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Sorry, I still think I am right about the media rarely lying

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Re: Sorry, I still think I am right about the media rarely lying

#3

Post by monsecchris »

I think the original thesis is correct, but my best counterexample is the Covington Kids where the media had the original video which gave them the full context, yet they chose to hide that evidence and instead advance the idea that somehow the kids were white supremacists based on the pixels from one close-up photo.

I think another reasonable counterexample is Jussie Smollett's catastrophe, where any fleeting scrutiny whatsoever would tell you that it was fiction, but the media failed to question even the most ridiculous story and ran with the false narrative for weeks.

Re: Sorry, I still think I am right about the media rarely lying

#4

Post by elmerfud »

Reading the first couple of sentences it seems that the definition of lying has been twisted a bit. Lying is about conveying information with the intent to deceive the listener. The acknowledgment that is made in the article that they believe media often deceives their listeners to advance an agenda by intentionally leaving out important context means that they are lying.

Trying to use a definition of lying that means only making false statements is not a proper definition. There is a big difference between someone who makes a false statement that they genuinely believe at the time and someone who makes a completely true statement but has omitted certain details in order to deceive the listener. The first person is simply mistaken and hopefully will correct themselves with more knowledge. The second example is someone who is using words to manipulate an outcome by getting someone to believe what is ultimately an untruth. It is completely possible to say only true things and be a liar.

"A lie that is half-truth is the darkest of all lies." ― Alfred Tennyson

Re: Sorry, I still think I am right about the media rarely lying

#5

Post by anigbrowl »

In an effort to be 100% right about a general observation to which some exceptions exist, the author contorts the original argument o ridiculous extremes, asserting that other parties may be fools, may even be crazy, but they're absolutely not liars. I don't know why it's such a stretch to acknowledge that some people are dishonest; this seems like an ego trip of someone so anxious to preserve a reputation or self-perception of superior rationalism that they suspend all other critical faculties like probabilistic estimation. It's easier to debate abstractions than make a real-world judgment call that might be wrong.

But they’re wrong! Read the articles! The one Vermillion linked is FBI Says No One Killed At Sandy Hook. It’s discussing an FBI crime statistics report for the year the Sandy Hook shooting happened. The report lists zero murders in the town of Sandy Hook that year; Infowars thinks this means the shooting was fake.

According to Wikipedia, the FBI report is real and does in fact list zero deaths for Sandy Hook. They say the shooting was investigated by Connecticut state police instead of Sandy Hook local police, and since the FBI crime statistics are based on local police reports, it didn’t include the shooting.

This is such bullshit. There is a world of difference between 'FBI report does not list any deaths at Sandy Hook' (a factually true statement hat might mean different things to different readers) and 'FBI says no-one killed at Sandy Hook.' I call bullshit because the writer is no fool and understands the difference between an omission and a positive assertion (of absence or non-existence). It's really disappointing to see a person of obvious intelligence with a significant following resort to such specious arguments rather than just qualify or venture beyond their original assertion.

tl;dr sophistry masquerading as objectivity.

Re: Sorry, I still think I am right about the media rarely lying

#8

Post by ZeroGravitas »

monsecchris wrote: post #3

I think the original thesis is correct, but my best counterexample is the Covington Kids where the media had the original video which gave them the full context, yet they chose to hide that evidence and instead advance the idea that somehow the kids were white supremacists based on the pixels from one close-up photo. I think another reasonable counterexample is Jussie Smollett's catastrophe, where any fleeting scruti…

Interestingly, a lawsuit about that was thrown out for the same reason given in this article:

https://www.businessinsider.com/covington-kid-nicholas-sandm...

Basically, the news was just reporting what someone said, so no foul.

> He objected to widely-reported statements by Phillips to the effect that Sandmann had "blocked" him and "would not allow him to retreat."

> But the judge said that these are "objectively unverifiable" and so can only count as opinion, which is unactionable in this case, as it is protected speech.

> Bertelsman also said: "The media defendants were covering a matter of great public interest, and they reported Phillips's first-person view of what he experienced.

> "This would put the reader on notice that Phillips was simply giving his perspective on the incident."

Re: Sorry, I still think I am right about the media rarely lying

#10

Post by monsecchris »

ZeroGravitas wrote: post #8
monsecchris wrote: post #3

I think the original thesis is correct, but my best counterexample is the Covington Kids where the media had the original video which gave them the full context, yet they chose to hide that evidence and instead advance the idea that somehow the kids were white supremacists based on the pixels from one close-up photo. I think another reasonable counterexample is Jussie Smollett's catastrophe, where any fleeting scruti…

Interestingly, a lawsuit about that was thrown out for the same reason given in this article: https://www.businessinsider.com/covington-kid-nicholas-sandm... Basically, the news was just reporting what someone said, so no foul. > He objected to widely-reported statements by Phillips to the effect that Sandmann had "blocked" him and "would not allow him to retreat." > But the judge said that these are "objectively unv…

Federal courts since then have stated that being called a "white supremacist" is not defamatory as well.

https://www.jdsupra.com/legalnews/court-rules-that-being-cal...

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