3 ms·

The majority of "fake news" are factual news described from a partial point of view and with a political spin. Even fact checkers are not immune to this and br

The majority of "fake news" are factual news described from a partial point of view and with a political spin. Even fact checkers are not immune to this and brand other news as true or false not based on facts but based on the political spin they favour. Fake news is a vastly overstated problem. Thanks to internet, we now have a wider breadth of political news and opinions and it's easy to label everything-but-your-side as fake news. There are a few patently false lies on the internet which are taken as examples of fake news - but they have very few supporters.

mistermann 6y ago
> There are a few patently false lies on the internet which are taken as examples of fake news - but they have very few supporters. Very true. What's interesting though is how many supporters there of the idea that extremely large quantities of people 100% "hook, line, and sinker" buy into such fake news stories - based, ironically, on fake-news-like articles assuring us (with specious evidence, if any) that this is the true state of reality. The world is amazingly paradoxical if you look at it from the proper abstract angle.
chimprich 6y ago
> Even fact checkers are not immune to this and brand other news as true or false not based on facts but based on the political spin they favour. Could you give an example? > There are a few patently false lies on the internet which are taken as examples of fake news - but they have very few supporters. How many do you consider "few"? I can go to my local news site and read a story about the novel coronavirus and the majority of comments below the article are stating objectively false facts. "It's just a flu" "Hospitals are empty" "The survival rate is 99.9%" "Vaccines alter your DNA" ...and so on. There is the conspiracy theory or cult called QAnon, which "includes in its belief system that President Trump is waging a secret war against elite Satan-worshipping paedophiles in government, business and the media." One QAnon Gab group has more than 165,000 users. I don't think these are small numbers.

mistermann 6y ago

> There are a few patently false lies on the internet which are taken as examples of fake news - but they have very few supporters. Very true. What's interesting though is how many supporters there of the idea that extremely large quantities of people 100% "hook, line, and sinker" buy into such fake news stories - based, ironically, on fake-news-like articles assuring us (with specious evidence, if any) that this is the true state of reality. The world is amazingly paradoxical if you look at it from the proper abstract angle.

chimprich 6y ago

> Even fact checkers are not immune to this and brand other news as true or false not based on facts but based on the political spin they favour. Could you give an example? > There are a few patently false lies on the internet which are taken as examples of fake news - but they have very few supporters. How many do you consider "few"? I can go to my local news site and read a story about the novel coronavirus and the majority of comments below the article are stating objectively false facts. "It's just a flu" "Hospitals are empty" "The survival rate is 99.9%" "Vaccines alter your DNA" ...and so on. There is the conspiracy theory or cult called QAnon, which "includes in its belief system that President Trump is waging a secret war against elite Satan-worshipping paedophiles in government, business and the media." One QAnon Gab group has more than 165,000 users. I don't think these are small numbers.