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Edward Snowden talks about fake news
It is a daily subject that we have known for years. Fake news dominates our timelines. What do we do against it?
We notice the consequences of spreading fake news more and more. The best known examples are of course Brexit and Trump. Where did all of this came from? Is it the fault of technology? The quality of today’s journalist or is it our own fault? The European Commission calls for years to have better journalism. Journalist are not a good representation of community anymore. High educated and caucasian older men who dominate the news for us. The media have already lost their independence.
Are the algorithms constantly learning and do the confirm our ideas again and again? Smart software as the gatekeeper of the information we see. In other words, software defines our world? Also this has become reality. Questions is whether the average person is aware of that? I’m afraid that it are only a few.
But perhaps, we might be the biggest problem? Where did the critical thinking ability of humanity go to? We live in a society where it comes to speed and convenience. In the media it is all about who has the first new fact and therefore the most scarce attention from the ‘viewer’. It is about clicks and temporary superficial attention. That’s big business. How sad. But we preserve it ourselves. We are guided by superficial content. The biggest barkers receive the most attention. Why and what is the truth these days?
Edward Snowden gave a quite striking solution for ‘fake news’ and contemporary superficiality that is not additional monitoring of the news in the interview below. It is particularly to learn people to think critically again. This is fully in line with other things that is seen as the most important skill for people in the 21st century. Curiosity and critical thinking. Why do you read the things you read and are you open for new insights? After all, you will learn nothing from people who always agree with you. You will learn from people who do not agree with you.
The solution is to make people more resilient to ‘fake news’ which lies in the mental toughness of many bullshit what we see and read online. Because mainly the online world is determined by nonsense. A lot of nonsense. The clever perspective of Edward Snowden.
