Have you heard of Ramses the Great and the Battle of Kadesh, Octavian and the Egyptian Queen Cleopatra VII? do you know they were perpetrators of what we now call (fake news) ? , while their fake news led to massively bloody battles and political gains in that era, today’s fake news purposes and consequences don’t differentiate much from those of the past. we will know together how it affects us personally, and those who are marginalized. we will be left with questions of personal responsibilities and biases as well as those of ethics and perceived notions. So, let’s start this journey together and I hope my dark sense of humour doesn’t throw you off (preying emoji).
{pseudo-news, hoax news} is what we call the deliberate disinformation that is spread with the intent to mislead and damage an agency, entity, a person and/or a group of people like minorities and ethnic groups. take this example { A land without a people for a people without a land } is widespread fake news used by the Zionists to justify the genocide and ethnic cleansing they committed and continue to, against the Palestinian people on their historic land of Palestine in order to establish their illegal state.
It has a colour too, and it is ……. Yellow, (yellow journalism) used to be spread by traditional news media like magazines and journals you know….. those papers your grandpa and grandma used to get from the little kiosk around the corner……yes that (wink face) , but now it is spread faster and wilder due to changes happening in the times we live in, and social media’s access to people around the globe, it is sensationalist, dishonest, or outright fabricated headlines designed to increase readership and views and not inform facts or evidence. Similarly, clickbait stories and headlines earn advertising revenue on social media outlets which is the main goal, and not credibility. so, who do we blame for this? Well An analysis by BuzzFeed found that the top 20 fake news stories about the 2016 U.S. presidential election received more engagement on Facebook than the top 20 election stories from 19 major media outlets – ooooh don’t throw tomatoes at me just yet. this little fact I just told you done by BuzzFeed your looking down on, is cited in the American congress so ………. if it is good for the American congress you bet, I will put it in here. (wink face)
Confirmation bias and social media algorithms like those used on Facebook and Twitter -further advance the spread of fake news which makes it difficult for journalists to cover significant news stories, and maybe governments will do better in regulating those outlets,,,,,, so they can spy on us themself (wink face ).
I know what you are thinking, and I know you want the juicy part, ok…. ok I will say it (DONALD TRUMP) of course! you are right, we can’t mention fake news without mentioning the 45th president of the United States of America Donald Trump and Kellyanne Conway -his counselor and the proud inventor of the term (alternative facts). Trump has carried on a war against the mainstream media, often attacking it as "fake news" and the "enemy of the people” But the problem with his usage of the term comes from the fact that Trump uses IT for any news that is not favorable to him or which he simply dislikes. His usage of the term has increased distrust of the American media and humanitarian reports coming from American and international NGOs globally. As the Russian deemed the news Regarding the atrocities committed by the Syrian regime against its own people in the usage of chemical bombs against people in the cities of eastern Gota, Aleppo and Idlib and about 8 other cities as (fake news ) . recently the term has a stigma attached to it because of the way it has been used by trump which resulted in it being banned from all official documents in 2018 by the British government after the recommendation of the House of Commons' Digital, Culture, Media and Sport Committee.
After knowing all of that do you think that the Press Coverage of the Refugee and Migrant Crisis played a rule in the perceived notions in the mind of European citizens? to what extent and how ?!, let’s find out …. shall we
According to the Council of Europe’s Media coverage of the “refugee crisis” report: it was the European press that framed refugees’ and migrants’ arrival to European shores in 2015 as a crisis for Europe. While coverage of “the crisis” is characterized by significant diversity, overall, new arrivals were outsiders and different to Europeans: either as vulnerable outsiders or as dangerous outsiders ……. Others nonetheless labeled as a crisis.
