Fake Bhai Fake: A 2-minute Trick To Filter Out Most Fake News
Dear BJP/Congress/AAP or any other party supporter,
You’ve been continuously under fire of fake news. I get your pain. Here’s the tool you’ve been waiting for all your life. It’s called I’M VAIN.
I’M VAIN is a bunch of shortcuts to see if your news is reliable. It stands for Independent, Many Sources, Verifiable, Authoritative, Informed and Named sources. Here’s how it works:
- Independent:
Independent sources are more reliable than self-interested sources.
You know how your mother always says you’re beautiful? That’s fake news. She told so because she’s related to you and doesn’t want you to feel bad. And did you notice how your classmates or tinder dates just told you exactly how you look? That’s because they had nothing to lose. Rely on that news.
Ditto in the media, you’ll come across many channels and newspapers that are linked to powerful people. Don’t believe them immediately. And search for information from the outlets that are not linked to them.
CM Yogi Adityanath will anyway say that his state looks good, because it’s his state. Take this with grain of salt.
Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) collects information on all parties and presents them. Later you’ll see there’s another reason to rely on them.
2. Many Sources:
News confirmed from many sources is more reliable than a single source.
If you listen only to your tongue — Biryani is the best food; You should have more of it. That’s fake news; if you follow it the kingdom of your buttocks will burn. If you listen only to your butt — Green leafy vegetables are the best, you should have only that. You arrive at the best food when you listen most of the body parts. That’s why don’t listen to only one person. Take info from many places to get the right idea.
The info you get from a single person can be wrong for many reasons — They’re biased; they had the wrong idea; they had incomplete info; they want the fame, etc., The news coming from different places has more chances of being real. Here’s an example from ‘The Newsroom’ how the multiple sources are applied.
3. Verifiable:
News that gives verifiable information is more reliable than one that is not verifiable.
Everybody has that friend who lies to their girlfriend that they’re at a place they’re not. And rightly, the girlfriend does not believe them. And they get caught the moment the girlfriend asks for their location. Verifiable information saves the day.
When you are drowning with information, check for whether it is verifiable or not. For instance, in the video given below, Gyandev Ahuja says that more than 3,000 condoms are found everyday in JNU. How did they gather that information without violating the privacy? Where is the source?
Compare that to this article; it says Ministry of Home Affairs published a picture of a Spanish-Moroccan highway as its own road in its report. It gives the year of the report and the name of the photographer. So, you can check both online.
The news turned out to be real and the ministry apologized for it.
This is also why ADR’s information is reliable cause it is also verifiable. They give links to the sources of info like the links to politicians’ affidavits.
4. Authoritative/Informed:
News that is received from an Authority or Informed person on the topic is more reliable than the one that’s not.
‘Laughter Is The Medicine’ has origins in the Bible. That’s why no doctor says, “ You have Cancer, so Laugh!!”, Whenever you’re given some information at least check if the person giving it is qualified to give it or not.
Zee News published a news report during Demonetization that the new Rs.2000 notes had a GPS chip in them. Sounds good and possible. Only, no authority was mentioned. It was just him.
RBI which designed the notes released this. No news about the chip. Guess which one is true?
There’s a little brother of this trick. Here you search for names.
5. Named:
News from the named sources is more reliable than the unnamed sources.
There was this movie called PK. In it Anushka, the heroine, is going to marry Sushant, then side-hero. But at the last minute she receives a letter saying marriage is off. It screws up her mind up for years. Later she realizes, that letter was meant for someone else. She’d have done better to realize — you don’t believe unsigned letters.
For real life example here’s the story of Sridevi’s death which was initially ‘reported’ to be from the cardiac arrest. That turned out to be false.
Guess whose report turned out to be more reliable? The people who came forward to name themselves — Dubai Police.
Final Words:
So that’s the small trick you can turn to filter most of the fake news. Every trick has its weak spots. But all of them combined, they will save your day. Use it wisely, save yourself and others from this fake news epidemic.
That’s all folks — The power is yours.