The Tweet reported a news item. It shocked the reader. Their emotions spiked.
The news item was small and quiet. It reported on the same subject as the Tweet, above. No reactions to the item.
The topic was the same. Handled differently. Which one is believable? Which one is not? Why does this matter?
Because today’s America appears to rely more on Tweets and Facebook reports than news reports researched, studied and written carefully with supporting facts and logic. The news item is fact checker. The news item is reality. If it is doubted, check on their research. Then draw a conclusion.
The Facebook and Tweet reports may be true. Mostly they are not. They are not even news. Why? Because they report only emotion and opinion. If a happening – event, trackable and recorded – has occurred, then the opinion that accompanies it seems true, but it may not be accurately recording what happened.
Cause, effect, result. That is fact. That can be checked. That is embedded in context, too. The context can be checked. The combination of all these factors can be weighed for relationships that produce a clear statement of Cause, Effect, Result.
Then a judgment, your judgment, can be formed. Even then, context extends itself and morphs due to many factors. Does the occurrence now change in meaning and impact? Maybe. Maybe not.
This is why the historian's job is never done. Evolving events, relationships with a widening reach of facts and relationships, all point to why something happened and why it is important for us to know.
We all remember the old story about the King who lost his kingdom because of a lack of a nail. The horseshoe loosened on his horse’s hoof. The horseshoe fell off. The horse became lame soon after and shied from battle. The king fell off and was slaughtered on the battled field. All because of a nail.
What is the nail in today’s newscasts? What is the source of the news you are hearing or reading? Is it opinion or fact? Is it exaggerated or true to scale? Is the voice calm and balanced? Or is it excited and foreboding?
What we read or hear is input to our brains. What we accept as truth and fact is processing by our brains. Meaning is subjective. Fact is objective. Knowing the difference is vital to knowing what is true.
And it is not easy to know the difference. It takes work and concentration. Those who do this are accurate reporters. Those who don’t are creators of non-news, or fake news.
Guess who has lied more than 10,000 times in a little over 2 years? Taken as gospel but truly not fact.
Who is the producer of fake news, now?
I ask: who do you trust? Why?
April 30, 2019
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