Opinion

Poor sources mislead too many

Legitimate-looking pieces claim dinosaurs still alive

By Derek Dobachesky

Posted on Feb. 15, 2007, at 12:00 a.m.

Truthiness. It’s when you know something in your gut, and don’t need to reference things such as books, facts or your brain.

I’ve noticed this phenomenon more and more lately, and not just in the partisan rhetoric of politicians running for office or on Stephen Colbert’s “The Word.” No, even on our very own humble little bastion of intellectualism, the University of Maine campus, truthiness tends to pervade the everyday public debate.

A perfect example of this would be last week, when someone posted an article to the student forum about Bush’s proposal to cut funding for NPR and PBS in this year’s budget. Within minutes, there were several e-mails sent applauding the president’s move, two because the public networks are too “liberal” and one because they’re “milquetoast moderates.”

I’d like to ask the readers of our humble little publication, is reality really so subjective that nearly everything that we know depends upon our personal opinions? None of the responses cited any particular examples as to the lack of objectivity in either of the two networks. I haven’t personally used either of the news outlets for my own consumption in the past, but still, something tells me there’s a problem when something is being derided as both far-left and centrist. And something also bugs me about a news outlet being called “too centrist” as well, when news is supposed to strive for objectivity.

In our society, it feels as if relativism, the belief that reality is entirely subjective, pervades everything. If you can have an opinion, chances are there’s some sort of unreliable source out there to back you up. Want evidence that dinosaurs still exist? You can easily find a plethora of different, fairly articulate and plausible-sounding sources out there proving your point.

I might be idealizing the time period a bit, but I tend to remember that, back in the ’90s, people could distinguish between what is and what they believe. Today, it appears the roles have reversed. If you want a worldview in which straight, white, Christian men are solely responsible for every evil known to the human race, there are plenty of news sources out there for you.

If you want a worldview in which Bill Clinton is responsible for multiple politically-motivated contract killings and Hillary Clinton is part of a communist conspiracy seeking to overthrow capitalism and the entire American way of life, all while making us disco dance in Speedos with the Village People, I’m sure you can find some alternative news sources for that as well.

What frustrates me about this phenomena is how widespread it is, and the fact that each side absolutely hates the other side and derides them for lacking “objectivity.” I can understand listening to “Democracy Now!” or tuning into Fox News once in a while, but if you get all of your news from Keith Olbermann, it’s kind of a double standard to constantly scream about how biased Sean Hannity is, and vice versa.

I’m not saying that there is not a place for political, religious or other subjective ideologies, or colorful, albeit incredibly partisan, pundits in this world. All I’m saying is that our society nowadays seems to have a serious reality deficit. Maybe I’m old-fashioned or elitist, but I still like getting my information from serious news publications like USA Today and The New York Times, both of which I believe faithfully convey accurate information. I admit it, The New York Times is blatantly liberal but – to the best of my knowledge – it does not twist around or spin the truth; it simply chooses as newsworthy those events that support a liberal agenda, which is what its audience demands. If you want to be an unabashed, but nonetheless well-informed conservative, why not read the Wall Street Journal?

I’m not saying that alternative news outlets do not have a place, but simply that you might want to switch to more mainstream outlets that use more primary sources, including professionals in relevant fields and legal and policy experts and relevant documents. These have a greater knowledge of civics and less of a tendency to twist the truth to partisan ends, for your main sources. Perhaps take what Hannity, Olbermann, Bill O’Reilly and the rest of the punditry says with a bigger grain of salt.

Derek Dobachesky is a third-year political science major.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 15th, 2007, 12:00 am. You can follow any responses to this article through the RSS feed.