When you hear news - do you research or fact check it before forwarding?

1. 72

   ptosisposted 19 months ago

   When you hear news - do you research or fact check it before forwarding?
   
   So get info such as 9th circuit court has 80% cases overturned - the highest in the system - would you fact check that on snopes or the American Bar association first?     " .. more than 99 percent of that circuit’s decisions stood and the Supreme Court reviewed a scant 0.106 percent of circuit court cases each year."
   The answer is yes … and really no. Confused? Many are, because we all suck at math.
   
   

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2. 89

   Ken Burgessposted 19 months ago

   I would never use 'fact check' or some other source that checks the facts... because they themselves often have a 'bias' in how they report the facts, and/or what facts they choose to find.
   
   But I almost always do a Search... you can type in:
   "9th circuit court has 80% cases overturned"
   
   and then I select what looks like interesting results:
   
   http://www.nationalreview.com/bench-mem … athan-keim
   
   http://www.abajournal.com/magazine/arti … sed_appeal
   
   Wala... doing my own research and not relying on Snopes to give the answer to me.

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      bradmasterOCcalposted 19 months agoin reply to this

      Ken, great comment.

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      Ericdierkerposted 19 months agoin reply to this

      Thanks Ken, I have been meaning to look that up.

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      ptosisposted 19 months agoin reply to this

      Great answer: For the 9th, used not only snopes but also the ABA

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3. 96

   lisavollrathposted 19 months ago

   I am that annoying friend who fact checks all the crazy stuff people post, and leaves a link of the source showing it's bogus in the comments.
   
   So, yes. I'm a fact checker.
   
   I like PolitiFact, but I also like to Google the pertinent details, and see what the first five or six sites are that support the statement. If they're an assortment of well-known organizations, I feel good about it. If they're the usual list of extreme right-wing or left-wing blogs, not so much.

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      Ken Burgessposted 19 months agoin reply to this

      As I noted in my answer:  http://www.npr.org/2012/01/10/144974110 … under-fire
      The only way to really find unbiased answers is to do your own research from scratch, otherwise you swallowing whatever bias or BS they are feeding u

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      lisavollrathposted 19 months agoin reply to this

      What I've learned from HP: no matter which sites you use to verify facts, somebody is going to tell you they're biased. I could say I was standing there, watching an event happen, and someone would still yell bias.

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      Ken Burgessposted 19 months agoin reply to this

      Indeed... I guess the point I would like to make, is that the 'fact check' sites aren't 100% reliable, and have a tendency to be not quite so factual in their fact checking.

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4. 86

   dashingscorpioposted 19 months ago

   I don't forward news stories unless they're unique or funny.
   My guess is most people who do forward news stories are not investing their time trying to "fact check" or compile other sources. News stories are biased right down to the photos used.
   Most people forward news stories that (they agree with) to people they believe will appreciate them or in some instances it's an attempt to win an argument they've been having with someone.

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   Ericdierkerposted 19 months ago

   This question is interesting to have on a writer's site. I would not trust fact check business as far as I can throw them. I think a side trip to Wicki to get some buzz words, Chase down what buzz words were used in the news, Look for non-paid PDF references. Kind of check to see what Gov entity regulates a field and see what they got.
   But forwarding for me is sending it to a confidant to get their view, not to show them that something is true.
   What I see as the biggest mistake that researchers make is considering conclusions as facts. You just cannot be that lazy and be credible. You simply do not read the headline and the last line. You have to go through and put facts down, and then separate them with pros and cons and further separate them by fake type hyperbole like flaming adjectives or adverbs.
   If it was a "bright sunny day" does that mean the witness was blinded by bright or that he had on sunglasses that partially obstructed color vision?
   I used to right mostly legal stuff. You have to cite every single source used to come up with your argument.
   Now I write a whole lot about the Bible. But you would have to know your bible to know that because I do not due that "this verse says this so that means it makes sense here" kind of bolstering. Either it makes sense to you are it doesn't. In the philosophy and spirituality field you do not state as a fact, that is for the reader to determine.
   
   Great question and it made me kind of review and structure my process. I think I do some of this without even a conscious intention.
   Politics are cool because in the end the only fact that matters is the fact of if someone bought the bullshit.

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