Forums

Forum Menu
Home› Main Category› Second Amendment/Politics

The dangers of believing what you want to hear

Gene LGene L Senior MemberPosts: 11,826 Senior Member
in Second Amendment/Politics #1
We've seen press manipulation lately, people reporting on what they want to believe rather than on what they don't want to believe, but which is true. This is known as Fake News.

Here is an example from St. Louis. I encountered it on Facebook, where not only was the incident wrongly reported, but was interpreted to suit the political agenda of the reporters. The report was that in St. Louis, cops had broken a window at a restaurant in order to "militarize." That was the conclusion based on a video, a sound of broken glass and a cop walking away. The conclusion was that cops had broken the window to lay the blame on protestors.

Anyway, the Riverfront News later recanted the story. Seems like the restaurant's internal cameras recorded a young man without a shirt who threw a chair through the window three hours before the alleged cop's act.

https://www.riverfronttimes.com/newsblog/2017/09/16/did-cop-shatter-culpeppers-window-during-protest-video-raises-questions

There is a great danger to truth and freedom to report lies or half-truths or opinion as truth.
Concealed carry is for protection, open carry is for attention.
· Share on TwitterShare on Facebook

Replies

  • zorbazorba Senior Member Posts: 23,860 Senior Member
    #2
    Yes there is, and likewise there's a huge danger to relying on sites like face***k for news.
    -Zorba, "The Veiled Male"

    "If you get it and didn't work for it, someone else worked for it and didn't get it..."
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • earlyearly Senior Member Posts: 4,950 Senior Member
    #3
    It's gotten to where news is like handloading data. Best to confirm with multiple sources.
    My thoughts are generally clear. My typing, not so much.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • JermanatorJermanator Senior Member Posts: 16,131 Senior Member
    #4
    There is a lot of stuff like that out there.
    Reason obeys itself; and ignorance submits to whatever is dictated to it.
    -Thomas Paine
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • orchidmanorchidman Senior Member Posts: 8,134 Senior Member
    #5
    early wrote: »
    It's gotten to where news is like handloading data. Best to confirm with multiple sources and then err on the conservative side.

    Fify
    Still enjoying the trip of a lifetime and making the best of what I have.....
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • JerryBobCoJerryBobCo Senior Member Posts: 8,070 Senior Member
    #6
    early wrote: »
    It's gotten to where news is like handloading data. Best to confirm with multiple sources.

    Just consider the published max loads a good place to start, and you'll be ok.

    FYI, I knew a guy who had this philosophy. Last I hear, he had all his body parts.
    Jerry

    Gun control laws make about as much sense as taking ex-lax to cure a cough.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • Make_My_DayMake_My_Day Senior Member Posts: 7,742 Senior Member
    #7
    zorba wrote: »
    Yes there is, and likewise there's a huge danger to relying on sites like face***k for news.

    It's hard to believe almost any of the articles on face***k anymore.
    JOE MCCARTHY WAS RIGHT:
    THE DEMOCRATS ARE THE NEW COMMUNISTS!
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • Gene LGene L Senior Member Posts: 11,826 Senior Member
    #8
    Well, you're right, but the Facebook linked to a Liberal News Rag. So the fault isn't on FF, it's on the Riverfront Times, which lost a helluva lot of credibility. They had an agenda. So be it.

    I hope I don't link or post specious links. If it sounds too good to be true, it probably is. And I refuse to see myself as a victim. S...t happens, and it's not all directed at me. Some of it affects me, but that's life. I've been coping with this for a long time and learned long ago not to take candy from a stranger. I'm surprised that some here haven't learned this yet.
    Concealed carry is for protection, open carry is for attention.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • bullsi1911bullsi1911 Moderator Posts: 11,247 Senior Member
    #9
    It's called "confirmation bias", and it affects everyone. Everyone interprets facts and phenomenon though the filter of what we already believe.
    To make something simple is a thousand times more difficult than to make something complex.
    -Mikhail Kalashnikov
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • Make_My_DayMake_My_Day Senior Member Posts: 7,742 Senior Member
    #10
    alphasigmookie wrote: »
    Last I checked with the exception of occasional ads/sponored posts Facebook doesn't post articles. Your "frends" and the groups you follow post articles. If there's a problem with the articles you're seeing you might want to check or reevaluate your feed and what/who you let in or at least who's links you click. That said I cosider fb a way to keep up with what's going on in the lives of my friends and family, definitely not a news source.

