#comm281

[xchibax-blog1]

Am I Reading Fake News?

Social media sites have become one of the main places people find and share news. Although social media can foster healthy exchanges of information and ideas, it also makes it very easy to spread inaccurate news. Millions of websites have popped up in recent years that turn a profit by selling advertisement space and accruing clicks. To draw in vulnerable news consumers, these websites produce stories with dramatic, emotional headlines and photos that are either manipulations or complete fabrications of the truth. There are several easy ways news consumers can evaluate the credibility and accuracy of a news story and its source.

I recently came across a news article shared on Facebook titled “Depopulation Test Run? 75% of Children Who Receive Vaccines in Mexican Town Now Dead or Hospitalized” from a website called Awareness Act. First, I analyzed the story itself, including the content, the page layout, and the corresponding hyperlinks. Then I went on to analyze the actual website and looked at Awareness Act’s other stories, their website design, and their website information.

According to the article, two infants died and 37 were hospitalized in La Pimiento, Mexico due to vaccines administered to protect them from Hepatitis B, rotavirus, and tuberculosis. The article goes on to state that some people “believe it was a test run for depopulation.” The article then continues to list the dangers of vaccines and cites a CDC scientist that proved vaccines were connected to autism. 

There are several glaringly obvious grammatical and writing style issues that should immediately lead readers to question the credibility of the article. First, neither a date nor an author is provided with the article, two components that all credible news sources include. The format and headline of the article also lead the viewer to believe that it is a news article. However, the content, regardless of its level of accuracy, is clearly opinionated and activist-driven. Lines such as “Everyone should know not to trust politicians, so why are we trusting them with the lives of our children?” and “The bottom line is, never trust the vaccine industry!” are not only unprofessional but are also obvious sentences designed to sway reader opinion. 

The grammar and style of this article should also serve as a warning for readers. Although not all online publications adhere to official journalism writing standards, publications that use exclamation points, contractions, and words like “gonna” or “okay” should be immediately questioned. In this article, the author uses “there” when it should be “their” and “to” when it should be “too.” Credible and objective news sources should also not be using the second person point of view. In several instances, the author uses the word “you” or “we” to tell the reader to do or not do something. 

Also, the first photo in this story depicts two infants receiving medical care. Although the photo has the Associated Press’ copyright symbol in the corner, the image is not captioned and looks like a screenshot. When I searched the image on Google, I found that it came from a story from 2014 that investigated sabotaged measles vaccinations given to infants in Syria. This photo was completed unrelated to the story in Mexico but was used as a way to evoke an emotional response from readers. 

However, some fake news stories are better at mimicking professional formats and styles than others. Therefore, doing background research on the topic or event the article discusses is another easy way to determine the credibility of a source or story. When I looked into this vaccine story more, I found that it held some level of truth. Vaccinations in a rural town in Mexico were reported to have harmed several infants in 2015 and the story was reported by several credible news sources including The Guardian, CNN, and a story in the Washington Times from the Associated Press. However, the Awareness Act article got several key facts wrong and distorted others. According to the Associated Press, only 31 infants, not 37 as reported by Awareness Act, were hospitalized and the town was La Pimienta, not La Pimiento. The Mexican Institute for Social Security reported that the vaccines themselves were not dangerous but were contaminated with bacteria that caused the death and hospitalization of 33 Mexican infants. However, Awareness Act did not report on this statement but instead blamed the actual vaccine. Although these falsities or mistakes seem rather minor, they distinguish credible news sources from fake ones. Awareness Act’s claims of “depopulation efforts” were also completely unfounded and not supported by any other credible news source. 

Awareness Act also uses several hyperlinks in conjunction with some of their misleading or false statements. By clicking on just a few them, it is clear that they either link to equally inaccurate information or to studies that in no way defend what the article claims. The first sentence of the article, “Vaccine producers have crossed every line imaginable” is hyperlinked to a completely unrelated journal article from the University of Pennsylvania comparing the diversity of the pharmaceutical industry in the United States to other country’s industries. The sentence “Vaccines today are filled with toxic ingredients such thimerosal or formaldehyde” is hyperlinked to publichealth.org, which does say that vaccines contain thimerosal and formaldehyde but also goes on to say that they present in levels that are not harmful. They also include a statement from the Chiapas Health Secretariat about the hospitalizations that was said to be given in an interview conducted by Fox News. However, the hyperlink brings the reader to an article with the exact same headline as the Awareness Act article from a website called “Government Slaves.” 

Finally, readers can also analyze the actual website design to determine if the article is credible. Awareness Act has no “About” page discussing the purpose and history of the website, while most authentic news sources do. Also, when readers go to Awareness Act’s Privacy Policy listed on the bottom of the page, the site provides a single Gmail account as their only contact information. Credible sources like the New York Times will have many different ways to contact them and even have their own email listing. Also, by analyzing Awareness Acts other stories, it becomes clear that all of their stories deal with highly emotional topics and have equally misleading and dramatic headlines. 

References 

Depopulation Test Run? 75% of Children Who Receive Vaccines in Mexican Town Now Dead or Hospitalized. Awareness Act. Retrieved from http://awarenessact.com/depopulation-test-run-75-of-children-who-received-vaccines-in-mexican-town-now-dead-or-hospitalized/

Danzon, P. M., et al. (2005). “Vaccine Supply: A Cross-National Perspective. Health Affairs, 24(3). 706-717. 

