I have to confess – I am now using social
media outlets as my first source of information when I’m needing updates or
just breaking news. I’ve consumed it readily and rapidly without exercising
much discretion. Recently, however, I’ve come to realize that perhaps we need a
fact checker as I believe the levels of manipulation (yes, I’ve intentionally
used that strong and powerful word) have reached new highs (or is that lows?)
in an effort to play on emotions and get folks polarized while being denied the
whole truth. Now, you might argue that people ought to be more discerning and
use multiple sources, but for many the harried pace of life means the “news”
comes in the easiest, most convenient format. And what’s easier than a 140-character
tweet? Couple that with the emotion of the moment, and the veracity of the
comment becomes less important than the comment itself. Using data that might
fit for an extreme situation, sharing half-truths, passing on rumors, and name
distortion were all in full view recently. None of which serve to elevate the
debate and allow the focus to be on genuine concerns. That’s the real loss in
the world of quick opinions and choosing camps.
In the absence of a fact checking option,
perhaps it might be wise to revisit what I used to do before the explosion of
social media. I had a file labeled “letters never sent”. At times, my emotions
and upset at a current event or individual would get the best of me and I would
write a torrent stream largely driven by emotion and often biased by my own
views of the world. The process was remarkably therapeutic! I also knew at the
end of the crafting of my marvelous tome, it was best to sleep on it. More
often than not, the passing hours allowed for a clarity that was previously
missing, to calm my emotions, lift the fog off my thinking, and allow for a
more productive solution to appear. Over time the file did grow, and after a
time lag, many of the letters were shredded. I preserved some relationships
that would have been lost, or at least severely compromised, that were
important for my work and me.
