If you think the news you watch or read is true, well, someone
out there is waiting to tell you it’s actually “fake.”
But what is this fake news
after all? Where does it come from? The answer is not what you’d expect.
Ultimately, it is derived
from the democratization of the public sphere and the increasing isolation
people have from opinions differing from their own, and if handled improperly
could increase political risk in the U.S.
The Road to Fake News is Paved with Copper Cable
Although the furor over
fake news can be traced back to the 2016 election, this isn’t the beginning of
the issue. In fact, it all starts with the 1984
Cable Act,
which deregulated the cable television industry and led to the cable industry’s
$15 billion wiring of America between 1984 and 1992.
Prior to the expansion of
cable and the subsequent development of cable news, Americans had
overwhelmingly gotten their news from print media and broadcast television
stations that were almost indistinguishable. Then competition from CNN (1979),
Fox News and MSNBC (1996) brought about a substantial decline in the broadcast
news’ audience (down from 50 million in 1980 to just over 20 million in 2010).
The new channels, however,
were not subject to the FCC’s fairness doctrine that had been established in 1949
and abolished in 1987. The repeal of the fairness doctrine created the
conditions for radio and television stations to share more partisan opinions—that
would appeal to a very select audience.
By the mid-1990s, the
Internet had entered the picture. And from the 2000 to 2016 the proportion of
the population using the Internet grew from 43.1% to 88.5%. We see an exponential growth curve in the number of websites after 2000.
The explosion in the
number of online media outlets resulted in a further expansion of voices and overwhelming
choices for the consumers--even those of political information. In the mid-1990s, John Keane, Professor of Politics, had been optimistic about the Internet,
imagining it as a public sphere that deterritorialized public life. And he may
have been right, since the Internet has provided broad access to news, blogs,
and social media, through which multi-directional communication reaches around
the world.
The Great Divide
With print and electronic
media (online, cable and satellite), people were bombarded with so much
information that they needed to whittle down the choices, and as such, tended to choose those that best matched their own political beliefs.
At the same time, people
have begun to receive more and more of their news through social media, leading often to a further narrowing of voices they are exposed
to--since we tend to associate with others similar to ourselves.
Surveys conducted over a
number of years provide evidence for how the increase in news outlets has
influenced the widening gap between the two parties. Looking at the polarization in Presidential approval, the average difference between the Presidents’ approval ratings
by members of the two parties in the years 1960 to 1979 was 32.8%, whereas the
average difference from 1980 to 2014 was 53.6%.
In terms of ideology,
Republicans and Democrats have grown increasingly divided since 2004. Even our lack of trust for members of the other
parties has increased over the years.
But even worse, we also fear each other, “More than half of Democrats (55%) say the Republican
Party makes them “afraid,” while 49% of Republicans say the same about the
Democratic Party. Among those highly engaged in politics – those who say they
vote regularly and either volunteer for or donate to campaigns – fully 70% of
Democrats and 62% of Republicans say they are afraid of the other party.”
Where Have All the Good Facts Gone?
After the GOP convention Newt Gingrich famously
said, “The current view is that the liberals have a
whole set of statistics, which theoretically may be right….As a political
candidate I will go with how people feel, and I’ll let you go with the
theoreticians.” Late night television shows reveled in the statement, pointing
to its apparent irrationality.
But later it became clear
Gingrich was anything but unusual. Rather the United States had entered the post-truth
era—a
time in which “borders blur between truth and lies, honesty and dishonesty,
fiction and nonfiction.”
“Fake news” became an
integral part of our post-truth society.
Originally, fake news
entered our lexicon through discussions of Facebook’s inefficiency to weed out
hoaxes and satirical articles algorithmically. The topic took on a new partisan
dimension when media outlets and pundits began attributing Donald Trump’s presidential
win—at least partially—to the power of fake news.
Overwhelmingly, the focus
was on the power of marginal right wing news outlets like Breitbart, associating them closely with the problem of fake news.
But then President Trump appropriated the term to describe
CNN and Buzzfeed for news about Donald Trump’s and Barack Obama’s being
presented an intelligence report about a dossier with compromising financial
and personal information. Later the term expanded to include the New York Times
and NBC, resulting in the infamous “enemy of the American people” Tweet.
But we have to ask again: where
does fake news come from? Is it just horrible greedy people/companies taking
over? If so, which side? Very rarely does a person say their own preferred news
is fake, but rather that of their opponents
is.
This fact may give us a
hint to where the fake news and post-truth politics have come from. And I’m sorry
to say that WE are not guiltless. Fake news is an outgrowth of the increase in
voices, the FCC’s repeal of the “fairness principle,” our desire for news that agrees
with our pre-established opinions, narratives and ideologies, as well as the
decentering of Truth by post-modernist
criticism.
Political Risk
Risk arises not from the
news itself. The broad range of disagreeing voices is good for a working
democracy. Rather the risk comes from how Americans decide to cope with the
issue.
It is possible to label news outlets we disagree with the “enemy of the
people,” we can ban certain news outlets from our social media platforms, and
we can remain distrustful of the intentions of those with opposing views. Authoritarian
leaders and societies tend to reach for these types of solutions. But such solutions do not lessen risk; rather
they foment anger and increase the chance for violent resistance.
Instead, there are other—better--options.
Americans should
understand the history and context of the current situation and recognize their
own role in the problem. The American media is based on market economics, and
economics is the method of changing the presentation of the news. If we feel
the other side’s news is too biased, we should recognize that ours is too. We
need to demand that the news outlets provide the full context and more than just
a pundits rendering of a straw-man argument for opposing sides. We should stop
watching or listening to outlets that do not provide hard evidence for claims,
while still recognizing that background sources are still possible to maintain
a source’s safety.
And if we really like the
excitement of a good opinionated talk radio or news show, we need to make sure
we watch a similar show put out by the opposition outlet and question both of
them. Moreover, we should always follow up with non-partisan fact checking sites.
The alternative narratives
provided by post-modernist criticism have given us the ability to have a
broader range of voices in the public sphere, but it has also weakened the
foundation for our assessing of truth. We need to understand that narratives
and interpretations may be debatable, but some questions
actually have been resolved, and we can trust the scientific evidence. But we as a society need to define which
questions those are.
We need to ensure that
critical analysis and critical thinking are an integral part of our education
system. As the number of voices increases, our populace needs the skills to weed
through information and find the facts, and then weigh the evidence for both
sides’ arguments.
But most importantly, we
need to seek to understand the logic and trust the intentions of our opponents.
We shouldn’t begin with the idea that they are seeking to destroy the country,
our freedoms or our way of life. We can let them explain why they are seeking
this or that law.