Media literacy is the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, create, and act using all forms of communication. In its simplest terms, media literacy builds upon the foundation of traditional literacy and offers new forms of reading and writing. Media literacy empowers people to be critical thinkers and makers, effective communicators, and active citizens.
- National Association of Media Literacy Education
Don’t you hate it when someone starts off a wedding toast with quoting the dictionary? Well, forgive the faux-pas, but all I can think about lately is media literacy and the severe lack of it. In the last year, more so than ever before I have been sent a disturbing amount of horribly written articles, or even worse, YouTube lectures as if they are the end-all-be-all of a topic. Don’t even get me started on the gigantic problem we have with utilization of memes as news. People love to share the thing that they took 47 seconds to read b/c the headline said all they needed to know. We all love a good YouTube rant because it doesn’t feel like the “mainstream media” fed it to us! We found it all on our own (ish - hello algorithms, I see you)! And then we all (myself included) love to share things that really confirm our own biases. That sweet spot of information that feels like it’s written just for you and for you to share to convert all your friends to your way of thinking - it’s a hell of a drug. Doesn’t mean that it’s anymore right than doing a line of coke is though. Feels great in the moment, but is a horrible idea overall. It’s in this moment of thinking beyond the immediate dopamine hit of sharing, and asking if it’s best in the long run.
Guilty confession: I like to read things from places like MSNBC and Slate. These two places are liberal heaven and say things I love to hear. I also know they’re pretty well researched most of the time. However, I am aware enough to know that they’re editorializing a story that speaks to my inner progressive. I share sparingly.
Another guilty confession: I like to read things from places like the Wall Street Journal and the New York Post. These two places are on the opposite side of MSNBC and Slate, but they help round out a story. The WSJ is well researched, but they’re editorializing as well to scratch the itch of a more conservative human. I share sparingly.
On their own - if you only read one of these sources, you’d be getting a fairly incomplete picture. Also, I won’t even go near “sources” on the right or left like Fox News, InfoWars, or Wonkette. Just pure trash - nothing journalistic about anything they do, and their impact has been detrimental. If you’re having trouble identifying where a source lands, the Media Bias Chart is a great place to start. On it you’ll see where a source falls in the left to right political scale, but more importantly the top to bottom overall source reliability. Nothing is perfect, but a media site should be consistently reliable in the information they’re giving you.
I was recently asked what I read, watch, and listen to stay well informed. In today’s world, to break out of the bubble that just makes you feel so good, you have to have a well balanced media diet. In a typical week I consume articles from over 25 sources (some paid, some not), listen to 5-8 podcasts, watch 5-8 news based (and satirical news based) shows, and try to read 1-2 books. I also look up things I don’t know or understand as necessary. All of this makes me a gigantic news hound, and a pain-in-the-ass know-it-all. I’m aware of that, but I also have a basic understanding of most things happening day to day that is well curated. These are the things I follow in my social media feeds.
Where I look to for straight facts: The AP and Reuters are short and to the point, fact based, no editorializing. Did something happen or not? That’s it. Most of the time there’s no politicizing of a story. You’ll notice they’re at the very top of the Media Bias Chart.
We are currently in an infodemic alongside of a pandemic. These two things together spell disaster. And while we need science and medicine to do their thing to correct the virus, we need education to fix the information problem - this being harder to solve for because humans are creatures of habit and do not like having their beliefs challenged. We also have an issue of trust. It is all too easy to share something from social media that we like, and that makes us feel smart whether or not it’s fact based. It’s emotional. Americans have a hard time telling the difference between fact and opinion. I give this 10 question quiz to my journalism students every term. It takes 2 minutes. How did you do? Only 26% of initial respondents got all five factual questions correct, and 35% got all five opinion questions correct. Those are abominable numbers. If you can’t understand fact vs opinion in a single statement, how are you able to understand complex issues in any article? This is where our distrust begins.
Social media is caught in the crosshairs of this discussion. As of October 2019, PEW did a study acknowledging that 1 in 3 people get their news from social media and the role the networks play. This is a jump from 1 in 5 in 2018. While social network responsibility is very much a discussion for another day, how people curate their feeds directly impacts what they know and is entirely up to the user. Advertising aside, what you choose to follow and what groups you join is all up to you, dear reader. Instead of jumping off a network all together, why not try changing what’s delivered to you first?
In any of your main feeds, how have you curated what you see? Do you follow Fox News? Unfollow it. Do you follow the Associated Press? If not, follow it. Do you follow random accounts on Instagram that beat a drum about something related to a health or fitness craze or theory? Are these “sources” posting “feelings” or are they posting peer reviewed science? Be wary. Keep this to a minimum. Influencers are just humans curating info. If you want to follow people and not media, look at their credentials. Medical doctors, journalists, lawyers, scientists are all great places to start. At the moment, I follow no more than 5-10 average person influencers in any of my feeds. Pure entertainment, mostly. Do not follow someone that has an agenda, i.e. out to convert everyone into being an anti-vaxxer. This may be what you’re looking for, but you won’t get unbiased information and it’ll only feed your ego.
Begin to remove the garbage and replace with it with reputable sources. Now this is where someone might say, “But the mainstream media lies!'“ and ya know what - there’s some truth to that as they are businesses and they’re trying to sell clicks and make money. Another reason why I look at the AP/Reuters more than anything else. The difference being is that I know there’s a solid journalistic methodology that goes on at these places, and that there’s quality research and fact checking happening not only within the organization, but afterward on third party fact checking sites. It takes a village. The percentage of accuracy is better than whatever I got from someone’s wordpress.com website that they couldn’t bother to buy the domain for. This is typically a gigantic red flag by the way, of something potentially not reputable.
We can help each other by not sharing every single thing that comes across our feeds. We can read for our own enjoyment and our own education. Follow social media influencers sparingly. Read across party lines. Stay above that reliability line in the media chart. Don’t go down a YouTube rabbit hole. If what you’re going to share hasn’t been reviewed, or will start a never ending debate, unless you’re an expert moderator it might be best not to smash that share button.
