This editorial represents the unanimous opinion of all 15 Outlook editors.
Edgar M. Welch read online that the owner of the Comet Ping Pong pizza restaurant was connected with a human trafficking ring. On Dec. 5, Welch reportedly walked into the Washington, D.C. restaurant and fired his AR-15 rifle. He was quickly detained and no one was injured.
The cause of Welch’s violent episode has been a buzzword as of late: fake news.
In late October, fake news websites began perpetuating the fictional theory (referred to as Pizzagate) that James Alefantis, the pizza restaurant owner, was part of a child trafficking ring led by Hillary Clinton. It appears that the motive behind the fake news websites specifically targeting Alefantis in their fabricated story was his Democratic connections. As reported by the New York Times, Alefantis “has prominent Democratic friends” and has “previously communicated” with John Podesta, Clinton’s campaign chairman.
Pizzagate is far from the first fake news story to gain prominence in 2016. According to Buzzfeed, fake news stories outperformed real news on Facebook for the last three months of the election. That means that more voters were reading false information like “FBI agent suspected in Hillary email leaks found dead in apartment in murder-suicide” than were informed about the truth.
The full scope of the effect of fake news on the election is still unknown. However, the incident at Comet Ping Pong is the most acute example yet of the dangers of fake news poses to our country. Fake news is a threat to the truth and must be addressed.
There’s nothing new about conspiracy theories and blatant partisanship. Our parents saw the same tabloids on the grocery store shelves at our age, but the internet has allowed for an unprecedented level of partisan and false news.
For creators of fake news, the benefits of spreading false information outweigh the detriments. The entry cost of creating a website is much lower than that of a print media company, and ad revenue generated from the cheap sites can be immense. U.S. law sets a high bar for people to sue a publication for publishing false information, and regardless, the anonymity of the web allows creators to post anything without any danger of legal action.
It comes down to us as consumers of news to be more perceptive of what we are reading and keep publications accountable to the truth. The first step is becoming aware of the external and internal forces that leave us susceptible to partisan and fake news.
Shortly after the election, a viral 1998 People article “quoted” Donald Trump as saying that, if he ran for president, he would run as a Republican because “they’re the dumbest group of voters.” But the truth is, Trump was never interviewed by People magazine in 1998.
This article is a perfect illustration of the need to be more skeptical of what we see on our social media pages. It is a well-known phenomenon that social media websites allow people to live in an echo chamber. Their algorithms are designed to keep people using the site, and what keeps them on the site is the amplification of information that reinforces their beliefs and biases and the censorship of information that challenges them. In this case, it confirmed the biases of people who opposed Trump.
Regardless of truthfulness, when a quote or a headline confirms our bias, we tend to take it at face value. There’s nothing novel about desiring to be right, and fake news caters to this desire.
Perhaps the easiest way to avoid fake and biased news is to read from reputable, mainstream publications, not Facebook or other social media sites. It is an almost effortless way to know that you are reading reliable news. However, to get news from various sources, Google news is considered the most reliable, and does not skew results by a user’s political viewpoint.
Sourcing and corroboration are also powerful tools to combat fake news. The rise of the internet has not all been bad news for truth and the ability to easily Google the details of a story allows us to see if it was picked up by major news outlets, or is simply a fabrication. And if the story is indeed real, reading how another outlet reports on it allows us to get alternate viewpoints.
Finally, our ability to be informed is ultimately limited by our willingness to challenge our beliefs. The rise of fake news can only partially be accredited to well-meaning consumers being tricked by malevolent misinformed. Instead, fake and partisan news’s popularity is primarily caused by our personal desire to be affirmed in our beliefs. So read from reputable news sources that differ from your opinion. And be skeptical of lurid headlines that play to your biases, because if it seems too good to be true, it probably is.
