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How to Mislead with Facts

consilienceproject.org

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Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#231

Post by QuadmasterXLII »

Ambolia wrote: post #216

Most of the times "fact" wars or "culture" wars are just covert interest wars. Just ask yourself who benefits and how, pull from the string, and most "facts" will just dissolve on a carefully crafted narrative that has nothing to do with the truth and a lot to do with gaining or not losing some type of power.

Thats an interesting way to look at it. Picking a specific culture war, I’d like to examine gay conversion therapy. Who would you say are the covert interests pulling strings on either side?

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#232

Post by tablespoon »

WesternWind wrote: post #223

It seems like many journalists are failing in their primary responsibilities to keep the public informed. Fact checking liars or misleading statements is tedious, and some politicians lie or mislead. Journalists should be doing investigations and creating reports that put social and political issues in context. Yet so often these issues, real issues that affect lives, are treated as political theater or a public spor…

> It seems like many journalists are failing in their primary responsibilities to keep the public informed. Fact checking liars or misleading statements is tedious, and some politicians lie or mislead....

> I can't blame journalists for the politicians lying or misleading, but I can blame them for so often going for the easy stories that they are fed, instead of the hard ones they have to look for or put together.

It's worth noting that journalism in general has had its revenue streams decimated by Craigslist, clickbait, subscriber loss due to competing with free, etc. Except for very few prestige outlets, most media outlets have been forced to shrink their newsrooms, year after year, for a couple decades. Even though the prestige outlets are healthier, they're not so healthy as to be able to pick up all the slack.

It's easy to criticize someone for not doing as thorough a job as you'd like, but it's not very reasonable when that person is the last man standing from a team of ten, and the team's workload has increased in the meantime.

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#233

Post by NikolaNovak »

motohagiography wrote: post #57

Faster heustistic is to check not whether the facts are true, but if the implied conflict that connects them is real. The old adage about how "dog bites man," may be true but it's not news, whereas "dog bites capitalist oppressor" is essentially all news these days, and it may even be construed as not entirely untrue, even though it seems obvious the dog has not developed class consciousness and thrown off the leash…

Hi - where is that "dog bits capitalist oppressor" from btw? Google only has this comment. While I've been developing "news/internet literacy" for decades, I found it insightful to focus not just on facts but the spin and intent of fact presentation. Would love to read more if you've got some thoughts/links :)

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#234

Post by tablespoon »

Ambolia wrote: post #216

Most of the times "fact" wars or "culture" wars are just covert interest wars. Just ask yourself who benefits and how, pull from the string, and most "facts" will just dissolve on a carefully crafted narrative that has nothing to do with the truth and a lot to do with gaining or not losing some type of power.

> Most of the times "fact" wars or "culture" wars are just covert interest wars. Just ask yourself who benefits and how, pull from the string, and most "facts" will just dissolve on a carefully crafted narrative that has nothing to do with the truth and a lot to do with gaining or not losing some type of power.

No, I don't think it's that simple. Take the classic culture war issue: abortion. There's genuine, widespread, and deep opposition to it. The "covert interests" didn't manufacture that opposition, but they have latched onto it to help make unpopular policies (e.g. laissez faire economics, tax cuts for the rich) electorally viable.

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#235

Post by Ambolia »

QuadmasterXLII wrote: post #231
Ambolia wrote: post #216

Most of the times "fact" wars or "culture" wars are just covert interest wars. Just ask yourself who benefits and how, pull from the string, and most "facts" will just dissolve on a carefully crafted narrative that has nothing to do with the truth and a lot to do with gaining or not losing some type of power.

Thats an interesting way to look at it. Picking a specific culture war, I’d like to examine gay conversion therapy. Who would you say are the covert interests pulling strings on either side?

The issue is whether christian communities get to choose how to run their own communities or if they need to be told what to do from more progressive states.

Not saying they shouldn't be told what to do. Maybe they should.

But the power issue is very clear. They are either too dumb or immoral and need to be told what to do, or they are grown ups and can run their communities however they see fit.

