I do admit that I think how social media works is to presume anything you hear on facebook or shitter as false unless proven otherwise.

Does anyone here think they have a good heuristic to determine if anything on a social media website is true? Can we progress dialectically towards the truth with social media or does the system motivate liars to double down on falsehoods? If it were possible for us to own social media can social media be made to encourage truth telling and punish liars?

  • The Snark Urge@lemmy.worldEnglish
    4·
    1 year ago

    My usual (read: not ideal) heuristic for noticing manipulative media is a sense of things being too pat. Fitting an agenda too neatly, that is.

    The best way to deal with these things is probably with strong media literacy and limiting your media diet to an amount you can consume responsibly.

    I can say for certain I’d be happier if I didn’t try to keep up with as much as I do. I simply don’t have the energy to read everything critically.

    • redballooon
      2·
      1 year ago

      With that exact heuristic climate change deniers look at the weather and flood reports and say “wait a second, that fits into the liberal sciency agenda too well”.