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Crowd Sourcing Truth? What is really going on out there?

#1 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 02:51 PM

Last night I had the amazing opportunity to have an in-depth conversation with a friend and colleague who left Eritrea to become a doctor here in the USA. What I love about talking to people from many parts of the world is having my eyes ripped open to see where I would never think to look.

The starting point of this discussion focused on a news article that arose at the beginning of November:
Http://www.aljazeera...1171043467.html
In which 28 people were killed in a mass shooting.

Eritrea, for those who have that vague recollection of hearing but not knowing where this country is, sits on the coast of the Red Sea directly across from Yemen, north of Ethiopia and east of Sudan. It is ruled by what is called a dictatorship that for the most part has chosen isolationism and keeps people from 18-40 years of age from leaving rhe country. Part of the reason for this entrenched status has to do with it's location, which, as you can imagine, is highly strategic at the southern mouth of the Red Sea and near to the tip of the Saudi Arabian peninsula. When Eritrea broke away from Ethiopia, it put itself in the unique situation of having the powers of the world hoping it would fail or at least bargain to keep its independence. It has done neither.

So back to the article. The source of the information was an Ethiopian journalist working with the Associated Press who got the information from a known terrorist group (sorry, i would need to ask again to get the name and may just edit it in later) and passed it along. The story, which had no verification, only a video with audible gunshots, proceeded to pass into the main media without question, easily believed as yet another cruel dictatorship killing its people.

Except no one was shot. The gunshot was real, but it was into the air. And remember that Ethiopia, a land locked country, really misses having that coast line. It turns out, according to friends and family within the country, that no one died. The shot was a warning shot. And that Ethiopean reporter? He had been barred once before for something like corruption.

This was one month ago. And after being priviledged to have Ment's insight into the Ukraine, I want to ask, how do we fix this? Fix the absence of multiple sources, especially in places where we do not get the full story?

I am bandying around an idea that maybe we need to create an unofficial news source. Everyone in the world, pretty much, is online. Why can't we use that to bypass or at least cross check the stories being fed to us? After last night, I am starting to question how much I truly know about the world.

This post has been edited by Gust Hubb: 30 November 2017 - 02:51 PM

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#2 User is offline   Nevyn 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 03:08 PM

Especially when you are talking about events like mass shootings, the evidence suggests crowd sourced reports are significantly LESS accurate than news agencies, especially in the immediate aftermath.

Also even more easy to manipulate by bad actors.

As for the article that is your example, I would say that still lives in a murky area where it is tough to tell which side to believe. Who are the sources for saying no one was shot? Who once banned the journalist? Who labelled the sources as a terrorist group? I mean, did your buddies friends and family witness the incident? Or are they saying no one was shot based on the information they get within the country?

And as to why the story might be picked up without more verification, well, that's the downside of having a very closed country. According to the wikipedia page, reporters without borders ranked Eritrea BELOW North Korea for media freedom. That makes it rather difficult for the AP to get more sources or know which sources to trust.



Put it this way, in the western world, the american alt-right are at the fore-front of doubting traditional sources of information, and trying to circulate 'truth' among their own. And that so called truth is often comically easy to debunk and would not pass the laugh test. That gives you an idea of the danger of crowd sourcing. People pick their crowd according to their beliefs, and end up picking their truth the same way.

This post has been edited by Nevyn: 30 November 2017 - 03:24 PM

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#3 User is offline   Morgoth 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 04:21 PM

Also, Eritrea is a brutal and terrible dictatorship, with one of the very worst human rights records in the world. I'd be much less likely to trust information coming from people living within the country than I would a journalist from without.
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Posted 30 November 2017 - 04:22 PM

View PostGust Hubb, on 30 November 2017 - 02:51 PM, said:

The starting point of this discussion focused on a news article that arose at the beginning of November:
Http://www.aljazeera...1171043467.html
In which 28 people were killed in a mass shooting.


Only that is not what the article is saying. It only states that "an opposition group has claimed" that "security forces killed at least 28 people". Further down in that same article it clarifies that the US embassy only confirms reports of gunfire but importantly not the deaths, and the only quoted source for these supposed killings is a Facebook message from an opposition party. So really the article isn't saying anything wrong, they just lack information.

This post has been edited by Gorefest: 30 November 2017 - 04:23 PM

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#5 User is offline   Mentalist 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 04:50 PM

Errrrm... WAT?

Gust, I know your heart is in the right place, but still: check your facts, plz.

