Fake News and Media Bias

 What is media literacy?

As we were children, we were told about kid's fiction stories like the little red hood. Each of those stories brought their very own moral values, even so, fiction is still something an adult create to feed the children's mindset so they can live life as a child, full of wonders. But as they all grow up, they knew all those stories are just- lies. It is hard now for them to tell otherwise. 

As an adult now they start to listen to media and news. The modern platform which everything happening around the world been told. But how does this making us fed? How does all of the news told to us are really the truth and only the truth been told? As the growing number of internet users years by years has been calculated statistically, most people now know the current issue through social media. The platform like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram are the most popular application nowadays. But do we click the link to the head news they just read or the havoced headlines making us feel enough to know everything and the whole situation? This is a very concerning issue everyone should take into accountability. 

Fake news and media bias

To make everyone understand on grasp, fake news is half lies/lies. While media bias is influenced by information. 

Fake news gives overlap in between falseness and intent to harm. Disinformation is the in-between them. 

Falseness is the misinformation with unintentional information given to the readers. Disinformation is the fabricated information that readers might get caught into lies whether the information given was misinformed or malinformed. Malinformation is the worst in which the news has the abuse of private information. 

Media bias is the influenced information likely by ownership, sales, and ideology. Ownership is where the head of the department ask or direct the writer or editor of the daily news to write based on his idea. We call this payroll bias. The second is clickbait news for the sales. In which the news sold for the sales of the company. Clickbait used to catch the readers' attention so they can get their or a third party's business to raise up. There is case study on this matter which there bias in news some example is in coverage and tone in GERI (refer: the hotdog 2.0) and ownership of mass media companies (refer: who owns mass media Malaysia- the H Market & media prima, ASTRO; stakeholders/interest). 

Another way how media package or present the information is by framing. This way of media presentation only showing what they want us to see instead of what we need or the reality of the news. 

What is media literacy?

In simple meaning, tackling the way we perceive the news or information in the news we read. First, we need to understand the news. Second, we need to be skeptical. Media skepticism is the attitude of questioning and doubting the news first, especially the conspiracies one instead of trusting it blindly. These ways of self-improving will help us to be a smart and better internet user. 

S.U.R.E AHH? 

What is S.U.R.E AH? This is basically an acronym for us as the internet user on the news we have in our hands. Instead of accepting it at first read, we can look for something else as a way to make sure the news is not "manipulating" the readers. 

First, the S. S is for Source. Source can be in ways political, sketchy, and a mere opinion. If we are able to cross-check the news we can at least educate ourselves to not blind trust. The source that has these branches can be a piece of manipulative news or biased news as it basically what the writer wants us to read or what we need to know. 

Second, the U. U is for Understand. Understand the news is one of the ways to not misunderstand the content in the news we had. We can misunderstand the news if we do not read them carefully. If we misunderstand the news, we can be lied to by false truth. 

Third, the R. R is Recognising the news. Don't we all have this experience where the news headline has catchy wordings with misleading pictures that not even connected to what really the news brought. Usually, these can be in tabloid and established paper. A tabloid is where the news happens to have those catchy phrases which more to gossip worth wording such as giving people to misinterpret the content. This actually can be harmful because most of us do not even click on the news' link given to the headlines. As the users scroll through the applications' feed, they just stop by for few seconds to read the headlines before continue on scrolling down. Establish paper is one that usually gives the direct news but not always the case as there still some newspaper companies that influenced by third-party companies that usually one of the stakeholders. 

Lastly, the E. E is emotions. Emotion is how we reacted to the news after we reading them. Our emotions can lead to the spread of misinformation throughout the internet. Platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram tend to mislead people when some of us re-write the information we got in irrational emotions. Without fact check, this can be harmful to most of us readers. 

(reference is an example of what media showing us and what the reality we behind the picture media had shown)

Findings

So next time we read the news, we need to understand that there risks if we blindly trust the information we have in our hands. Using S.U.R.E AHH acronyms can help us to practice media etiquette better and indirectly helping our internet usage experience getting better. 

That is all from me, i hope to see all of you soon again. 

source: "Fake News and Media Bias" Seminar by Benar Betul, @benarbetulmy (instagram) and Democracy Discourse Series, @dds.malaysia (instagram)