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#236

Post by Ambolia »

tablespoon wrote: post #234
Ambolia wrote: post #216

Most of the times "fact" wars or "culture" wars are just covert interest wars. Just ask yourself who benefits and how, pull from the string, and most "facts" will just dissolve on a carefully crafted narrative that has nothing to do with the truth and a lot to do with gaining or not losing some type of power.

> Most of the times "fact" wars or "culture" wars are just covert interest wars. Just ask yourself who benefits and how, pull from the string, and most "facts" will just dissolve on a carefully crafted narrative that has nothing to do with the truth and a lot to do with gaining or not losing some type of power. No, I don't think it's that simple. Take the classic culture war issue: abortion. There's genuine, widespre…

Abortion is a can of worms which combines many underlying power issues, from the obvious issue of personal freedom that usually gets discussed, to the need of capitalism to be able to double the work force[1], to eugenics and demographic control [2], to the most fundamental power issue that is who gets to decide what it means to be human and when does human life start.

[1] https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/1/23/18183091/t...

[2] https://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/08/14/43208...

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#237

Post by tablespoon »

ren_engineer wrote: post #169
ncmncm wrote: post #31

The New York Times mastered all this long ago. It is not necessary to lie. All you need is to be selective about what truths you tell, and where. Some goes on the front page, some on page 13, other bits nowhere at all. Hans Blix's UN reports, before the invasion, about Iraq's entire lack of any WMD whatsoever were too important to completely ignore, but were easy enough to bury in a back page. The entire lack of any…

The NYT won a Pulitzer for helping the Soviets cover up millions starving to death. They've always been a propaganda rag https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walter_Duranty https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_famine_of_1932%E2%80%93...

> The NYT won a Pulitzer for helping the Soviets cover up millions starving to death. They've always been a propaganda rag

Your comment itself is a example of how to mislead with facts.

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#238

Post by sputr »

WesternWind wrote: post #223

It seems like many journalists are failing in their primary responsibilities to keep the public informed. Fact checking liars or misleading statements is tedious, and some politicians lie or mislead. Journalists should be doing investigations and creating reports that put social and political issues in context. Yet so often these issues, real issues that affect lives, are treated as political theater or a public spor…

> It seems like many journalists are failing in their primary responsibilities to keep the public informed.

I would argue that that is not their primary responsibility. That is, in fact, to put food on the table.

Journalists are not well paid and, more importantly, are easily replaceable. "Real journalism" is hard, but makes no money, while pop-journalism is very easy and profitable. So media companies demand and pay for pop-journalism. And that can be done by far too many people.

So blaming them for doing what they need to do to get paid when doing "real journalism" will get them fired is... pointless.

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#239

Post by ncmncm »

rndmize wrote: post #203
ncmncm wrote: post #31

The New York Times mastered all this long ago. It is not necessary to lie. All you need is to be selective about what truths you tell, and where. Some goes on the front page, some on page 13, other bits nowhere at all. Hans Blix's UN reports, before the invasion, about Iraq's entire lack of any WMD whatsoever were too important to completely ignore, but were easy enough to bury in a back page. The entire lack of any…

Oddly enough, I see no mention of any specific source in the article, yet the top comment here is bashing the NYT. Is there some reason for this? Does the NYT represent the entire industry? Are they alone in deciding what is news, or its priority? (One would be forgiven for thinking this is, in fact, the primary purpose of a news room). Selective choice of facts would seem to be applicable here, as if the vast majori…

NYT promotes itself as "the paper of record", holding itself out as the standard of truth. Its failings are thus similarly iconic.

Re: How to Mislead with Facts

#240

Post by mbesto »

WesternWind wrote: post #223

It seems like many journalists are failing in their primary responsibilities to keep the public informed. Fact checking liars or misleading statements is tedious, and some politicians lie or mislead. Journalists should be doing investigations and creating reports that put social and political issues in context. Yet so often these issues, real issues that affect lives, are treated as political theater or a public spor…

> but I can blame them for so often going for the easy stories that they are fed

It's hard for me to blame anyone who needs to put food on the table. Journalism isn't a benevolent profession, people need to get paid. Until money gets disconnected from this profession, I don't think it's ever going to be fair to say "why can't these people be ethical?".

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