5 Easy Ways to Spot a B.S. News Story on the Internet

[XemaSab]

The Internet, while awesome, is also a mind-boggling marvel of bullshit production and dissemination. A misleading or outright fake news story can get forwarded on Facebook a million times before Snopes.com can even write up their rebuttal (no, oral sex does not prevent breast cancer). Since the rise of social media, we get more and more of our news from each other, and far, far too many of us aren't asking ourselves the important question:

"Is the amazing news I'm about to share even fucking true?"

Because most of the time, we don't need somebody else to debunk these stories for us -- not if we know what to look for. For instance, it should always raise red flags if ...

#5. It's World-Changing News from Some Obscure Website

#4. It's From the Fucking Daily Mail (or Another U.K. Tabloid)

#3. It's Predicting Some Future Disaster by a Strangely Specific Date

#2. It's a Poll Disguised as a News Story

#1. It's About a Miracle Cure for Obesity, Cancer, or Clean Energy

http://www.cracked.com/blog/5-easy-ways-to-spot-b.s.-news-story-internet/

[Gorp]

1. #6. It has "foxnews" in the URL.

[Ohio Joe]

7. heh...

That was exactly the first thought I had when I saw the title of the OP

[Gorp]

9. Well? It's true.

[hollysmom]

11. I thought of News max -

so many republicans or breitbartuse that as a source on my different party discussion board quote those.

[Archae]

15. Fox news is bad, but there are sites far worse.

WND, NewsMax, Town Hall, etc.

[Gorp]

16. Sludge Report

[WhoIsNumberNone]

22. Man, I hate it when someone posts exactly what I was going to say...

[OceanEcosystem]

2. As others have also said before, watch out if it appeals to one's innate biases or prejudices.

For instance, conservatives would probably leap to believe a fake news story that claimed, "Study shows that liberals have a lower IQ than conservatives."


And liberals would probably leap to believe a fake news story that claimed, "Study shows that conservatives have a lower IQ than liberals."

[ChisolmTrailDem]

3. No news story that declares "Study shows that conservatives have a lower IQ than liberals."

is fake, bogus, wrong in any way, shape, or form.

[OceanEcosystem]

4. There are plenty of ways such a news story or study could be wrong.

It could be bogus if it only uses a survey sample size of 2 people, for instance.

[reformist2]

5. The Daily Mail is a guilty pleasure.

Best gossip rag in the world, imo.

[RebelOne]

13. I agree. I check it out every day. n/t

[WinkyDink]

6. I read the UKDM...daily. I'd like you to point out where its hard news is bogus. But hey: CRACKED?

Yeah, THAT'S a great source. Was MAD's website down?

There's lots of mayhem and show-biz twaddle, but there's also:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2284843/Tony-Blair-admits-people-abusive-10-years-ordered-Iraq-invasion.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2284743/Apple-agrees-66m-compensation-US-parents-children-racked-huge-bills-buying-extra-content-free-iPad-games.html
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2285163/Dr-Baile-Zhang-unveils-invisibility-cloak-TED2013-conference--says-did-fun.html

[SidDithers]

8. And chances are that it will be posted by someone in GD...nt

Sid

[REP]

18. Didja notice "Natural News" was one of their "do not believe" cites?

High five!

Any Time You See a Headline Like ...
"Vaccinated Children Five Times More Prone to Disease Than Unvaccinated Children" -NaturalNews.com
Or
"Studies Show That Online Gaming Can Add Years to Your Life" -i-Newswire
You Should Read It As ...
"Vaccinated Children Five Times More Prone to Disease Than Unvaccinated Children AND ALSO WI-FI IS CAUSING WORMS TO GROW IN YOUR BRAIN" -Hobo talking to his pet rat on the subway

[Posteritatis]

19. Yep, that's another "assume they're lying by default" site. (nt)

[lpbk2713]

10. Check the date

Someone may have overlooked the date or they could be clutching their pearls
over something that happened five years ago and omitted that relevant info.

[Tommy_Carcetti]

12. Andrew Breitbart's name is somehow associated with it. nt

[Nye Bevan]

14. Yes, I HATE HATE HATE when DUers use the FUCKING Daily Mail as a source, like this DUer did:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/11271226

[HomeboyHombre]

17. "Forward this to everyone you know" = total crap nt

[Posteritatis]

20. I love that someone went and registered alientruthrevealed.blogspot after that post

Content's kinda entertaining, too.

[XemaSab]

21. .

[apocalypsehow]

23. Yep. Nails it. n/t.

[cthulu2016]

24. #6 It is in General Discussion on DU

[Dash87]

25. If it's your brother, nephew, friend, or anyone not you that experienced something,

and you decided to come on the internet and write about it for them, you probably made the entire thing up. Good rule of thumb for sorting through urban myths, bull crap, etc.

[Bigbluebrush]

26. Headline contains both "Republican" and "Strategy"