Sign of the times
Accuracy be damned: With Twitter and Facebook, media feels free to reportincorrect information
In the rush to be first, the news media has been quick to report incorrectinformation posted on Twitter and Facebook.
Reputable news media sources reported all sorts of incorrect information aboutthe Connecticut shootings.Imgace.com
There are many lessons to be learned from the horrific events that took place in Connecticut. Debate on gun control, dealing with people who suffer from mental health issues, how we as a society cope with what can only be described as unimaginable — these are all being talked about around water coolers and dinner tables.
There’s another part to this tragedy that we can’t overlook: the way the media covers breaking news stories.
In an effort to “get it first,” they recklessly threw out misinformation. The best of the worst was identifying the shooter as Ryan Lanza, 24, and tweeting his Facebook profile picture around cyberspace.
Why is anyone going to pay attention — much less believe — anything the media reports from the scene of breaking news when so much of it turns out to be wrong?
The news outlets had to correct themselves when it turned out that the shooter was 20-year-old Adam Lanza, his brother. Ryan ended up posting “Fuck You CNN, it wasn’t me” on his Facebook wall in an attempt to help clear up the confusion.
There were also early — and incorrect — reports that Lanza’s mother taught at the Newtown elementary school, as well as massive confusion as to what, and how many, weapons had been used.
In the wake of the shooting, there was also a statement attributed to actor Morgan — which spread faster than nude photos of Kate Middleton — that spoke of how the media is making these psychopaths into superheroes.
The problem? He did not write it and had no idea where it came from. It doesn’t matter, though, because it’s still being shared on Facebook and tweeted at warp speed.
All of this is misinformation is leading us down a very slippery slope. Why is anyone going to pay attention — much less believe — anything the media reports from the scene of breaking news when so much of it turns out to be wrong?
It has become such common practice that most outlets don’t even bother to acknowledge their mistakes anymore; they simply remove the page from their websites in the hopes that no one will remember and then let some PR flak try to explain it away.
Can you imagine what it must have felt like if you had a child in that school, or knew somebody that worked there, and you were trying to find out what happened? In a world where instant gratification is quickly becoming the norm, perhaps a little more homework and a little less rush to be first would be one lesson we could learn in this horrible tragedy.
