But some good can come from it
From the Rose Law Group Reporter Growlery
By Phil Riske | Senior Reporter/Writer
There’s quite a difference between satire and maliciously falsified news.
CHICAGO—Promising that every effort would be made to limit the impact on residents’ day-to-day lives, Chicago officials announced Wednesday that a fleet of plows was working around the clock to clear more than 18 inches of fresh bullet casings that had blanketed the metropolitan area overnight.
That’s satire from the ONION publication.
Yoko Ono: ‘I Had An Affair With Hillary Clinton In The ’70s.’
That’s from a headline in World News Daily Report, a Website that peddles made-up stories.
It seems fake news sources are doing so for two reasons: for political gain, but moreover for profit.
Big brands, often inadvertently, are helping fund the Websites at the center of a growing controversy over misinformation on the Internet,” The Wall Street Journal reported. “Ads from companies such as Choice Hotels, SoundCloud and Bose Corp. appear on sites with false or misleading news or on social media. Those companies are among thousands of brands that could appear on such sites based on a user’s browsing history or demographics.,” the Journal reported.
There are dangers in this trend of bogus journalism. Why? Because it preys on the gullible, witness the man last Sunday who fired an assault rifle inside a popular Washington, D.C., pizza restaurant that has become a target after being featured in a fake news story.
Last year I started a Website called “The Bunion,” which published satirical stories similar to the ONION.
I no longer publish such stories. Why? Because we are gullible.
I hope what comes of all this is a public that looks with a jaundiced eye at any news story or tweet that doesn’t seem to ring true. Look at the source of such news. Let’s vet this nonsense. By questioning, then researching, we’ll discover what’s good journalism and what’s garbage.
The news media, which have been stung on numerous occasions by fake news, should now itself take some blame for spreading fake news and pause for as long as it takes the check the facts.
If we can’t legally yell “Fire” in a crowded theater, why should we be free to fan the flames of lies?
