Fake News

Fake News! Now there is a term that has become way too common in recent months!  Rest easy — this is not a political post taking sides with one party or another. I am merely borrowing the term as a useful analogy. Fake News! Stories, reports, facts and figures presented as truth but branded by someone as false, designed to misconstrue, deflect, and mislead. Most of us are tired of this tactic, wishing people would simply take responsibility for their actions and commit to act and report with integrity.

Here is the thing that is often overlooked: fake news is hardly new. There are certain words or phrases, probably in every generation, that cause someone to lose credibility as soon as they are introduced into a discussion. Once unleashed, rational discourse around the topic becomes nearly impossible. “Commie” would be one of those terms from the 50s and 60s. Spin a story about someone’s communist affiliation and their whole reputation was at risk whether the accusation was true or not. The suspected person then spent more time trying to defend themselves than anything else.

As a native North Carolinian, I find that the term “southerner” has a lot of fake news attached to it. A Hoosier born friend of mine remembers that when he was in a doctoral program, he and some classmates were traveling to a conference in Virginia. One of them expressed shock that there could even be a doctoral program in the south because, of course, southerners were intellectually inferior. Some still hold that opinion; I would call it fake news!

Labels that communicate stereotypes and prejudices are often founded upon fake news repeated and believed frequently enough that the assumptions become unquestioned. Even when they form unintentionally, it can take generations to overcome them. But there are also deliberate attempts to deceive and misinform. I think these are a bit more malicious because of the intent involved. On a recent trip to Mackinac Island, a historian provided an overview of the establishment and growth of the Grand Hotel, which is a centerpiece of the island’s attraction.  He shared advertisements seeking to recruit bookings in anticipation of the hotel’s completed construction. The ads described the hotel as having more than a 1000 luxurious rooms in a setting that sounded like paradise, while the actual plans only called for about 300 rooms, and several of the amenities promised in the ads simply were not true. This was absolutely fake news, but it didn’t matter! The goal was to convince, attract, and profit from potential clients, with no regard for the truthfulness of the claim. (And it worked!) That kind of advertisement was not limited to Mackinac. It was common practice in the business then; and some would say that is still true of the advertising world today.

In addition to stereotypes and misinformation, we could add another layer to the fake news collection: truth colored or slanted to influence how one thinks about a topic. A movie review came across social media a few days ago. It read something like this: “It is the story of a young girl who came to an idyllic community where she killed the first person she encountered. The rest of the story documents how she and three friends eventually will kill again as she finds her way home.”

Sound like a movie you know? It was posted as a review describing the Wizard of Oz. I think it was written in jest; it got a good chuckle from me, anyway! But that is not at all how I would describe that movie. At the same time, it is not untrue is it? Dorothy’s house lands on and kills one witch when she arrives. It ends with another witch melting as Dorothy makes her way home! More information reshapes how we hear and interpret the story! But the spin, the emphasis, the nuance, the overlooked details all contribute to how the story is heard.

I belong to a faith tradition that is concerned with knowing and presenting the truth. Admittedly, this is a dicey subject in an era where a competing claim insists there is no absolute truth, and what is true for you does not have to be true for me. That could make it arguable that no news is fake news if someone claims it is true. I don’t embrace that point of view, but it does add complexity to the task of living together and trusting each other! In this milieu, I listen to the Christian sacred text as it offers admonishments and exhortations about the importance of avoiding incorrect teachings, inaccurate genealogies, false prophets and the like. We are encouraged to discern between the spirits – to distinguish between what is true and not true. It is basically a concern that one not be duped by fake news!

I presume that the preoccupation with avoiding fake news in the Biblical texts is there at least in part because there were competing claims about what was to be believed and taught about God, Jesus, community practices, etc. Direction like that sounds simple enough. Beware of what is false; cling to what is true. As much as possible ignore, if not end, the spreading of fake news. That would be a much simpler task if we could assume that those teaching, posting, and broadcasting a) were trustworthy; b) didn’t have ulterior motives; c) knew what they were talking about in the first place. To be fair, some are trustworthy, don’t have ulterior motives, are well informed about their subject matter, but like all of us perhaps can’t see their own blind spots or are missing one or two important pieces of information that significantly reframe the story. I recently read a book called Factfulness, the premise of which is that much of what we believe to be true about the world stands in stark contrast to the factual evidence. It seems that life, and all the communication that goes within it, can be really complicated even in the best of situations! What is a person who simply wants reliable info to do?

Sadly, there are no quick fixes to such an age-old problem, but here are some potentially useful hints. First, be willing to wait to form an opinion. Today, we are much more geared to rush to a conclusion. If I have a question, I whip out my phone and Google it. Within seconds I have an answer—well, a few thousand options actually, not all of which agree!  The answer I find may be true or it may be fake; but I have a solution. I love technology and you are not going to hear me bash its use but I will say the value of waiting is underappreciated. So when we have questions, rather than rush to the easiest conclusion or explanation, in the spirit of many wise predecessors, take pause unless it is an urgent matter than cannot be postponed. The exhortation from Matthew 10:16 is generally sage advice: “Be cunning as serpents but gentle as doves.” I take that to mean be wise, be careful, be gentle, be kind.”

A second hint is as old as good reporting itself. “Know your sources.” What was important in knowing who supplied the material for a printed news report that went through a vetting and verification process is exponentially more important in the age of digital overload where pressing “send” puts most anything in play as seemingly credible news. We too often we fall prey to the “it must be true, I read it on the internet” mentality. Who informs or reports what you believe is true about God, about faithfulness, about current events from downtown bike paths to climate change to immigration? The complexity of life is only further confounded by the sinister motives that seem to occupy every waking moment of those who seek to sow seeds of disruption and sorrow.

Another hint: consult more than one source! After all we have four gospels in the canon, and a few others that were excluded. Why consult more than one? Because when we proclaim a story – any story really — we tell it in our language and from our point of view. Studies of oral tradition and storytellers have demonstrated that those always vary a little bit, even when we think they do not.  By consulting multiple sources we at least have the opportunity see if and where there is a common core and a common agreement. And, we have a chance to avoid living in an echo chamber where like-minded voices simply amplify and reinforce a position that may not be as straightforward as it is presented or as well-developed as it might be if it had the benefit of additional points of view or critiques.

Finally, know yourself – how do you most clearly hear and discern a way forward? This may be the most important of all. Quakers place great emphasis on the Inner Light, a metaphor for the Divine that suggests we have an interior guide who can teach and guide us. That suggests that one of the most important things we do as we contribute our part to this Game of Life is to recognize when, how, and what God speaks to us. Perhaps it is the answer that rises in the quietness of the moment. Or what becomes obvious to you during the study of Scripture. Or what breaks forth in your heart in the midst of fervent prayer, or what strikes with clarity in the midst of corporate worship, or what becomes convincingly clear in conversation with a trusted friend.  There is a wealth of resources available to assist us as we make sense of the many layers of life and the often conflicting interpretations of it.  

It seems we have always lived in an age where conflicting claims woo our allegiance. Apparently it is part of what happens when many voices try to obtain success, assemble support, and influence their respective corners of the world. As if there were not already enough material out there advising you on how to make sense of the world, I add this small contribution. I will leave it to you to decide if this is just another snippet of Fake News.