But Seriously...

How is "Sandy Hook Truther" a thing?

It really is. Thanks to the likes of Alex Jones, there's now a group of people who think the most horrific, unspeakable act of violence in the last decade was some big put-on. How about that, Juice?

But it gets far worse. These lunatics are threatening to KILL parents who lost their children in the massacre:

(Source AP)
https://apnews.com/b3d2d2f44dd14b44...n=SocialFlow&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=AP

 

There's so many death threats since the rise of the internet, so I doubt these kooks are serious either, but it never ceases to amaze me how casually people throw this out. Didn't thousands of people threaten to kill that guy who was going to shoot some old rhino? I'm fervently against legislating speech, on the internet or anywhere else, but this is the one area people might need to make an exception.

 

I know. That's why I thought you would find this so fucking ridiculous.

 

Usually I'd pawn it off but this one is a whole new level of sick. I would want to murder the world if I were any of these parents, they are the LAST people on earth who deserve harassment.

Death threats are death threats and I hope they give this bitch the full 25 years-- As a lesson to future imbeciles. This shooting far and away above the other seemingly countless massacres sickened me in a way not even 9/11 could. The insane level of intentional malevolence and horror to it just rattled me to the core. It sure as hell was no "false flag". Those weren't government agents sobbing over graves and memorials. If somebody stabbed Alex Jones tomorrow I would laugh.

Conspiracy theorists aren't just stupid, they're dangerous because they actually encourage naive morons to act out. I wouldn't care if they were shot and pissed on.

 

Fake news.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/busi...16af66098fe_story.html?utm_term=.24e102f803ad

Most people have probably read this article by now. So, what is fake news? Who are the arbiters of what is fake and what is real?

I think and at least hope we have all come across articles that were just plain wrong and understand that it's the internet; not everything on the internet is true. What makes a lot of this fake news push seem weird to me is that it is being spearheaded by silicon valley and not by some Government regulator. In my mind, free speech is free speech; there may be limits somewhere but I'm not sure that censoring what some deem to be fake news is that great of an idea. Right now it looks like the tech industry is getting together to censor out a segment of free speech they don't agree with. I look at what the sentiment was during the election cycle and the tech industry overwhelmingly supported Clinton. What is to stop the industry which controls the content a large segment of the population sees from receiving all of the information available about a candidate or a current event that the controlling group doesn't want to be widely known?

I know there is a lot of concern about Russian or Chinese interference but the reality is that even if it's true, it's not the only form of interference. Foreign entities regularly bankroll candidates as well. That is influence. Additionally, on the flip side of this, America does entirely the same thing the world over. Look at Voice of America, why are we suddenly holding everyone else to a higher standard?

 

I really don't know what to do about fake news. Censorship seems like one of those cures that's worse than the disease, but the disease was terminal to begin with... so yeah, I think we're fucked.

 

Well, it sounds like you're conflating "heavily biased op-ed publications masquerading as factual news" and "publications that promote factually incorrect information and put forward rumors as news" as both being "fake news," and I think those are two different issues that each need to be addressed independently and dealt with in separate ways. (Not just you, the term very rapidly suffered from usage creep over the last few weeks or months. There's also a difference between "fake news" and "this person is just lying" that people aren't recognizing anymore and it's driving me nuts, but that's only semi-related.) For either kind, though, all of the proposed solutions I've heard being thrown around amount a lot more to accountability than censorship. It's totally possible I've missed something, because there's been so much to keep up with, but the primary concern seems to be figuring out how to give people the best ability to differentiate between the digital equivalents of tabloids and the guy ranting on your local street corner, and news that's at least attempting to comply with some standards - either set by expectation/reputation or the law - when it comes to good reporting. (Obviously, there has never been a news publication in the history of the written word that has been able to be completely perfect at maintaining these standards.) To me, the clear solution is education, starting early. We were being taught how to research and evaluate sources starting in third grade in my (public) school district. But I don't know how to prioritize that and equalize how it's taught on a nationwide scale when education in general is such a low priority and federally regulating education is a completely complex and controversial venture.

