Who gets their information from Facebook and believes it? I do sometimes… guilty
Who gets caught up in emotional targeted news? Me…. guilty
Who is too lazy to go verify and fact check? Me… guilty
Who looks at the sources? Me…guilty but this might be an okay thing, I look to see if the website or article is coming from a news outlet so that is a positive
Who trusts news media outlets? Me… guilty
Have I ever fallen for photo manipulation? Yep… guilty
I clearly have a lot of work to do
Cymone this week posted an article Defining Fake News, I found myself making connections to the types of fake news I have fallen victim too; news fabrication, photo manipulation, advertising and public relations. It really bugs me when I fall for the news article because they LOOK REAL to only realize afterwards that it wasn’t or something inside says this doesn’t seem and I go look at a “trusted” news source and let me tell you my trusted news sources are like pretty ridiculous at times. I will look to see if it is on Discover Moose Jaw or Moose Jaw Today, the LeaderPost, or any other Saskatchewan/local news outlets but then I hear about their one sided views. This makes me so frustrated!
When it comes to photo manipulation it just blows my mind how pictures can be made to look so real or how easy it is to take a picture and place it in a different context, much like that ones that Alec showed us a few weeks ago in class. This occurs so easily and often as the article states it’s to catch the eye of the audience or to reinforce the content being discussed, my husband often says “a picture or it didn’t happen” but this cannot even be trusted anymore.
I am also a sucker for click bait stuff with interesting headings but for me this doesn’t have to do with me thinking it is a news story, it is more for the mindless entertaining story it may provide or for the shopping; thanks advertising and public relations!
Chris then talked about the consequences for students in the video and I think these are exactly where I am when it comes to the Ukraine & Russia War. I am terrified about all the misinformation out there and there is no quick and easy place to find the right information; well there might be but I don’t know where to look and I feel so overwhelmed already with my busy life that I do not find the time or energy to dig into it. Does this make me a bad person? I feel that it does. I feel worried that I am not able to tell false versus real in the time frame I would like to get my information in. Then I second guess news sources and I do not know who to trust, HELLO can I just get the old fashioned Moose Jaw Times Herald newspaper back, maybe I can trust that information; the world of getting news information seemed simpler then or at least easier and more trustworthy. The other point brought forward was anxiety; I suffer from anxiety and it seems to be more heightened lately with balancing my life’s pressures and goals. So pairing identifying fake news in regards to Ukraine and not sure who or what to believe or the anxiety of believing something that is not true, I am avoiding it all together.
Holly then provided 3 easy tips to teach our students how to spot fake news that I think I am going to use and take for myself; take a look at the source, look for its accuracy; fact check on snopes or politifacts), and look for neutral language. I believe it isn’t fair of me to teach my students how to spot fake news if I cannot do it myself and be confident in it. I am grateful for those websites to offer the ability for fact checks; thank you for sharing Alec and Holly for the reminder.
Frame of References:
Alec has provided these frames of references for understanding media bias but I still have some learning to do when it comes to understanding what left and right mean, or how to interpret them. So if you have any help with that I would love to hear it!
The jury is most definitely in, and I am so guilty and have a lot of work to do in order to grow in this area.
I am with you Christine! I felt as if I had no critical literacy and media viewing strategies prior to taking this course. This feeling of being shaken up and questioning what things we have believed in the past is uncomfortable, but ultimately positive, because it shows that we are striving to be better and develop new habits. I am so not a politics person, but I usually think of left as liberal-minded and right as conservative-minded.
I really like the way you put out those questions, which I believe I am guilty too!! And I need to work a lot when it comes to fake news and misinformation. Last week’s topic discussion and presentation were great as they shared good articles about fake news, with which we can relate a lot and learn how to deal with it. However, I believe social media plays a major role in the spread of fake news by fueling the sharing of fake news- often without people realizing they are becoming part of the problem.
Yup… I am guilty of all of those as well. With the pandemic, I do find myself being a bit more skeptical of what I read. So much false information was dropped with covid, so that did help me use a bit more critical thinking than normal. Thanks for reminding me of those media bias charts! It’s super interesting how media and news still take a bit of a side, even when they are simply informing the world of something.
I think that same that it’s important to check the truth behind a social media post which looks weird. Also checking the facts gives us a clearer picture about a post that is in a trend on social media. There are many websites where we can check the facts. I use Google Fact Check tools. Here we can simply copy the URL and check if something is real or fake. Also the three aspects which are: checking the resource, accuracy, and fact check are important as these are incomplete without each other.
I just love the way you started this blog. I too am guilty of the questions you asked… Sometimes I have a lack of time so I don’t check facts and most of the time I am lazy… but yes I agree it is important for us to check… Social media has aggressively increased the spread of misinformation and at one or the other point of our lives, we all have read it… Also, thanks Amanpreet, I will surely try this Google Fact Check Tool.
Yes, Christine! I appreciate your honesty and humour. I too am guilty of many of the things you mentioned and have been feeling bad about not being better at recognizing fake news. I have really appreciated all the resources provided in class and hope to become more efficient in verifying information. There just isn’t enough time in the world to be able to consistently verify the sources for everything we read. Hopefully using the tools mentioned in class and reading information with a critical lens will help us to develop skills to recognize fake news.
Oh, goodness. Your first few opening questions had me thinking. The other day I was scrolling through videos on Twitter and realized that my emotions were dragging me down a rabbit hole. It had been a particularly trying day at work, and trying to escape my brain for a while, I resorted to checking in on Twitter to see what my peers in #ECI832 were up to. But instead of sticking to that hashtag, I was watching sad videos about helpless animals. I clearly didn’t realize what I was doing quickly enough, but once I did, I knew I had been played a bit. So yes, I too am guilty of some of the points you raised in the opening of your blog post.