What can you believe

This is such an issue right now because so many “fake news” organizations are springing up on the 'net and people are posting fake news as a joke, or sometimes to deliberately spread misinformation. It drives us crazy at work because ordinary folks really have no idea of the work that goes into a story. They ask inane questions about how truthful the real news is. They have no idea that 75 per cent of our time is spent gathering information and fact checking. You can’t imagine how many times we have stopped a story because we cannot verify the information on time.  Of course if Justin Trudeau says something that isn’t true, we won’t call him a liar but we will present correct information and let people judge. We recently ran an environmental story where we presented numbers from an environmental report. One woman on Facebook said she disagreed with the numbers. That’s fine. That’s an issue between you and the environment ministry. So of course she goes on Facebook to say the story is wrong and that our reporting is wrong. OMG, this is not about winning a coffee shop argument. This is about facts. Somebody was obviously sniffing too many fumes in the hair salon. You almost wish her grade five teacher would show up at her doorstep, rap her knuckles and tell her smarten up.

I’ve got to write more later about disagreeing. Just because you disagree, doesn’t mean you’re right and the other guy is wrong, or that you’re a better person. It just mean’s you disagree.