80% of Americans say online news websites report fake news.

According to a recent poll by Monmouth University¹, 63% of Americans believe that traditional major news sources like TV and newspapers report 'fake news' stories. This is broken down between 27% who believe it happens regularly, and 36% who believe it happens occasionally.

The figures were even higher for online news websites, jumping to 80%. This was broken down as 41% who believe fake news is reported regularly and 39% who believe it happens occasionally. A further 9% replied 'don't know', with only 11% believing online news websites don't report fake news stories.

Democrats were found to be the most trusting of media sources, with 'only' 43% believing that major media TV and newspaper outlets report fake news stories, compared with 66% of independents and 79% of Republicans. Once again the figures were even higher for online news websites, with 72% of Democrats, 83% of independents, and 87% of Republicans believing that news websites spread fake news.

As the survey shows, much of the public are aware of the untrustworthiness of the mainstream media. However, one subject the survey didn't cover, which is just as significant a problem, is fake news by omission. As the Podesta emails revealed, the Hillary Clinton campaign wanted an 'unaware and compliant citizenry'.²

In fact Hillary Clinton's campaign team went further than just wishing for it. As the email reveals, they conspired to produce an unaware and compliant citizenry.

The behavior of much of the mainstream media suggests they also want an unaware and compliant citizenry. In the case of stories which could damage their narrative, they sometimes simply refuse to cover those stories. Or if they do cover them, it's only so they can explain to their brainwashed viewers why they should disregard and ignore such stories.

Perhaps the biggest example of this was the Podesta emails released by Wikileaks, which revealed numerous damaging facts regarding Obama and Hillary Clinton. For example, the emails revealed that Obama's government approved arms sales to foreign governments they knew were supporting ISIS.³ And yet, despite the fact that this should have been the story of the decade, stories such as this were either severely under-reported, or in some cases not even mentioned at all, by many news networks.

The best way to counter fake news by omission is to research news from a variety of sources. And of course, if a newspaper, website or TV channel uses expressions such as 'unnamed sources', 'possibly believed to', 'anonymous insiders', or other vague terms, and if they refuse to provide sources and links so readers can verify their claims for themselves, then readers should always treat the story with suspicion, and research the story further.

Real news makes statements. It doesn't need to hide behind ambiguous claims to protect itself.

#FakeNews

- - - - - - - - - -

Sources:
1 https://www.monmouth.edu/polling-institute/reports/MonmouthPoll_US_032917/
2 https://wikileaks.org/podesta-emails/emailid/3599
3 http://redpilledworld.blogspot.com/2017/03/obamas-government-approved-arms-sales.html