{"id":29649,"date":"2018-04-01T05:45:01","date_gmt":"2018-04-01T09:45:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/?post_type=bu-article&p=29649"},"modified":"2021-12-01T14:16:55","modified_gmt":"2021-12-01T19:16:55","slug":"the-war-on-fake-news","status":"publish","type":"bu-article","link":"https:\/\/www.bu.edu\/com\/articles\/the-war-on-fake-news\/","title":{"rendered":"The War on Fake News"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

One month before the 2016 presidential election, a white supremacist Twitter account sparked a rumor linking the Democratic Party to a pedophilia ring operating out of Comet Ping Pong, a Washington D.C., pizzeria. The story blazed across the internet\u2014one million tweets were tagged #Pizzagate in November alone\u2014and came to a head when Edgar Maddison Welch, a soft-spoken 28-year-old from North Carolina, decided to take matters into his own hands. On December 4, he opened fire on Comet Ping Pong. Although no evidence of trafficking was found at the site, and outlets as diverse as Snopes.com, the New York Times<\/em> and Fox News<\/em> debunked Pizzagate, the story stuck. A December poll<\/a> of 1,224 US voters found that 9 percent believed Hillary Clinton was \u201cconnected to a child sex ring,\u201d while 19 percent were not sure. \u201cIt\u2019s now clear that so-called fake news can have real-world consequences,\u201d Clinton said after the election. \u201cIt\u2019s a danger that must be addressed, and addressed quickly.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fake news has become a two-part problem: Fictional stories whip from Facebook feeds onto front pages, while right-wing media and government officials\u2014most notably, President Donald J. Trump\u2014level devastating charges<\/a> against the mainstream media that it<\/em> is peddling fake news. The COM community is working to take down this two-headed hydra, devising inventive ways to help restore trust in mainstream reporting and give the public new tools for separating fact from fiction.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWTH, LAMESTREAM MEDIA!\u201d
Sarah Palin, former governor of Alaska, on Facebook<\/a><\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Michelle Amazeen<\/a>, an assistant professor of mass communication, advertising and public relations, has mapped fake news\u2019 proliferation. In the period between 2014 and 2016, Amazeen\u2014with Lei Guo<\/a>, an assistant professor of emerging media studies, and Chris J. Vargo<\/a>, an assistant professor at the University of Colorado Boulder\u2014tracked 171,365 stories from 60 fake news websites for a study<\/a> published in New Media & Society<\/em> in June 2017. They found that credible news organizations influence fake news purveyors, who spin falsehoods around grains of truth; mainstream media then spends time and money debunking those bogus stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThose stories tied up a remarkable amount of news media resources that could have been devoted to other important issues,\u201d Amazeen says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

No wonder Welch was so confused about Comet Ping Pong. After his arrest, the New York Times<\/em> reported<\/a> that Welch had \u201csaid one article on the subject led to another and then another. He said he did not like the term fake news, believing it was meant to diminish stories outside the mainstream media, which he does not completely trust.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Such lack of trust has helped fuel the rise and influence of fake news. In September 2016, Americans\u2019 trust in the media hit an all-time low<\/a> of 32 percent. At that time, just 14 percent of Republicans trusted the media (down from 32 percent in 2015), compared to 51 percent of Democrats.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It\u2019s a long fall from 1976. With Watergate still a fresh memory, trust of the media was at an all-time high: 72 percent of Americans had confidence in mass media. Trust declined throughout the 1980s as cable television and conservative radio gave airtime to commentators like Rush Limbaugh, who questioned media reports that clashed with their own world views. The partisan divide widened until \u201cattacking the press was a part of what a successful Republican candidate did,\u201d says Dean Tom Fiedler <\/a>(\u201971).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The mainstream press has also made itself an easy target, says Fiedler, often producing reporting with a progressive slant, especially on issues important to conservatives. For example, mainstream stories about abortion rights tend to be written from the perspective of those who favor women\u2019s rights, and suggest that pro-lifers are extremist and antagonistic to women. The progressive bias pervades mainstream media on issues ranging from gun rights to coverage of the 2016 election, and \u201ctends over time to put the media in a position where it can be criticized for alienating people,\u201d Fiedler says. During the election, \u201cthere were a lot of Trump voters who felt disrespected by the press, which they associated with liberals, or people who look down on them.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Those missteps\u2014combined with the sometimes blurry line between real and phony\u2014made it easy for Trump to weaponize fake news. When Trump attacks the media as fake news, \u201che\u2019s trying to destroy the credibility of the press so the watchdog becomes toothless and the power the presidency can yield is unchecked,\u201d says Fiedler. \u201cOurs is a democracy that depends on the informed \u2018consent of the governed,\u2019<\/a> and in order for the governed to be informed, they need information that has integrity. If they are unable to give their consent based on good information, then our democracy will die.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cTHANK YOU FOR DOING YOUR JOBS!\u201d
\u2014A note<\/a> from a Trump rally attendee to reporter Sopan Deb and his colleagues<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

In this era of fake news, the tenets of good journalism have never been more vital. Starting with fairness. Fiedler says fair and impartial representation of views from both sides can help heal the partisan divide and restore conservatives\u2019 trust in the media. He recommends journalists and outlets check their biases when selecting and reporting stories, especially when covering issues with emotional weight, like abortion rights and gun control. Amazeen notes that many mainstream outlets are making headway: The New York Times<\/em> hired conservative op-ed writer Bret Stephens<\/a>, and NPR established the \u201cDivided States\u201d series<\/a> to interview supporters of both presidential candidates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

