Argumentative Essay About Fake News

Fake news comes from countless places and spreads at an alarmingly fast rate. Usually, false stories start as a hoax on a small scale website, blog, or even social media post. A journalist from a slightly bigger news

Throughout history, people have attempted to come up with explanations to make sense of events which could not be comprehend, such explanations are commonly known as conspiracy theories. According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary, the official definition of conspiracy theory  is “a theory that explains an event or set of circumstances as the result of a secret plot by usually powerful conspirators.” These theories can range from minor events, to large scale terrorist attacks. A few well known theories include, Bill Clinton caused 9/11, the Earth is flat, and a reptilian race is planning to take over the Earth. Conspiracy theories can inflict various amount of damage, but it dependent on the conspiracy theory context. (Mckay).  In an

However, if the news is based just on rumors, what would it be? It would turn out fake news. The recent memorable incident relating to the fake news would be during the 2016 US presidential campaign. In “The Journal of Economic Perspectives,” Enrico Moretti and Gordon Hanson state that fake news had some influence over the election result that Trump became the US president (Moretti and Hanson. 235). They also mention that they discover 41 articles which support Clinton or are against Trump and 115 articles which support Trump and are against Clinton (Moretti and Hanson. 225). These pro-Clinton articles were shared on Facebook 7.6 million times and these pro-Trump articles were shared 30.3 million times (Moretti and Hanson. 225). What makes surprising about this fact is those articles later turned out to be fake news. Before the news about Clinton’s scandals was leaked, there were much less of people who would vote for Trump and much less of fake news criticizing her. Nonetheless, her scandals came out, those fake news based on rumors increased the number. People read them out of their curiosity and shared them in a second.

On the internet there are hundreds of thousands of different news articles, but not all of them are real. Fake news is a type of hoax or deliberate misinformation that you can find almost anywhere mostly because of social networking platforms like Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and News Feed.

Why do political candidates, like Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton, sacrifice their morals and alter the moral fabric of society by using dirty tricks and maneuvers, twisting the truth, and telling outright lies?

Fake news is bad for anyone who is reading it. It causes drama. Leads people to the wrong conclusion. It also gives people false information.

There is so much untruths and altered information making it into the hands of the people we used to trust. The information from the media is no longer reliable.

Surprisingly enough, the recurrence dates back to the establishment of the United States.When technology and different forms of communication progressively advance, it is only fitting that the severity and number of fake news stories advance with it. One major trigger related to the spread are politics (Karkouti). Many lies are created to turn different political parties against each other or bring out the worst in candidates (Parkinson). The sheer interest in dominating an opponent is one reason for the spread of inaccurate media and the idea was even utilized by Benjamin Franklin in an act to turn the rebels against England (Parkinson). Despite inconsiderate, the strategy has been proven effective. In addition to competitive motivation, money is also a driving factor for publishing fake news (Zuckerberg). The key correlation is advertising on popular sites. For example, if a small or unpopular source is able to write a false story, attracting numerous viewers, their site will gain popularity and interest (Zuckerberg). Furthermore, as people continue to visit the prominent article, the site can finally earn money. Other small internet corporations see the rising fame of the scene and envy the

This has recently become a major concern because it can have detrimental repercussions and affect people’s lives. There are many ways to take steps toward getting rid of fake news. Facebook and Google are taking major action to try and prevent fake news from being spread on their websites. One way they did this is by changing their algorithm which allowed fake news to be filtered out of their feed. Not only should companies be trying to combat fake news from being spread, but also the society as a whole should help this from happening. One way to prevent the increase of fake news is if social media users know how to spot fake news. Some things to look for when reading an article is the date the story was posted, the author, and even read beyond the headline to see if the article actually matches the outrageous headline. If we as a society do not change the way we share and view news, then nothing will change and fake news will eventually outshine the real

According to James Carson from The Telegraph, the term emerged when President Donald Trump called out news sources for their inaccurate and biased reporting during his presidential campaign season. As the weeks and months go on since he made this accusation, fake news is popping up and being discovered all over the digital world. Much of this fake news is from unreliable or unknown sources, but it is delivered in a believable manner. Fake news is the digitized version of community gossip. It has grown into a monster that is out of any one person’s control, but unlike in the physical world, the spread of fake news is nearly immediate upon its creation, and its reach stretches far beyond walls, borders, and

The media has been around since the days of the printing press, to modern times where the vast network of the internet is a crucial part of everyday life. The news became popular because people want to be informed of what happens in their everyday life. Over the years, it has greatly changed and evolved. As time moved forward and technology improved, it became easier and faster to spread news and events around the world; data of information could be looked up in an instant because of innovations like computers and smartphones. Unfortunately, at the same time, it became simple to create “fake news” and manipulate the general public. Nowadays, fraudulent or flashy headlines along with false information in articles can be seen more frequently.

Some believe that the media is the enemy of all people. Millions are exposed to media on a daily basis and because we are so gullible and susceptible, we believe everything we see. This can be very problematic because serious events can be looked over by popular headlines such as, “Kim Kardashian has a secret pregnancy!”. However, not all articles are fake. An article about a recent salmonella outbreak, the further findings on sugar and cancer correlation, and an update on Wendy Williams prove that there are real news in the world. There are ways to determine if what you’re reading is real or fake: current date, cited sources and headline presentation.

It is no secret that the news has always been known to be bias toward a certain opinion, but experts can trace acts like this all the way back to the nineteenth century in early America (Thornton, 2016). During this time period most of the well-known newspapers were explicitly linked to political parties and economic interest. Respected historian Chilton Williamson writes this about the early 1900’s, “The presentation of facts simply as facts, editors and writers reasoned, cannot accomplish the exalted goal of saving civilization” (Thornton, 2016). But what if a leader comes along and believes that the best thing for their country is to use extreme media bias? In 1933 Adolf Hitler changed the meaning of media bias by completely controlling what people saw and read. Hitler eliminated papers against his control, and promoted the ones in favor. By doing this, he forced people to only see what news was being presented in one way, instead of an accurate and fair representation of the entire news (The Press in the Third Reich). This statement is not insinuating that bias with Nazi Germany is the same as modern America, but it is suggesting that bias amongst media allows for a misrepresentation of the truth to the people.

As the world evolves and changes due to the explosion of technology, so does mankind's ways of intellectual comprehension of informative news. The present day of news has overemphasized the meaning of fake news; which represents any form of false information that is illustrated as factual news. That tends to spread throughout the internet and the media. Misinformed news has taken over the world in so many ways, such as the birth of satirical and sketchy news, the financial motivation to publish actual false news, and difficult to sustain news.

The recent surge in popularity of social media comes with a price: fake news. Fake news is defined as news or media that has been altered or modified. Journalists have begun to analyze why that fake news exists and why it continues exist. Two authors, Eoin O’Carroll and Kevin D. Williamson, both have written articles about fake news. Eoin O’Carroll’s article “How Information Overload Helps Spread Fake News,” discusses how the media has bombarded us with news stories, blurring the distinct lines between real and fake news. Kevin D. Williamson, a journalist for the National Review, writes in his article “‘Fake News, Media and Voters: Shared Reality Must Be Acknowledged” that the news is not fake; it just does not align with one’s personal beliefs. Both authors successfully appeal to their audiences’ emotions and feelings, but O’Carroll is more likely to succeed than Williamson in persuading his audience to try and combat fake news because the writer presents himself as someone the intended readers will more readily identify with and offers evidence that his readers will find more compelling.