During the Ebola scare that revolved around Kacie Hickox in 2014, I was the local newspaper editor in the rural Maine town of Fort Kent, where Hickox stayed after she left isolation in New Jersey. As a consequence, I know a thing or two about how different media outlets portray the same events.
When I compared what we saw on national news and social media with what I saw with my own eyes as Hickox and Maine Governor LePage faced off in front of the world, I can say with confidence that along with the solid reporting that occurred, I also saw fake news, biased reporting, and reckless reporting while our community orbited that black hole we call “The Media”, and I survived to tell the tale.
Since the reports emerged that fake news stories may have influenced the recent election, readers of our publications have approached me to ask how they can know if a news report is real or fake. Beyond the commonsense advice to find news from reputable sources and to check out the truth of an article you find on social media before passing it along, here are 10 things you should know about the news, both fake and real.
1. The free press isn’t free. The news comes to readers, both print and digital, as the result of research, many hours of effort, insight and talent. Whether someone is earning their money to write real news or fake news, someone is paying for that report.
2. Fake news is cheap to write. The only thing cheaper than making up facts and relying on gullible Internet users is the price to share fake news on social media.
3. Know if you are the customer or if you are the product. When you buy a newspaper, pay for access to digital news, or your digital outlet has a printed version that they sell, then you are the customer and the news is the product. If the news is “free” to everyone, such as network news and many online news outlets that have no print edition to sell, then the reader (and their online information) is the product, and the advertiser or special interest group funding the publication is the customer.
4. The reliability of news declines by geography. Local news is generally reliable but becomes increasingly less reliable when you reach regional distances beyond state borders. If one of our local papers publishes misleading or incorrect information, our readers can confront us with the facts, and we take responsibility to correct the mistake. Locally written and locally sourced reports on distant events are generally reliable, as are most news wire stories from sources such as Reuters and the Associated Press.
5. Political news is the most unreliable news. Whether it involves politicians speaking out of ignorance on complex or specialized topics, biased reporting by the publication, politicians ignoring questions to blather on about an unrelated topic, or people just spouting nonsense in an authoritative tone, political news is mostly a mess of self-contradictory statements and opinions. Bring a big grain of salt.
6. People try to manipulate the news. I’ve seen people — from members of law enforcement, to politicians, to organizations, to private citizens — use subtle and not-so-subtle tactics to manipulate the news media. People will pass on leads anonymously in order to embarrass rivals or manipulate local opinions, civic leaders will demand we suppress a story for the sake of the community, or someone might threaten us with legal action. There are any number of ways to try to influence the news.
7. “The Media” tells more truths than lies. That’s why we pay attention. However celebrity news is not news. It is gossip, and we should know the difference.
8. There is a spectrum of reliable news, stretching from news that is without any discernable bias such as weather alerts, to total fabrications meant to manipulate people to act against their own self interest. The trick to telling the difference is to identify whose interests the outlet is serving.
9. In general, seek national and world news from unemotional sources. If you find your world and national news from sources that tend to inject emotional opinions into the content, you run the risk of aping those opinions or rejecting them out of hand. We all know how to think for ourselves.
10. Support your local news outlet. Local journalists record your community’s history. Relying on social media to record precious local history makes about as much sense as relying on a pack of howler monkeys to paint the Sistine Chapel. A person who loves their community and values the regional history will support the local news outlets by purchasing print copies or buying a print or digital subscription.
It’s a wild world when it comes to news. Before you sit down for a satisfying meal of online content, ask yourself, am I buying this meal, or is someone fattening me up for the slaughter?
Andrew Birden is the founder of Fiddlehead Focus and general manager of Northeast Publishing, a division of Bangor Publishing Company, which produces the Houlton Pioneer Times, Star-Herald, Aroostook Republican, St. John Valley Times and Fiddlehead Focus for rural Maine. He is the recipient of two Maine Press Association freedom of information awards, and the MPA Newspapers in Education award.