I also don't think the onus should be entirely on consumers of news for sorting this all out, especially when it has such important consequences. What responsibilities the news has to its consumers has been a complicated issue since newspapers began (and probably before then), it's not necessarily all that modern. Unfortunately, I think a lot of problems with both fake news and "real" news doing their job poorly are the "can't put the toothpaste back in the tube" type of problems, like such a higher priority of being "first" rather than being "accurate," the elevated importance on clicks/traffic for an industry that's essentially entirely supported by banner ads, and the melding of news with entertainment. I don't think "fake news" in the "heavily biased" sense of the term should have to change all that much, if at all, but I do think actual fake news has to have some kind of accountability in place. There are consequences for promoting false/inaccurate/misleading information in any other arena, and for good reason. It's just such a slippery slope type of situation whenever it comes to imposing any kind of regulation anywhere on the internet and, besides, even if some kind of system is put into place for somewhat established websites, as we've seen even here people can value what completely random and unqualified people can create entirely independently as much as "the news" and there's no way to combat that at all (except education). When it was just print newspapers, we all somehow collectively understood how to differentiate between the Op-ed section of the newspaper and the actual journalism sections, or the reputable newspapers versus the tabloids. There has to be some way to apply that to news/"news" online. I just don't know how. I've heard so few answers about all of this that are feasible, ethical, constitutional, and legal all at once.

And the reality that this question has been such a huge theme of this year is so goddamn surreal.

Edit: As I was writing all that, I was trying to remember what I knew about yellow journalism and how that was (at least attempted to be) squashed and how that might apply to this problem. Then I made my social media rounds and saw that JSTOR wrote about just that recently, with a handful of links to papers that look interesting to read at some other time than 3:30am. If anyone's interested.

 

If I had a dollar for every time someone in the media that was part of the problem was trying to explain the problem I'd be as rich as the Trump himself.

It's not a 'side'. It's both, through and through. Anyone in their right mind should be distrustful of the media these days, and most of the population is, with conservatives even slightly less trusting than liberals.

The thing is, even though both sides hate the media in general, they've largely bought into the caricatures of each other the media purports, as well as a lot of fake 'data'. I don't trust the data on jack shit anymore unless I thoroughly know the methodology used to gather it. Our politics now also influences the reporting on damn near everything, and it shouldn't. The spin we constantly get on how a story is reported seems to almost always be based on political reasons.

Businesses writing stories and selling narratives is a separate(errrr sort of separate) issue, and I guess is such easy money that a lot of the networks won't turn it down.

 

I see your point, I just think it boils down to six of one, half a dozen of the other.

Op-Ed masquerading as news or reporting factually incorrect information, in my mind, are the same thing; as both are trying to influence public opinion by showing no journalistic integrity. I don't want to single out journalists either because sometimes they can only report what witnesses or people of authority on an issue give them as the 'truth.' For instance: look at Benghazi and what reporters were told in the immediate aftermath was the cause of the event or look at outright lies told to the media in the immediate aftermath of Ferguson-Micheal Brown.

I do disagree to some extent with your view on the remedies. If the gatekeepers of search engines and social media decide to change the algorithms to suppress information then, in my opinion, that is censorship. If I read the other part of what you say correctly then I would agree. Accountability and Education are ALWAYS a good thing. If it is shown that a reporter, website, official or witness is shown to have knowingly lied to try to sway public opinion then they should be held accountable. I think we live in an age now where we can put the bad actors into the virtual public stockade so to speak, where the public can throw rotten eggs and vegetables at them; broadcast widely pictures and information about the reports/statements made that were incorrect with the individuals picture attached to them. Essentially call them a liar and ruin their reputation. If that happens enough, people will be reacquainted with the importance of honesty.

EDIT: Again though, we are left with: Who arbitrates the truth from the lies. Facts and truths depend on perspective in pretty much every arena other than hard science.

 

Wow, Chicago is serious about reducing crime! (By making less things a crime.)

From an e-mail from the Cook County State's Attorney:

"The Cook County State's Attorney's Office has a new policy concerning retail thefts.

Felony Review will not be approving felony charges unless the property in question is valued over $1000.

However, if felony charges are based upon the offender's prior criminal history, then charges will not be approved unless the offender has ten or more prior felony convictions."

I forsee a lot of wailing and gnashing of teeth as big retailers move their stores out of questionable neighborhoods and make shitty places to live even more shitty. But at least the jails won't be full of criminals.

 

That is both shocking and not surprising.

Not surprising because I have a personal bias against Reddit in that I've never really liked or trusted their up/down voting system. Just kinda had this intuitive feeling that it wasn't a good way to go about things.

But shocking because I didn't realize how easy reddit could be to manipulate. Though it makes sense.

I'd really like to see Reddit's response to that. And I recommend everyone here watch the video next posted. It's immensely interesting.

 

That's definitely true, but the other side of this is that the mainstream media outlets should do a better job so every time you want to understand something you don't have to dig through half a dozen sources. They do worse than poor, they pretty much just try to tell people what to think and I can't think of a single major outlet I haven't seen outright lie more times than I can count.

 

I think the complete opposite is true. The so called "mainstream" media has been moving toward bullshit sensationalism to try to keep up. The customer clearly wants easily digestible rage bait, not thorough reporting and in depth analysis.