Adams, M. “75% of Children Who Receive Vaccines in Mexican Town Now Dead or Hospitalized.” Government Slaves. Retrieved from http://govtslaves.info/75-of-children-who-received-vaccines-in-mexican-town-now-dead-or-hospitalized/

Understanding Vaccines. Public Health. Retrieved from http://www.publichealth.org/public-awareness/understanding-vaccines/goes-vaccine/

Mexico says bacteria contaminated vaccine blamed in 2 deaths. (2015, May 13). The Washington Times. Retrieved from http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/may/13/mexico-says-bacteria-contaminated-vaccine-blamed-i/

Chulov, M. Beals, M. (2014, September 17). “Measles vaccination mix-up leaves 15 infants dead in northern Syria.” The Guardian. Retrieved from https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/17/measles-vaccination-mix-up-syria-15-infants-killed

[taylorchendel-blog]

The Pulling From Fake News to Make a Story

With the increase in social media use there has also been an increase in fake news. Fake news, which used to be regarded as a piece of media that was known by its viewers to be intentionally false or satirical has taken a turn to mean something much more serious. Most people under 30 years old are not subscribing to traditional media outlets, and are instead getting their news from trusted adults, the internet, and different social media platforms. This behavior is creating a new wave of individuals who are more politically influenced by social media than ever before. Young people have been more skeptical of the concept of objectivity in the media and are leaning toward local blogs and opinion pieces as their preferred way of getting information (Marchi, 2012).

Fake news is not just a concept that is read about in class, though it’s easy to get caught up in class discussions and readings and forget that fake news is not something lurking the shadows of the internet, but is a large part of our everyday lives. Many of my friends and family members share fake news, and site it during debates regarding various topics from the funding of planned parenthood, or to defend their choice on who they voted for in the most recent presidential election. I myself have fallen victim to fake news, and admit I have been responsible for circulating it myself. I recently came across a piece of fake news on my Facebook newsfeed titled, “Controversial child sex dolls floated as treatment for pedophiles”, the piece that was being shared came from the New York Post, but it was cited in the article that the original source was The Sun, a British tabloid. The article claimed that Scandinavian experts are urging pedophiles to use child-like sex dolls, as a form or treatment/prevention. The article highlights an exchange between the Sexpo Foundation, who believe pedophiles should have access to the dolls, and Norwegian law enforcement who have, according to the article confiscated 20 dolls in the past 6 months.  The article talks about the fear that the dolls will increase the likelihood of individuals committing acts of abuse, while the Sexpo Foundation claims that having access to the dolls will have an opposite effect.

When investigating both sites I noticed that each cite was flooded with articles regarding celebrity gossip and weight loss tricks, as well as titles that appeared to be click bait in the way they had the potential to inflame the reader’s emotions, most of the titles containing the words “sex”, “Trump”, “feud”, and “outrage” which furthered my suspicious regarding the validity of the cite. I went on to search the title of the article in my general search bar and was able to see that the article had been featured on other news platforms including Fox News, all three of the articles from the New York Post, The Sun, and Fox News all used the same wording using words like “sick”, “creepy”, and “disgusting” to show their bias towards what they were reposting on. The Sun had one major difference though were it featured other speculations which further decreased is validity, such as “Human and robot marriages have been slated for 2030 when, one expert claims, the law will be altered to allow humans to tie the knot with androids.” Though the articles followed the same general format and held the same stance the other two outlets chose not to include unsupported stances from the original source. The New York Post is the only source that provides a link to the Sexpo Foundations website allowing its readers to further investigate the stance and the validity of this foundation. When the reader clicks on the link provided they are redirected to a website that for a non-profit that provides sex counseling and deals with topics regarding human sexuality, including pedophilia. The New York Post also provides a link which includes the foundations statement regarding the sex dolls. With this in mind it appears that the New York Post, though it still used similar biased language to The Sun and Fox News, did provide it’s readers with links to information for readers to view the perspective of the other side. It also appears that the original source, The Sun, is more so fake news than the New York Post, and Fox News due to the selective pulling of information from the The Sun’s article which did feature claims that were not cited, as well as made claims regarding the dark net, and the sale or drugs as well as the dolls, meant to further inflame the emotions of its readers.

  Knox, P. (2017). Controversial child sex dolls floated as treatment for pedophiles. Retrieved March 31, 2017, from http://nypost.com/2017/03/13/controversial-child-sex-dolls-floated-as-treatment-for-pedophiles/

Marchi, R. (2012).  With Facebook, Blogs, and Fake News, Teens Reject Journalistic “Objectivity” In, Journal of Communication Inquiry. (pp.246-258). New York, NY: SAGE

Murphy, M. (2017). British cops investigating import and sale of vile sex robots designed to look like children. Retrieved March 31, 2017, from https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2653144/british-cops-investigating-import-and-sale-of-vile-sex-robots-designed-to-look-like-children/

Nonprofit floats child sex dolls as treatment for pedophiles. (n.d.). Retrieved March 31, 2017, from http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/03/13/nonprofit-floats-child-sex-dolls-as-treatment-for-pedophiles.html

Seksuaalineuvontaa, seksuaaliterapiaa ja koulutusta. (n.d.). Retrieved March 31, 2017, from http://www.sexpo.fi/