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OpEdNews Op Eds    H2'ed 8/11/17

Don't Fall Into The Trap of Using the "Fake News" Label

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Don't be duped. The "fake media" narrative is an attack on ALL of the press and the first amendment.

As a progressive, you know that the term "Democrat party" is right wing framing, or languaging. You know that the "death tax" is a languaged phrase created by right wing framing master Frank Luntz to disparage inheritance taxes. I created the phrase "dynasty tax" to put a more left-wing spin on inheritance taxes.

So, beware. The phrase "fake news" is also a languaged phrase crafted with intention to affect the way people think. I submit that the phrase was created to lower the trust in any news sources.

A Telegraph article identifies the source of the term:

"It was at Donald Trump's first press conference as President-elect when the term "fake news" broke out of media discussions and into the mainstream. "You are fake news!" he pointed at CNN's Jim Acosta while refusing to listen to his question. Since then, the now President of the USA has been calling out major media outlets several times a week for being 'FAKE NEWS' via his Twitter feed - particularly CNN and the New York Times."
Donald Trump
Donald Trump
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Perhaps Trump knew, even at his first press conference that the only way he could survive opposing media attacks would be to get people to stop trusting media as reliable sources. Perhaps he realized that the press would be one of his strongest antagonists. And Trump's strategy with all of his antagonists has been to attack and deprecate them.

So be aware. Every time you use the term "fake media" you are adding energy and power to the underlying message that has been languaged and framed into the word. That helps Trump, helps the media that want to condition people to stop paying any attention at all to actual news.

This framing/languaging campaign has been incredibly effective, luring the biggest monopoly platforms-- Google and Facebook-- to adopt policies aimed at preventing "fake news." They've recruited establishment supporting, mainstream media organizations to "help" them. How has that worked out? Multiple sources in the progressive community have reported that progressive news and opinion websites have been deprecated by Google as reported by these articles:

Google Censors Block Access to CounterPunch and Other Progressive Sites New Google algorithm restricts access to left-wing, progressive web sites

My analysis of google referrals to OpEdNews.com indicates that referrals from Google to OpEdNews have dropped 20 to 45% since Google's war on progressive media began.

Graph of Google referrals to OpEdNews
Graph of Google referrals to OpEdNews
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Any ideas on how to deal with all this?

There are also reports that Google is minimizing ad revenues on sites it considers sources of "fake news."

Finally, the truth is, the effort to diminish the public's trust, even their attention to news has been under way for a long time. Other strategies have also been used to undermine trust and interest in news. This is just the latest iteration.

The difference is now, major platforms-- Google, Facebook, for starters-- are playing a role in this-- an incredibly dangerous one. Their attack on progressive media is an attack on the first amendment. They have risen to near the top of the list of threats to democracy.

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Rob Kall Social Media Pages: Facebook Page       Twitter page url on login Profile not filled in       Linkedin page url on login Profile not filled in       Instagram page url on login Profile not filled in

Rob Kall is an award winning journalist, inventor, software architect, connector and visionary. His work and his writing have been featured in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, CNN, ABC, the HuffingtonPost, Success, Discover and other media.

Check out his platform at RobKall.com

He is the author of The Bottom-up Revolution; Mastering the Emerging World of Connectivity

He's given talks and workshops to Fortune 500 execs and national medical and psychological organizations, and pioneered first-of-their-kind conferences in Positive Psychology, Brain Science and Story. He hosts some of the world's smartest, most interesting and powerful people on his Bottom Up Radio Show, and founded and publishes one of the top Google- ranked progressive news and opinion sites, OpEdNews.com

more detailed bio:

Rob Kall has spent his adult life as an awakener and empowerer-- first in the field of biofeedback, inventing products, developing software and a music recording label, MuPsych, within the company he founded in 1978-- Futurehealth, and founding, organizing and running 3 conferences: Winter Brain, on Neurofeedback and consciousness, Optimal Functioning and Positive Psychology (a pioneer in the field of Positive Psychology, first presenting workshops on it in 1985) and Storycon Summit Meeting on the Art Science and Application of Story-- each the first of their kind. Then, when he found the process of raising people's consciousness and empowering them to take more control of their lives one person at a time was too slow, he founded Opednews.com-- which has been the top search result on Google for the terms liberal news and progressive opinion for several years. Rob began his Bottom-up Radio show, broadcast on WNJC 1360 AM to Metro Philly, also available on iTunes, covering the transition of our culture, business and world from predominantly Top-down (hierarchical, centralized, authoritarian, patriarchal, big) to bottom-up (egalitarian, local, interdependent, grassroots, archetypal feminine and small.) Recent long-term projects include a book, Bottom-up-- The Connection Revolution, (more...)
 

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