The same 2017 published report also comes to the conclusion of 3 types of trends, firstly the Regional trends: where there was a massive contrast between media coverage on the West and on the East of the Old continent, especially, between media in the receiving and non-receiving countries of refugees. basically what they are trying to say is that if you were living in one part of Europe and your relative in the exact opposite one, geography won’t be the only opposite thing you would have regarding the refugees crisis,,,,,, those family gatherings will get awkward ( wink face ), secondly Temporal trends: a fancy term referring to narratives of the coverage of the refugees in 2015 from being sympathetic and empathetic across Europe in the summer and especially early autumn of the same year, to it gradually replaced by suspicion and, in some cases, hostility towards refugees and migrants. so maybe it was a weather thing (wink face) ………. Thirdly Media trends: this trend is stereotypical because the report had found that “the crisis” and in a significant section of some countries’ right-leaning press in the East and West Europe alike, were coverage that promoted hate speech and hostility towards migrants and refugees and it was systematic and persistent especially in some parts of Eastern Europe (esp. Hungary),,,,,,,,, so we won’t be inviting any Jobbik members to the friends party anytime soon ( wink face ).
When it came to the marginalized group AKA our fellow human beings, the report had found that refugees were given limited opportunities to speak directly of their experiences and suffering, they were spoken about and represented in images as silent actors and victims in most cases. sure, there were some significant exceptions, but it was time and place-specific. And with that limited to nearly nonexciting chance if you were a woman then those chances are slim to none, refugee women were never given the opportunity to speak (e.g. Hungary) while in other cases (e.g. Germany) they were only occasionally given this opportunity. So basically, the media in Europe is the gossiping granny of the neighbor nobody can talk to her or about her, while she is up in your business. (wink face).
I know you are tired and you are not a bad human being you just want to live your life, and there are so many things you have to do and maybe people in your life to take care of, university to attend, or a job to go to. your just busy and don’t have the time to keep up with all of this, moreover, you might even ask yourself why? which between you and me is not a good look for you, but seriously back to the point how can I not fall for fake news ?! how can I help ? and obviously, my blog is amazing and you are asking when am I going to publish again ?! the answer is very soon ( wink face ).
We are all going to fall for fake news but maybe we won’t be fooled by it for long, here are my personal go-to guidelines when reading something:
- Come on if your elders believe it and start to tell you about conspiracy theories maybe take it with a grain of salt,,,,,,, a lot of salt.
- Try and fellow the sources of the news and know what kind of speech or political views they are promoting , is their coverage fair ? how is the overall language of the reporting ? and if it lines with the ethical code of journalism which we can discuss and know more about in next blogs ( wink face ) .
- If it promotes hate and fills you with negativity towards someone based on their religion , nationality , language , ethnicity ex ,,,,, essentially based on who they are , then maybe report the idiots and close the stupid window and stop reading !
I am sorry this is not working for me, I know your smarter than that, right? I mean you made it this far without me boring you to death so………
my personal advice to you based on my experience as a marginalized minority is this: be kind, find the mercy that is in your heart to connect to others suffering and try to put yourself in their shoes. Feel how you would want to be treated and looked at. If you believe you are a free human deserving of happiness and life just remember so are others. there is enough in this world for All of us as different as we are, as colourful as we are, as we dance flamingo /zorpa/Dapka/ štajeriš/ Zeybek/ Partalos/ we deserve to find safety and prosper. We deserve happiness. And of course, if you want to do more you can always become an e-activist…… what is that?! Stay tuned for the next blog to find out (wink face ).
Sources:
*https://www.unhcr.org/56bb369c9.pdf
* https://sciences.ucf.edu/psychology/mmlab/wp-content/uploads/sites/82/2018/11/PresentationCW.withoutnotes.pdf * https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/16/business/media/vladimir-putin-moscow-press-trump.html
* https://abcnews.go.com/Technology/fake-news-stories-make-real-news-headlines/story?id=43845383
* https://www.aljazeera.net/encyclopedia/military/2017/4/4/أبرز-هجمات-نظام-الأسد-بالكيميائي-في-سوريا
Author: Reem H.
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