Confidence in journalism/news/media and "experts"

[Ron]

I ran across this quote and it pretty much sums up my thoughts on the matter. The Ebola thread coming back to life made me realize how much more cynical about our culture I am now than I was even back then.

When the Red Pill starts to enter your system: "If they lied about this, what else are they lying about?"

When the Red Pill fully kicks in: "Oh my god...they lied about everything"

My starting point on every issue is that I'm being lied to or being fed disinformation and then I go from there.   

It's a big adjustment, but I find I'm not nearly as disturbed by the incoherence of the propaganda that is on 24/7 rotation.     

During the Ebola thread I was still stuck in option #3, I've moved from #3 through #2 into option #1 since then.

[RocketMan]

The media should start selling used cars.  It would be a good fit what with their lack of professionalism and honesty.
Then again, that would be demeaning to used car sales people.  Their ethical standards are much higher.

[Ben]

I chose the "consume a diversity" choice and hope for the best. I lean towards the worst case of "zero confidence" these days, but hope that by reading across the range of opinions (I don't believe there's much non-opinionated news these days), I will get somewhere within the general area of facts.

I do have to get better about making sure I read well past the headlines and first paragraphs of stuff, because a lot of the time when you get past the middle of the article, it no longer resembles the headline. Headlines these days seem designed to cause outrage, which is immediately disseminated by social media (also "headlines" in a way), and sadly I fall for it a lot more than I should.

[Nick1911]

My views mirror Ben's, in that I hope I can root out some semblance of truth using the internet and non-mainstream sources.  One of the best things about the internet is that in the firehouse of information it provides, you can people who really understand a particular topic/story deeply.  Unfortunately, the signal-to-noise ratio is crap, and you have to approach with extreme cynicism to sort the wheat from the chaff.

The poll specifically asked about journalistic media - which I take to be organizations who's business it is to sell news.  I have zero faith in these organizations - their motivations to report accurate, truthful information are in direct conflict with their business goals of increasing views, clicks and advertisement revenue.

[Lennyjoe]

I’ve been listening to Newsmax lately since I was turned off by Fox News during the post election bs.  Don’t totally trust Newsmax either so I usually hit multiple sources before I start to believe anything

[MechAg94]

IMO,
1.  Look for the what, who, where, when, how.  Ignore or skip the fluff/filler. 
2.  Focus on the facts and ignore the emotion and hyperbole. 
3.  Get better at separating fact versus opinion.  More importantly, don't let the crazy opinions distract you from the facts.
4.  Pay attention to what facts they are not saying. 

I find I read almost all articles with a lot of suspicion. 

[RoadKingLarry]

And follow the money.

[HankB]

When multiple media outlets use identical or nearly identical expressions and verbiage to "report" a story, it's a safe bet you're being lied to, at least in part.

[MechAg94]

Even when they are not actively trying to lie, they are just repeating what another news service said or just going for click bait headlines. 

[zxcvbob]

If I could vote for the first two in the list, I would.  They are all lying, all the time.  By listening to lies from a diversity of sources you can sometimes glean a little bit of truth.  (usually it's not worth the effort)

[Ben]

When multiple media outlets use identical or nearly identical expressions and verbiage to "report" a story, it's a safe bet you're being lied to, at least in part.

I wish I could find that dang compilation video of "local" news outlets reporting on stories. It was actually posted here somewhere. All the "local" reporters used identical language when describing the political stories. One of the local stations here was in the video and using identical phrases to local stations in LA.

When the "local" stations are all owned by corporations in NYC and Chicago, it's not really local. Same goes for "local" newspapers.

[MechAg94]

From what I heard, that video was the result of the corporation who owned the stations wanting all their stations to read a statement during the news broadcast and read it verbatim.  It wasn't a story they were all repeating, it was a statement handed down from corporate.  The first time I heard about it, the claim was that corporation wasn't was leftist as most and the video was an attack on a "conservative" TV corporation. 

I think the compilations Rush used to always do were better.  He would do montages of all the big talking heads describing a current story using the same phrases.  It was obvious the talking heads or their writers were colluding on the story.  Not illegal, but it showed none of them were doing independent news.

[French G.]

Believe any news source? Go read more articles about any subject that you personally know front to back. Good luck with your crying fit. WSJ is a reasonably straight arrow. I will look at a lot of sources. Right wing news is useless, all fear mongering BS, same as MSNBC

[Ben]

The first time I heard about it, the claim was that corporation wasn't was leftist as most and the video was an attack on a "conservative" TV corporation. 

I guarantee you the one I watched was all progressive slant. I don't doubt that a right leaning corp would do the same thing.

[Angel Eyes]

I wish I could find that dang compilation video of "local" news outlets reporting on stories. It was actually posted here somewhere. All the "local" reporters used identical language when describing the political stories. One of the local stations here was in the video and using identical phrases to local stations in LA.

This one?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_hGKT5FI78

[MechAg94]

This one?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q_hGKT5FI78

I think that is the one I remember.

[Ben]

I don't think that's the one I remember. It is just repeating that one line. I'm pretty sure the one I watched had several example stories that were repeated.

It does hammer the point down though.

[bedlamite]

[Jim147]

I think both of those are at least 10% high.

[bedlamite]

I think both of those are at least 50% high.

ftfy

[MechAg94]

Come on, the space worms were actually beneficial to Fry after he ate that sandwich.