By Valiente Rook
Is the news really neutral and about reporting the facts or is it about pushing agendas and giving us biased or opinionated information?
With the rise of “fake news” we need to be ever more vigilant when it comes to the information that we hear or see.
Whether we like to admit it or not, every one of us has our own stance and views on things that will be biased to one idea or another. We will tend to buy or watch outlets that support our views, reinforcing our own outlook on things.
Neutrality in the news rarely exists, as the majority of outlets will have their own narrative to tell and spread, mandated by those that own that outlet. They will try to sway us with their views on a story, whether it is by omitting facts, telling us one side of the story, using language to influence or by manipulating us emotionally. We do not want to see beyond what is being told to us, because we want to hear our own narrative and feel vindicated of our own prejudices.
We should try to fact check everything that we hear or read before spreading it ourselves, in case we ourselves become the mouth piece of “fake news” and regurgitate what is being fed to us without thinking about the wider or hidden implications. We shouldn’t automatically believe everything that is told to us, we should try to get as much information on a story as we can; reading all sides of the agenda, questioning the reliability of the source, checking the reliability of the author and finding out the arguments on all sides of the story. We should also bear in mind the time and space given to certain stories, if the news outlet is pushing one story and giving little time to something that may be of more importance to society. We should be careful about the facts and figures given to us without knowing the source or knowing if that source is reliable and who has funded or commissioned certain polls or research.
The reality is we do not have the time or even the resources to truly research any piece of news that we feel dubious about, in which case we can only stay alert to what is being said and question what we are being told without taking everything at face value. Lastly, if we can help it we should stop commenting on things that have uncertain facts in case by spreading it we make those facts certain in the minds of the populous.