CBS News reporter Sopan Deb (\u201910) was dubbed<\/a> by Politico<\/em> as one of the \u201cbreakout media stars\u201d of the 2016 campaign season for his work debunking misinformation and helping to inform voters. Now a culture reporter<\/a> at the New York Times<\/em>, Deb interrogated then candidate Trump at press conferences, fact-checked his speeches, and offered spot-analysis. He also spent a lot of time interviewing the future president\u2019s backers\u2014despite some hurling insults at him.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Michelle
Assistant Professor Michelle Amazeen has found that fewer than 50 percent of consumers who access news online can identify its source.<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe vast majority of Trump supporters I interacted with over those two years were very nice and very warm,\u201d says Deb. \u201cThey just wanted to have their voices heard.\u201d In a CBS recap<\/a> of his campaign reporting, he wove in quotes from his conversations with Trump supporters. Sandy Woodmansee, a construction supervisor from New Hampshire, told him, \u201cI was laying in bed, trying to sleep, and I don\u2019t know why, but I thought of the Clintons being back in the White House and it absolutely appalled. The very next day I volunteered to assist Donald Trump.\u201d When his candidate won the New Hampshire primaries, \u201cWoodmansee spotted me across the room, walked up to me, grabbed me by the face and plopped a big kiss on my cheek.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to improving fairness in reporting, journalists must remind themselves of another 101 lesson: Be wary of anonymous sources.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cAnonymous sources are cancerous,\u201d says Fiedler, who adds that transparency is key to irrefutable reporting. Mainstream outlets like the New York Times<\/em> too often lean on anonymous sources, \u201csurrendering some of their credibility every time. These are little things, but they add up over time to a vulnerability in the media to the skepticism that conservatives hold on to.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

COM is training future journalists to combat fake news by respecting those tenets of journalism. In courses like Media Law and Ethics, students learn how and when it may be appropriate to use anonymous sources, and in classes like Media Criticism, they investigate issues including political biases and the effect of conservative news on mainstream media. They\u2019re also taught to avoid content like native advertising\u2014designed to blend in with a paper\u2019s own stories\u2014that erodes readers\u2019 trust. A consumer survey by Amazeen found<\/a> that fewer than one in five people could distinguish native ads and that their trust in a publication declined upon learning the content was branded. \u201cOn the one hand,\u201d says Amazeen, \u201cjournalists are trying to fight fake news, but on the other hand, the publishers at their organizations are participating in this practice that some find misleading or ethically challenging.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIN A WORLD OF WILD TALK AND FAKE NEWS, HELP US STAND UP FOR THE FACTS.\u201d
\u2014PolitiFact call to action<\/em><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Curbing fake news isn\u2019t just a job for experts and the media. \u201cUltimately, the only solution here is going to be creating a more literate society,\u201d says Fiedler. When buying a new car, he points out, we might check Kelley Blue Book<\/em> and read online reviews.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It would make sense, he says, to spend as much energy analyzing the media that drives our other major decisions, like selecting a president. It turns out, the majority of us don\u2019t.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fewer than 50 percent of consumers who access news online can identify its source, Amazeen found in a study<\/a> she published in Digital Journalism<\/em> in 2017\u2014and yet, we pass that content along to our own online communities, becoming complicit in its proliferation. To start, Amazeen suggests to her students, pay attention to sources and bylines, and be wary of content penned by \u201cstaff,\u201d which is often produced by PR firms. Read the \u201cabout\u201d page, where some fake news sites print a disclosure. Amazeen recommends that journalists use the \u201congoing story structure,\u201d a term coined by Kathleen Hall Jamieson, cofounder of FactCheck.org<\/a>. In this method, newsrooms track and continuously report on tenacious fake news stories, instead of debunking them once and moving on. She notes that BuzzFeed News<\/em> reporter Craig Silverman has been leading this charge.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Following Trump\u2019s inauguration, Amazeen and other COM faculty developed a series of media literacy initiatives for students, including visits from journalists and class projects on fact-checking. Aaron Sharockman, executive director of the Pulitzer Prize\u2013winning fact-checking organization PolitiFact<\/a>, taught students how to verify statements by political leaders. A forthcoming program will train students to assess the credibility of news sources, and to detect and expose fake news. Students will then share their fact-checking knowledge in high school government, political science or journalism classes in the Boston area, as well as with organizations engaged in the 2018 senate elections, like the League of Women Voters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt can be exhausting for people to have to try and sift through what\u2019s accurate, and what\u2019s not,\u201d Amazeen says. \u201cBut in today\u2019s age, it is in our interest to be able to determine where information is coming from so we\u2019ll recognize all the attempts at influencing us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The state of the union isn\u2019t all gloom and doom; there has been an upswing in consumers turning to trusted news sources. Since the election, publications like the New York Times<\/em>, the New Yorker<\/em>, the Atlantic<\/em>, and the Wall Street Journal<\/em> have counted record donations and subscriptions. In the fight against fake news, and the Trump administration\u2019s attacks on mainstream media, Fiedler says we\u2019re seeing \u201can energized news media, not one that is shrinking from this.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know that you\u2019d see in more than a handful of other countries the news media driving the public agenda, as is happening in the US. If I were watching from another country, I would see this as an encouraging sign of a vibrant democracy where the news media plays a critical role.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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