Eritrea is NOT a landlocked country. I did a double-take on reading that, and had to go back and wiki it, since I clearly remembered (from finishing a book on African history earlier this month) that the whole reason Eritrea and Ethiopia had so much conflict was BECAUSE for the longest time Eritrea was the only access to the sea the Highland kingdom of Abyssinia had!
It's why the Italians first set up a colony there, and tries to conquer Ethiopia through Eritrea.

As for the actual point: the reason it'd be incredibly difficult to crowd-source "truth" would be because any such organization would end up having an "agenda" . Opposing restrictive regimes that distort "truth" is a laudable goal, but you have to be be honest with the fact that you WILL lose a measure of objectivity when you pick a stance like that- even if it's less of a conscious choice, and more of a "forced by circumstances"

Also, the problem with crowd-sourcing would be the fact that you have no way to account for differences of opinion between your independent sources. And if you try to really be objective and collate info from opposing viewpoints to try to get to "the truth"... well, my evidence is anecdotal, but it takes several months of intense research, reading and daily cross-referenced to start seeing some patterns and gain some understanding. So it's not something you can do casually with any real measure of success.
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View PostJump Around, on 23 October 2011 - 11:04 AM, said:

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#6 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:01 PM

View PostMentalist, on 30 November 2017 - 04:50 PM, said:

Errrrm... WAT?

Gust, I know your heart is in the right place, but still: check your facts, plz.

Eritrea is NOT a landlocked country. I did a double-take on reading that, and had to go back and wiki it, since I clearly remembered (from finishing a book on African history earlier this month) that the whole reason Eritrea and Ethiopia had so much conflict was BECAUSE for the longest time Eritrea was the only access to the sea the Highland kingdom of Abyssinia had!
It's why the Italians first set up a colony there, and tries to conquer Ethiopia through Eritrea.

As for the actual point: the reason it'd be incredibly difficult to crowd-source "truth" would be because any such organization would end up having an "agenda" . Opposing restrictive regimes that distort "truth" is a laudable goal, but you have to be be honest with the fact that you WILL lose a measure of objectivity when you pick a stance like that- even if it's less of a conscious choice, and more of a "forced by circumstances"

Also, the problem with crowd-sourcing would be the fact that you have no way to account for differences of opinion between your independent sources. And if you try to really be objective and collate info from opposing viewpoints to try to get to "the truth"... well, my evidence is anecdotal, but it takes several months of intense research, reading and daily cross-referenced to start seeing some patterns and gain some understanding. So it's not something you can do casually with any real measure of success.


Lol. The funny thing Ment is I said Ethiopia is landlocked and not Eritrea. Read the OP again.

As for crowd sourcing, probably the wrong choice of terminology, but I am trying to think how to gather information outside of the larger news corporations. This friend had a good point that you always have to ask yourself why and what would be gained, for all sides involved regardless of whether it is government or press. When I am not at work, I would love to discuss all manner of other things I have come to rethink, but suffice it to say, I think that often the whole story is not provided and the choice of words used are inflammatory not accurate. For instance, my friend asked me: what is a dictator? Answer that and then try to see if you can avoid applying the term to other leaders we call by different names.
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#7 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:05 PM

View PostGorefest, on 30 November 2017 - 04:22 PM, said:

View PostGust Hubb, on 30 November 2017 - 02:51 PM, said:

The starting point of this discussion focused on a news article that arose at the beginning of November:
Http://www.aljazeera...1171043467.html
In which 28 people were killed in a mass shooting.


Only that is not what the article is saying. It only states that "an opposition group has claimed" that "security forces killed at least 28 people". Further down in that same article it clarifies that the US embassy only confirms reports of gunfire but importantly not the deaths, and the only quoted source for these supposed killings is a Facebook message from an opposition party. So really the article isn't saying anything wrong, they just lack information.


"Security forces killed at least 28 people in rare protests in the Eritrean capital, an opposition group has claimed, raising concerns from human rights groups and activists."

That is the opening paragraph to an article that's title states it as fact. Sure there are sourcing, etc. comments within the article, but do you read it as fact or allegations of? I need to dig up some more articles, but the major news corporations, including Washington Post, covered this, and based it alone on this report and the unrevealing video. Where are the bodies?
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#8 User is offline   Gorefest 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:09 PM

The title doesn't state it as fact at all. The title states that, according to an opposition party, 28 people were killed. The first paragraph does not say anything different. Nowhere does it state blatantly that this happened, only that it was claimed that it happened. I still don't see where the article is wrong. It just lacks information to be factual.

