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A story in The Conversation may be of interest to Soylentils:
"Fake news" is the buzzword of 2017. Barely a day goes by without a headline about president Donald Trump lambasting media "bias", or the spread of "alternative facts".
Many articles on the subject suggest that social media sites should do more to educate the public about misinformation, or that readers should think more critically about the sources of news stories before sharing them. But there are fundamental problems with this. First, there isn't a clear definition of what "fake news" really is. And second, it overlooks important aspects of people's psychological makeup.
"Fake news" can be classified in a number of ways and represented as a series of concentric circles. First, in the centre of the concentric model, we have actual fake news. These are the stories that we commonly see shared on sites such as News Thump and The Onion. These satirical stories are written for comedic purposes and are put together to entertain.
Next, we have propaganda articles. Typically, these pieces do not actually contain any real news value. They may, for example, detail an individual's past behaviour and suggest that that it reflects something about their current intentions. Alternatively, these pieces may contain some kernel of truth, but this may be twisted in such a way that it totally misleads audiences and misrepresents a story's true news value.
These propaganda articles take numerous forms. The Huffington Post, for example, included a caveat about Donald Trump's alleged bigotry whenever mentioning him in a story before the US election last November, while British readers will likely recall the Daily Mail's much-maligned attacks on former Labour leader Ed Miliband's late father in 2013, calling him a "man who hated Britain".
Finally, and occupying the outermost ring of the model, there are the stories that are technically true, but reflect the subtle editorial biases of the organisation publishing them. This reporting is commonplace within the mainstream media, through selective storytelling and politically-driven editorials. Whether this is reflected in the left-wing bias of The Guardian or the right-wing approach of the Murdoch media empire, this practice is less malicious and more a political interpretation of events.
There once was a precise word for the term "fake news" is trying to describe. Oh yes, it's "propaganda."
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 02 2017, @02:05AM
Gaslighting is the bread and butter of a narcissist.
This is how they do it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rules_for_Radicals#The_Rules [wikipedia.org]
When a narcissist is failing they double down on lies and half truths to smear their foes and recruit others to attack you. They literally use these to make you think you are crazy. By using the tools of 'everyone is saying...'. Projecting their strawman upon you then holding you up to standards that are not achievable. (rule 13) Ridicule such as John Oliver and Stephen Colbert (rule 5). Increasingly screeching stories about how bad someone is (rule 8).
Actual truth in there is meaningless. People who are good at persuasion actually understand that.
You could not make more insidious list of how to be a fucking bastard than 'the rules'. Many of our democrat leaders today look up to him and even idolize him.
I can point out the recent failures of the left with this list (and until recently the right). But I think I will leave that as an exercise to the reader.