Author Topic: Great Fake News Example  (Read 1282 times)

Ben

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Great Fake News Example
« on: March 26, 2017, 08:44:02 PM »
I thought this was a great example of persistent fake news:

So United prevents some girls from boarding a flight because they were wearing leggings and they were deemed not appropriately dressed. Pinhead Shannon Watts is there to see it and starts tweeting about United discriminating against women. Okay, fair enough initially, because I've seen lots of women with leggings on flights, and certainly seen both men and women dressed way less appropriately.

However, United caught wind of the incident almost immediately and responded that the girls were flying for free under the employee program and that the program has a dress code, which prohibits leggings. They clearly stated that they don't prevent paying customers from wearing them.

Even after this announcement, which is showing up everywhere, including them responding to the original troublemaker, Watts, celebrities and others are still pushing the "discrimination" story, often not mentioning at all that they were employee tickets, or in the case of the Washington Post, going on a biased run (biased against United) for like 90% of the story, then near the end having a line about the girls using the employee program.

Anyway, thought it was a good example about how fake news just keeps on going because of Twitter and the like. Not to mention things like the WaPo's crappy reporting.

http://twitchy.com/gregp-3534/2017/03/26/sarah-silverman-andy-richter-and-other-celebrities-are-still-crapping-on-united-over-leggingsgate/
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GigaBuist

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #1 on: March 26, 2017, 10:07:10 PM »
I'd term that more slightly incorrect news rather than the fake news we're hearing about now.  The initial reports weren't intentionally misleading anybody, they were just missing some key information that wasn't obvious to a casual observer.  A rather understandable mistake.

FAKE news is stuff like this:  http://prntly.com/2017/03/20/george-soros-admits-he-helped-his-mother-commit-suicide-wants-americans-to-embrace-death/  Actual headline: "GEORGE SOROS ADMITS HE HELPED HIS MOTHER COMMIT SUICIDE, WANTS AMERICANS TO ‘EMBRACE DEATH’" and basically nothing in the article really backs the headline up.  They cite a speech from 1994 by Soros where he never says he helped his mother die, his mother didn't commit suicide, and she died naturally.  That's fake news.... and it's also a website Trump has said he gets his news from.

MechAg94

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #2 on: March 26, 2017, 11:36:56 PM »
If there is anything fake about it, it has to do with reporters running stories and headlines based on very little and making no effort to get the whole story.
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Ben

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #3 on: March 27, 2017, 12:18:33 AM »
If there is anything fake about it, it has to do with reporters running stories and headlines based on very little and making no effort to get the whole story.

I guess that's what I was getting at. We more and more have front page stories based on nothing more than a couple of bits of unverified and unresearched information. There seems to, these days, be less and less effort or interest in correcting facts when verifiable information is made available.

I certainly admit to jumping the gun on something more than once in the last year based on what turns out to be wrong or incomplete information frantically released by the MSM. I don't recall it being that bad in years past. Nowadays I have to keep trying to train myself to search multiple sources and/or wait 24-72 hours for when the actual truth comes out.
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230RN

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #4 on: March 27, 2017, 12:53:19 AM »
Goebbels.

Even though a journalist may backtrack, it is repeated often, hence becomes the truth.

Ben said, "Nowadays I have to keep trying to train myself to search multiple sources and/or wait 24-72 hours for when the actual truth comes out."

A good policy.  We should repeat it often.  

"I certainly admit to jumping the gun on something more than once"

(And mea culpa too.)

Terry

 

Ben

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #5 on: March 27, 2017, 08:56:01 AM »
And this is the way the story should have been written - stating the facts immediately:

http://www.foxnews.com/travel/2017/03/27/united-airlines-under-fire-for-barring-teens-from-flight-who-were-wearing-leggings.html

If the MSM and other outlets hadn't taken their information from Shannon Watt's twitter feed without further investigation, it would have been a non-story.
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Fly320s

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #6 on: March 27, 2017, 09:32:25 AM »
I've been denied boarding on flights because of what I was wearing.  Most airlines have relaxed their dress code policies for non-revs these days, but they used to be pretty tough.
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makattak

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #7 on: March 27, 2017, 09:44:53 AM »
And this is the way the story should have been written - stating the facts immediately:

http://www.foxnews.com/travel/2017/03/27/united-airlines-under-fire-for-barring-teens-from-flight-who-were-wearing-leggings.html

If the MSM and other outlets hadn't taken their information from Shannon Watt's twitter feed without further investigation, it would have been a non-story.

I love this line:

Quote
Watts said the girl's father was allowed to board while wearing shorts and called the airline's policy sexist.

Ah, yes. Throw out a non sequitur. Well, HE was wearing SHORTS!!! And he could get on.

Yeah, lady. It would be sexist if he could wear shorts and they couldn't. I'm fairly certain that if they were wearing shorts, they'd have been on the plane and if he were wearing tights, he wouldn't have been. Sexist isn't: "he can wear comfy clothes that he wants to wear and they can't!!!" They could have worn the same comfortable clothes and been fine.

Our country is populated by selfish, self-entitled, narcissistic, grievance-mongering morons.
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Jamisjockey

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #8 on: March 27, 2017, 09:49:13 AM »
The alt-media is mostly just an outrage generation machine.  Any story that stirs outrage in the social media world is what leads. ....rabble rabble OUTRAGE!
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Hawkmoon

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #9 on: March 27, 2017, 11:06:10 AM »
Mark Twain told us that there are three kinds of lies: lies, damned lies, and statistics. I guess the modern, media equivalent is that there are three kinds of news: facts (news), lies (fake news), and alt facts.
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MechAg94

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #10 on: March 27, 2017, 11:29:30 AM »
I don't mind statistics so much, but you have to pay careful attention to what is being represented by the statistic and what is not.  IMO, you have to do that with all media and politicians these days anyway.
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230RN

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #11 on: March 29, 2017, 02:01:18 AM »
Here's another one for you, from jpfo.org

http://jpfo.org/alerts2017/alert20170328.htm

"NY Times Anti-Silencer Article Uses Argument Debunked by Washington Post"

Quote
The New York Times is once again wrong on the facts about firearms, silencers, and the impact of potential legislation on “gun violence.” They are disseminating the very definition of “fake news” that they claim to despise, yet have no issue with that because it advances their own agenda.

Scout26

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Re: Great Fake News Example
« Reply #12 on: March 29, 2017, 10:59:48 AM »
I've been denied boarding on flights because of what I was wearing.  Most airlines have relaxed their dress code policies for non-revs these days, but they used to be pretty tough.

When I worked for Airborne Express we were required (by Airborne) to wear a suit and tie if traveling as supercargo on our own planes or any of the airlines that gave us reduced fare tickets.

Some days even my lucky rocketship underpants won't help.


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