This post has been edited by Gorefest: 30 November 2017 - 05:11 PM

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#9 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:11 PM

View PostMorgoth, on 30 November 2017 - 04:21 PM, said:

Also, Eritrea is a brutal and terrible dictatorship, with one of the very worst human rights records in the world. I'd be much less likely to trust information coming from people living within the country than I would a journalist from without.


Ah, but I wasn't talking to someone within the country. I was talking to a fellow doctor in my department who left the country several years ago, but still has family and friends there. As for the facts of a brutal and terrible dictatorship, have you traced where that information is coming from. I have not yet done a deeper dive into the facts (given this conversation happened last night), but at the same time, I challenge you to ask who is telling you these things and what backs up the claims.

My Eritrean friend does not like the government. Let us make that clear. And he left the country illegally. So it is not like he supports the government as is. But on the other hand, as we see in this whole North Korea debacle, the question arises, why are countries acting this way. And the follow up question is, who is threatening them and how. I have heard it floated numerous times that the North Korea government is trying to get the nuclear missile so it will not be deposed by outside interests. Even if I find the government there despicable, it does lead me to ask how our more powerful countries show our "leadership" in the rest of the world. Libya for instance.
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#10 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:13 PM

View PostGorefest, on 30 November 2017 - 05:09 PM, said:

The title doesn't state it as fact at all. The title states that, according to an opposition party, 28 people were killed. The first paragraph does not say anything different. Nowhere does it state blatantly that this happened, only that it was claimed that it happened. I still don't see where the article is wrong. It just lacks information to be factual.


Ok, so why then is it published? And has there been follow up?
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#11 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:18 PM

View PostNevyn, on 30 November 2017 - 03:08 PM, said:

Especially when you are talking about events like mass shootings, the evidence suggests crowd sourced reports are significantly LESS accurate than news agencies, especially in the immediate aftermath.

Also even more easy to manipulate by bad actors.

As for the article that is your example, I would say that still lives in a murky area where it is tough to tell which side to believe. Who are the sources for saying no one was shot? Who once banned the journalist? Who labelled the sources as a terrorist group? I mean, did your buddies friends and family witness the incident? Or are they saying no one was shot based on the information they get within the country?

And as to why the story might be picked up without more verification, well, that's the downside of having a very closed country. According to the wikipedia page, reporters without borders ranked Eritrea BELOW North Korea for media freedom. That makes it rather difficult for the AP to get more sources or know which sources to trust.



Put it this way, in the western world, the american alt-right are at the fore-front of doubting traditional sources of information, and trying to circulate 'truth' among their own. And that so called truth is often comically easy to debunk and would not pass the laugh test. That gives you an idea of the danger of crowd sourcing. People pick their crowd according to their beliefs, and end up picking their truth the same way.


Nevyn, I agree whole-heartedly. As I just said in an earlier post, crowd-sourcing may be the wrong word. But on the other hand, we give a lot of credence to news organizations without actually asking the question, why and what proof. Sure Eritrea is locked down. Sure an authoritarian government like that can control information and manipulate as it sees fit. But that doesn't mean other sources cannot either. I refer you back to the hurricanes hitting the USA this year. At the time, major news outlets spent a lot of time covering all the effected sites. Were you aware that 1000s died in typhoons in Asia around the same time period? I wasn't. I stumbled onto that fact in one of my entertainment web pages, boredpanda. There are many ways to cover stories and news, and in the end, you have to ask yourself, how much do you trust them.
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#12 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:23 PM

Look, I am not trying to create this thread to support the Eritrean government.

Nor am I saying that news organizations like the BBC, Aljazeera, and Washington Post are awful, untrustworthy organizations.

I am merely spit-balling how to improve my world knowledge and ability to question what I consider as established truths. It is so easy for me, and probably others in America, to go along with the stories of the world swarming in through our preferred news sources. But talking to people who are coming from the outside in tells stories I have never heard. And I want to pursue that.
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#13 User is offline   Mentalist 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:28 PM

Ok, feel dumb now. No I haven't read the article you linked to, or seen the video b/c I'm also @ work.

What is a dictator? A leader who abuses the power of his office and uses the state, or extra-judicious means to suppress opposition, be it political parties, independent media, civil activists, etc.

Note that there's always a potential blurred line between what are "legitimate protests" and what are "outside actors trying to undermine the state's security" , which is the language employed universally to justify use of force against protesters (sometimes the last word needs quotation marks, sometimes it doesn't).

Overwhelming majority of politicians with any power have serious business connections- either local or international. That's fairly axiomatic and the degree to which this connection is institutionalized (see: lo¡bying in the US) and made transparent is what determines "level of corruption" .

