This is a chance for you to let go. What is one product or thing that you hate with a passion, and why do you hate it? Do you feel more confident writing now that you have a particular target in mind?
Length: 500 Words
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I’ve been letting go for a couple of years. But there is one area that still goes against the grain. It’s our instant information. How do we separate truth from fiction?
Information, in my opinion, can be described as truth and opinion. Anyone tall enough to reach the keyboard is an author. This information doesn’t require any authentication, no signature, no messenger’s identity. We don’t know if the author is so-called “expert” on the subject he/she is addressing, or if they are an uneducated, uninformed, opinionated radical who logged on to a public library computer.
Case in point is President-elect Donald Trump. Trump casts a long shadow. It isn’t necessary that he log into Twitter when he feels the urge to bash someone. If he wishes to make a statement at two o’clock in the morning he can call a press conference. No matter the hour someone will be on alert at the bureau desk. People will come out of the woodwork to record what he has on his mind.
During my younger years, which was a long time ago, a responsible person, a person who had earned his/her way to a decision-making position, had the final word as to what was published and what went elsewhere. Information was seldom tainted with opinion.
When we lived in Eugene, Oregon a television newsman by the name of Jim Brown (obviously not his given name) came to work at channel 14. He refined the term “Talking Head”. After reading five minutes of news, he then invested an additional ten minutes explaining to us what his words meant. After a time he drove me off the channel. What happened to people like Walter Cronkite and Gabriel Heatter? Were they the last of their kind?
Gabriel Heatter was gone before television came along. I was small – the year may have been 1944 – when I remember his broadcasts at six o’clock each evening. “Ah, there’s good news tonight,” where always his first words. We were in the midst of World War II, fighting for our very existence and I still recall the stress in my mother’s face as she waited at the radio to hear Gabriel’s opening statement.
Great post Scott. I was just having a conversation Thanksgiving say about how news used to not be printed unless it was fact, verified. I said, “Ah, I remember those days, and I miss them. What happened?!” A younger man chimed in that in a certain year (I forget which) news became classified as entertainment. He didn’t need to say anything else, it all made sense. I think a lot of news outlets strive to maintain the previous standard of excellence-I can tell the difference in reporting-there is little to know bias, plus, when I go to fact check, it checks out. But a little off the subject is this, I notice that with those that I know personally from the younger generations, they do not care to research on their own-they would just like all of their information delivered right to them, quickly. With this general/overarching perspective on information, they set themselves up to be completely deceived by anything or anyone
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You’ve put it all together in a neat package. Thank you.
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I just found this, it was in my reader, so funny and right in line-https://tabulacandida.wordpress.com/2016/11/27/dys/
Best wishes to you and your family Scott.
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