    I didn't join FB yesterday, and I never said the fake news I was referring to was originated by FB. For your information the BS articles I was referring to are the ones that promote conservative ideas or mock the left. I used to share everything that had a negative connotation about the left, until I started reading the articles themselves. Now until I read them, I generally won't share it unless I feel the information is credible. The one thing I do take issue with FB is their censorship, and I have had friends complain about the same thing. I've had at least one post deleted from my wall because I used a slang term for muslims (muzzies) in it. Really? Now I just call them goatf***ers and they leave me alone......LOL. Their justification for that was "it didn't fit within the safety guidelines of Face***k." First time in 9 years that happened. While I like using FB, I have contempt for their socialist dear leader and their commie policies.
    JOE MCCARTHY WAS RIGHT:
    THE DEMOCRATS ARE THE NEW COMMUNISTS!
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • Jack BurtonJack Burton Member Posts: 379 Member
    #11
    Like Mark Twain said “A lie can travel half way around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.” Then again maybe it was Mark Twain, who knows, as I found it on the internet.
    Came for the fishing, stayed for the guns.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • sgtrock21sgtrock21 Senior Member Posts: 1,933 Senior Member
    #12
    AG Jeff Sessions spoke to local law enforcement officials yesterday in sanctuary city Portland, OR. It mostly concerned the dangers of local LE being prohibited from assisting federal immigration officers with enforcement. Yesterday's evening TV news featured video excerpts including this statement that I was able to locate online in the Portland newspaper. "And Portland is not immune to these problems. Between 2013 and 2015, the city saw an increase in homicides of more than 140 percent. In 2015, Portland Police received more than 180 calls related to gangs, including shootings, stabbings, and assaults – the highest number since they began recording that number nearly 20 years ago, and almost double the count from 2014". The video was followed by a newscaster reporting the Portland police department had "corrected" that statistic to 100% and added that in 2016 the homicide rate dropped 100%. Huh? Unless my fourth grade teacher was an idiot a 100% increase would have doubled the rate in 3 years. Yikes! Conversely a reduction of 100% in 2016 would have resulted in zero homicides last year. Wonderful news! Unfortunately that would have meant the newscasters on the same TV station last year where lying about the dozens of homicides reported and were creating 100% fake news.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • tennmiketennmike Senior Member Posts: 27,444 Senior Member
    #13
    Sgtrock21, it's a pretty safe bet those newscasters weren't math majors and definitely didn't study statistics! :roll2:
      “I refuse to answer that question on the grounds that I don't know the answer”
    ― Douglas Adams
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • sgtrock21sgtrock21 Senior Member Posts: 1,933 Senior Member
    #14
    tennmike wrote: »
    Sgtrock21, it's a pretty safe bet those newscasters weren't math majors and definitely didn't study statistics! :roll2:
    They obviously just report what they are given to read. I'm appalled that someone in the chain could not realize that a number minus 100% would equal zero. So sad that our education system is now concentrated on political indoctrination as opposed to the basics we grew up with. Reading, writing, and mathematics. The commies lost a battle (cold war) but they are in it for the long haul.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • TeachTeach Senior Member Posts: 18,428 Senior Member
    #15
    These are the same idiots who think they're never going to run out of other people's money, right? "Stupid is as stupid does!"

    Jerry
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • snake284snake284 Senior Member Posts: 22,394 Senior Member
    #16
    tennmike wrote: »
    Sgtrock21, it's a pretty safe bet those newscasters weren't math majors and definitely didn't study statistics! :roll2:

    Yeah and they either didn't study history either or they ate their books!!!
    Daddy, what's an enabler?
    Son that's somebody with nothing to do with his time but keep me in trouble with mom.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
  • snake284snake284 Senior Member Posts: 22,394 Senior Member
    #17
    zorba wrote: »
    Yes there is, and likewise there's a huge danger to relying on sites like face***k for news.

    Using F...Book for facts reminds me of the guy in high school that made a book report on a comic book. He didn't tell the teacher. It was funny when the teacher ask, "Now who did you say the author was?"

    :rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao::rotflmao:
    Daddy, what's an enabler?
    Son that's somebody with nothing to do with his time but keep me in trouble with mom.
    · Share on TwitterShare on Facebook
Sign In or Register to comment.
Magazine Cover

GET THE MAGAZINE Subscribe & Save

Temporary Price Reduction

SUBSCRIBE NOW

Give a Gift   |   Subscriber Services

PREVIEW THIS MONTH'S ISSUE

MORE YOU MAY BE INTERESTED IN

GET THE NEWSLETTER Join the List and Never Miss a Thing.

Get the top Guns & Ammo stories delivered right to your inbox every week.

Sign Me Up
Advertisement