In other words, there are ALWAYS someone's business interests at stake. Sometimes, however, they coincide with (or are subsumed) my mass societal unrest/frustration. Said frustration usually emerges from deteriorating living conditions, lack of prospects, and/or disenchantment in whatever ideological basis the ruling regime was using to justify said poor living conditions. When that happens, you get mass protests, and business interests sometimes have to re-align in order to capitalize on the new movements, or co-opt them.

Media plays a role in creating the discourse, but media generally tends to be aligned with the agenda of its owners.

Edit: if you want to learn about diff areas, you need to do research. Read local media for that area. Big international news outlets rarely have the inclination to get down to the bottom of local power politics, esp when it doesn't affect anything major on the global scale.

Probably nearly every single country in the world is, at some level a pseudo-feudal society, with conflicting business interests shaping local politics. It takes incredible amount of time to get proficient in these matters, and that's without adding the layers of religion, ethnicity and all the other wonderful things people tend to be so ready to kill others over.

This post has been edited by Mentalist: 30 November 2017 - 05:36 PM

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View PostJump Around, on 23 October 2011 - 11:04 AM, said:

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#14 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:40 PM

Exactly. But in the end, how hard would it be to call Trump a dictator using said definition. And it is never a single person behind authoritarian regimes. There are always supporters.

What my friend did for me last night was to reinforce the drive to keep asking why. To ask what are the motivations. Regardless of how "good" a newspaper is, they are still a company that sells sensationalism at some level or another. Religions that provide charity often use it to spread their agenda (homeless people praying before getting a meal foe instance).

I just hope that as I continue to feed this drive I can get better at spotting the key questions to put what I learn in context.
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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:41 PM

View PostGust Hubb, on 30 November 2017 - 05:23 PM, said:

Look, I am not trying to create this thread to support the Eritrean government.

Nor am I saying that news organizations like the BBC, Aljazeera, and Washington Post are awful, untrustworthy organizations.

I am merely spit-balling how to improve my world knowledge and ability to question what I consider as established truths. It is so easy for me, and probably others in America, to go along with the stories of the world swarming in through our preferred news sources. But talking to people who are coming from the outside in tells stories I have never heard. And I want to pursue that.


Be careful of people with agendas Gust. A former civilian isn't exactly the soundest or unbiased of sources in these sorts of things.

But, good on you for trying to expand knowledge.

This post has been edited by H. D.: 30 November 2017 - 05:41 PM

Trouble arrives when the opponents to such a system institute its extreme opposite, where individualism becomes godlike and sacrosanct, and no greater service to any other ideal (including community) is possible. In such a system rapacious greed thrives behind the guise of freedom, and the worst aspects of human nature come to the fore....
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#16 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 05:44 PM

Appreciate it HD. In the end, I just want more view points outside my current sphere. My whome profession is honestly based on the premise of having no clue what is going on, so i am used to being am ignoramus.
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#17 User is offline   Nevyn 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 06:04 PM

View PostGust Hubb, on 30 November 2017 - 05:13 PM, said:

View PostGorefest, on 30 November 2017 - 05:09 PM, said:

The title doesn't state it as fact at all. The title states that, according to an opposition party, 28 people were killed. The first paragraph does not say anything different. Nowhere does it state blatantly that this happened, only that it was claimed that it happened. I still don't see where the article is wrong. It just lacks information to be factual.


Ok, so why then is it published? And has there been follow up?



There are journalistic standards, and those standards include citing your sources. The article said who was saying the information and what reactions to it were. It did not assert truth. It said "this is what we've been told and who by". It is also a standard

The article also included that the US agency there had not confirmed deaths. It included the statement of denial from the Eritria government.

Thats how news works. You don't just not report any information unless you have first hand documentary proof, or nothing would ever get reported. The responsibility is to pass on information about how you got it, so readers can make their own conclusion about the reliability of it.

The issue these days is often much more that people consuming and spreading the news don't care about looking at the sources or critically examining it. So the report gets mentioned by a blogger or on facebook, no longer mentioning the source and treating it as fact, and then it gets retweeted, and people just accept it from there.

But that does not make it a problem with the initial reporting.

Taking it to a Western example, when something about the White House is reported, the report generally includes their official response, even when that response if often laughable and demonstrably untrue. But to dig down into "what is true or not" with a given report, you need to look at what the source of the information was, the practices of the person or organization doing the report, and what the other side says and how credible they are.
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#18 User is offline   Gust Hubb 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 07:07 PM

View PostNevyn, on 30 November 2017 - 06:04 PM, said:

View PostGust Hubb, on 30 November 2017 - 05:13 PM, said:

View PostGorefest, on 30 November 2017 - 05:09 PM, said:

The title doesn't state it as fact at all. The title states that, according to an opposition party, 28 people were killed. The first paragraph does not say anything different. Nowhere does it state blatantly that this happened, only that it was claimed that it happened. I still don't see where the article is wrong. It just lacks information to be factual.


