haven't been able to produce. I get it. 2) Show legitimate Trump criticisms that transcend his persona. Again, you didn't. I asked for it, want to hear it, but you were unable to list a single item. Sorry, liberal anger against who Trump is doesn't count as a criticism I should care about. The only other item I want to comment on is your fixation with the birther issue. I never personally bought into it and had no interest. But I do understand why it was an issue that wouldn't go away. If Obama had simply produced the original long version of his birth certificate from the start, the controversy would have died a quick death. I actually think Obama intentionally kept it alive for political advantage. And to a degree, he was successful. Really, it took two to tango on this one.
