The Real Effects of Fake News
Did you hear? Donald Trump was endorsed by Pope Francis! Hillary Clinton’s cronies assassinated those who had proof of her wide-spread and selfish corruption! Hillary sold weapons to ISIS! Headlines such as these and many others plagued Facebook and other social media sites before the election, and many sources are saying that this spread of “fake news” may have changed the minds of voters around the country. Fake news has been around for ages (commonly found in tabloids around the world), yet it has never before been more prevalent than it is on the Internet. Millions of politically moderate Facebook users were exposed to these fanatical and reactionary headlines, and apparently for many, it encouraged them to change their minds when voting.
Aside from providing general misinformation, fake news is intended to make people nervous and uncomfortable; it’s meant to unsettle, scare and elicit knee-jerk reactions. Many studies are showing that it was used during the election to draw people away from the egregious behavior of Donald Trump and to make them focus more on the smaller mistakes of Hillary Clinton. Why did it have such a platform, though? Why were so many exposed to it? One could say that the social media sites that perpetrated the articles were to blame; many were chock full with fake political news. Others suggest that the American populace is to blame, and that every time someone shared some supposedly-true article they were helping Donald Trump more than they could have ever thought.
The problem with fake news isn’t necessarily that it’s blatantly fake. In this specific case with Hillary Clinton and the election, it created a subconscious seed of an idea that in the end swayed citizens to vote differently than they normally would have. It only makes sense; once someone has an idea firmly planted in their head, it’s pretty tough to forget, and therefore, even after the news was determined fake, people still had a tinted image of Hillary Clinton. These little ideas bunching up were likely a contributing factor to Clinton’s loss.
Yet fake news wasn’t the only kind of news that was against Hillary Clinton. I myself noticed much general attention brought to the campaign of Donald Trump and not nearly enough to Hillary Clinton’s. So much, in fact, that the New York Times issued a formal apology to its readers for focusing too much on Trump’s campaign goofs and not enough on Hillary’s campaign successes. Unfortunately, this is a harsh reminder that the only goal of newspapers is not to impartially educate the public; the goal is to sell as many papers as they can. Trump’s antics obviously sold papers.
A new burden has been placed upon news agencies. They need to focus more on reporting genuine and impartial news instead of publishing sensationalist reports of events that are half-true. In an ideal world, they wouldn’t even be tempted to report more on rabble-rousing issues as opposed to less entertaining but more relevant ones, yet unfortunately, that is not the world we live in.
On top of this, Americans need to understand any newspaper’s singular goal: to make money. Yet there has to be a balance between too much skepticism and too much blind following; it is up to every individual American to discern the truth among the lies and exaggerations. When in doubt, check with other sources! I believe that if we can do this in the future, people like Donald Trump will never be put on a pedestal nor be given more attention to than necessary.