Ok, so why then is it published? And has there been follow up?



There are journalistic standards, and those standards include citing your sources. The article said who was saying the information and what reactions to it were. It did not assert truth. It said "this is what we've been told and who by". It is also a standard

The article also included that the US agency there had not confirmed deaths. It included the statement of denial from the Eritria government.

Thats how news works. You don't just not report any information unless you have first hand documentary proof, or nothing would ever get reported. The responsibility is to pass on information about how you got it, so readers can make their own conclusion about the reliability of it.

The issue these days is often much more that people consuming and spreading the news don't care about looking at the sources or critically examining it. So the report gets mentioned by a blogger or on facebook, no longer mentioning the source and treating it as fact, and then it gets retweeted, and people just accept it from there.

But that does not make it a problem with the initial reporting.

Taking it to a Western example, when something about the White House is reported, the report generally includes their official response, even when that response if often laughable and demonstrably untrue. But to dig down into "what is true or not" with a given report, you need to look at what the source of the information was, the practices of the person or organization doing the report, and what the other side says and how credible they are.



Kay, so the reporting opposition group was the Red Sea Afar Democratic Organization, guerrilla organization and international terrorism group. Al Jazeera is a news organization of Qatar, which is in opposition to Eritrea due to Eritrea's support of the GCC countries. So to word my questions a different way:

How would you respond to an article in the USA that used Boko Haram as the only source of information regarding a violent event? How would your process the information if Boko Haram was labeled (both in the title and opening paragraph) as an "opposition group." Moreover, do you think someone quoting the article would preface any discussion of the event with the words "according to an opposing party" or "alleged?"

Let me answer that last question for you. No. People say "You hear that 28 people were killed by the government in Eritrea." Look at the title. It is worded to favor the truth of the opposition statement, do you disagree? It didn't say "Unconfirmed shooting in Eritrea, the US embassy cannot verify" or "28 people are killed, alleges a known international terrorist group" or how about "28 dead? Government of Eritrea firmly discounts rumor."

Have you heard of the cliche' "spirit versus letter of the law?" This is how life is complicated. You can play by the letter of the law of journalism, citing sources, etc. But if you bury such sources in inflammatory language, are you really reporting the story as an unbiased source. And if you are biased, how? Do you make it clear?
"You don't clean u other peoples messes.... You roll in them like a dog on leftover smoked whitefish torn out f the trash by raccoons after Sunday brunch on a hot day."
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#19 User is offline   HoosierDaddy 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 07:35 PM

Ummm, I don't generally trust any organization that is an "armed, insurrectionist group" by nature. Al Jazeera is by far more legitimate. Sorry.
Trouble arrives when the opponents to such a system institute its extreme opposite, where individualism becomes godlike and sacrosanct, and no greater service to any other ideal (including community) is possible. In such a system rapacious greed thrives behind the guise of freedom, and the worst aspects of human nature come to the fore....
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#20 User is offline   EmperorMagus 

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Posted 30 November 2017 - 07:51 PM

View PostH. D., on 30 November 2017 - 07:35 PM, said:

Ummm, I don't generally trust any organization that is an "armed, insurrectionist group" by nature. Al Jazeera is by far more legitimate. Sorry.


Al Jazeera is citing the armed insurrectionists in their reporting, that's Gusty's entire point.

In answer to your inquiry, Gust, I've learned that organizations like the WP, BBC, CBC, or the NYT are good enough sources for news on the US and its allies, but they start parroting their country's establishment lines when they report on anything that has to do with states that are considered hostile.

Al Jazeera is literally state-funded, I place as much trust in it as I do in Press TV or Russia Today.

The sad state of matters is that we, as the ordinary people, are besieged on all sides by forces that push us and pull us, that prod us this and that way, all to serve their masters' interests. The master can be a corporation, or a country, or an ideological group, but the important things is to know who she is, and to discard everything news source X claims that favor X's master.

NYT reports that Iraq has WMDs? It doesn't matter if they are right or wrong, you cannot trust them.
Fox News claims that without guns Americans will be defenseless?
CBC's reporting on Canadian arms sales to Yemen?
etc.

It turns out there really is no way to certainly know something, only stuff that you suspect to be true.
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