Spotting fake BS on the internet. It just seems so obvious to me when someone is making up a story for clout, or to plug a GoFundMe scam, or to push an obvious narrative of hate toward a group of people. And then I go into the comments and want to fucking scream.
And then, when you point out that something is fake, half the time people get all defensive about it. “Who cares? It’s still a good story” or “Well, it might be fake THIS time, but I can imagine people actually doing this, so I’m going to internalize this as more proof for my biases.”
I don’t get it, how is it so hard for people to spot? Like, yea, there’s the occasional one that’s done so well that it’s easy to fall for, but 99% of these kinds of posts and videos are so blatantly fake that I worry about the level of critical thinking skills the average person has. I thought the explosion of AI shit would make people be a bit more skeptical with the things they read and watch, but it feels like it’s going the other direction.
Firstly, the toupee fallacy: all toupees look fake. You may be able to spot all bad toupees but the good ones fly under your radar and thus you can’t ever know how good you’re actually at spotting them.
Also the assumption-as-fact bias. You think a story is false but did you ever get confirmation that you were right or are you treating your assumption as a fact?
Yeah, this is just confirmation bias at work. Nobody is immune to propaganda, because our brains are biologically hardwired to initially reject data that contradicts our worldview.
There are levels of utility to identifying such things though. Like the amI<insert adjective> subreddits, in fact who gives a shit if that’s made up? Its entertaining. But for news, yes, critical thought is useful.
The thing is, on places like AITA, those made up posts may seem benign and just entertaining, but I encourage you to look with a more critical eye. Well over half the time, there is usually someone in the story specifically acting unreasonable or idiotic or “bad” in some way or form, and they tend to belong to some group or another that the poster is relying on biases of to try and make more convincing. It’s not usually minorities exactly, but things like bosses, or in-laws, or tourists, or women in general. Just some group that people often have preconceived biases against. And then people read the made up story and go “Yea, those people really ARE like that!” and even though it’s completely fake, there is now mental support for those biases; and the world gets just a tiny bit more unfriendly and a tiny bit more isolating.
Another common defense I see is “the same thing happens in all forms of fiction, but I don’t see you complaining about movies or books!” which completely ignores that other forms of fiction aren’t trying to pass themselves off as something that actually, really happened, for real; with real people, that actually exist and act like that. And that’s the difference between telling a story for entertainment, and just fucking lying.
Spotting fake BS on the internet. It just seems so obvious to me when someone is making up a story for clout, or to plug a GoFundMe scam, or to push an obvious narrative of hate toward a group of people. And then I go into the comments and want to fucking scream.
And then, when you point out that something is fake, half the time people get all defensive about it. “Who cares? It’s still a good story” or “Well, it might be fake THIS time, but I can imagine people actually doing this, so I’m going to internalize this as more proof for my biases.”
I don’t get it, how is it so hard for people to spot? Like, yea, there’s the occasional one that’s done so well that it’s easy to fall for, but 99% of these kinds of posts and videos are so blatantly fake that I worry about the level of critical thinking skills the average person has. I thought the explosion of AI shit would make people be a bit more skeptical with the things they read and watch, but it feels like it’s going the other direction.
Two things to keep in mind here.
Firstly, the toupee fallacy: all toupees look fake. You may be able to spot all bad toupees but the good ones fly under your radar and thus you can’t ever know how good you’re actually at spotting them.
Also the assumption-as-fact bias. You think a story is false but did you ever get confirmation that you were right or are you treating your assumption as a fact?
Yeah, this is just confirmation bias at work. Nobody is immune to propaganda, because our brains are biologically hardwired to initially reject data that contradicts our worldview.
There are levels of utility to identifying such things though. Like the amI<insert adjective> subreddits, in fact who gives a shit if that’s made up? Its entertaining. But for news, yes, critical thought is useful.
The thing is, on places like AITA, those made up posts may seem benign and just entertaining, but I encourage you to look with a more critical eye. Well over half the time, there is usually someone in the story specifically acting unreasonable or idiotic or “bad” in some way or form, and they tend to belong to some group or another that the poster is relying on biases of to try and make more convincing. It’s not usually minorities exactly, but things like bosses, or in-laws, or tourists, or women in general. Just some group that people often have preconceived biases against. And then people read the made up story and go “Yea, those people really ARE like that!” and even though it’s completely fake, there is now mental support for those biases; and the world gets just a tiny bit more unfriendly and a tiny bit more isolating.
Another common defense I see is “the same thing happens in all forms of fiction, but I don’t see you complaining about movies or books!” which completely ignores that other forms of fiction aren’t trying to pass themselves off as something that actually, really happened, for real; with real people, that actually exist and act like that. And that’s the difference between telling a story for entertainment, and just fucking lying.