Episode 83: The Unchecked Conservative Ideology of US Media's 'Fact-Check' Verticals

Citations Needed

News, Society & Culture

4.8 • 4.1K Ratings

🗓️ 17 July 2019

⏱️ 49 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

"Three Pinocchios!" rates The Washington Post. "Pants On Fire!" declares PolitiFact. "True, but misleading," assess The New York Times.

In a media environment overwhelmed with information, misinformation, disinformation and so-called "fake news," a cottage industry has emerged to "fact-check" the content coming across our screens. Prestige, corporate media outlets tell us if a viral meme, a politician's statement or a pundit's controversial claims is indeed "factually correct."

But who fact-checks the fact-checkers? And what do mainstream media's particular hyper-literal, decontextualized approach to "facts" and "truth" say about how the press views its role as ideological gate keeper?

We are joined by writer Andrew Hart.

Transcript

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0:00.0	This is Citations Needed with Nemesh Yorazi and Adam Johnson.
0:09.0	Welcome to Citations Needed, a podcast on the media, power PR and the history of bullshit
0:14.1	I am Nemesh Yorazi.
0:15.3	I'm Adam Johnson.
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0:21.4	of our work through patreon.com slash Citations Needed Podcast with Nemesh Yorazi and Adam
0:27.6	Johnson.
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0:33.8	It keeps the show going and allows us to keep turning out all these episodes for you.
0:38.8	Yeah, and remember, as always, if you do, subscribe to us on patreon.
0:41.8	You get 42, 43 or so.
0:44.3	Many episodes we call news briefs.
0:45.9	They're about 10 to 40 minutes long where we talk about more recent events as they unfold.
0:50.7	Obviously they're not particularly recent anymore, but they're still good and still relevant
0:54.1	because I don't know, something something history rhymes.
0:56.8	Exactly.
0:58.6	The Washington Post rates this statement three Pinocchios.
1:03.2	Politifact rates this meme pants on fire.
1:06.7	The New York Times finds this political commercial true but misleading.
1:11.7	In our media environment where there's an overwhelming barrage of disinformation, information
1:16.4	and so-called fake news, a cottage industry has emerged to quote-unquote fact check all
1:21.4	the content coming across our screens.
	...

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