Sifting through the News—Two Experts Share Ideas
When you check your newsfeed, turn on the television, or open a newspaper these days, do you wonder whether you're getting real or "fake" news? You’re not alone! “Based on a barrage of questions over the last couple of months, the Principia Parents Association (PPA) and School administration felt it was important to address this issue” says PPA President Heather Holmes.
And who better to help do this than the experienced news media duo of Principia Chief Executive Marshall Ingwerson (C’79) and his wife, Clara Germani? Ingwerson spent his career before joining Principia at The Christian Science Monitor, concluding his tenure there as the Editor. Germani, a longtime Monitor reporter and editor, also spent several years with The Baltimore Sun and teaches journalism at college and high school levels.
Ingwerson and Germani spoke to Principia parents and friends in the IDEA Center earlier this week, sharing ideas about how to navigate the changing world of news, identify accurate information, sift through bias or tilt, and maintain an openness to different points of view. Their suggestions are relevant to young people as well as adults, because “it’s never too early to start learning how to discern what’s true and what matters,” Ingwerson noted.
As Germani pointed out, “There are ways to check things. It’s responsible citizenship to know what you’re reading and not to share something that you haven’t read completely or confirmed is real.” Sharing unverified information is, she said, “tantamount to gossip.” To help audience members avoid that, Germani offered concrete tips for fact-checking items that seem either “outrageous” or “too good to believe”—poor grammar or spelling being obvious giveaways. Quickly reviewing the “about” section on any website is very helpful, she noted—and if such a section doesn’t exist, that’s an immediate clue, too. For further verification, Germani often Googles the author’s name to see other articles or publishing outlets or does a search on specific quotes, to determine if they are being used out of context.
Noting that “when something fits a pattern in which we’re invested, we tend to believe it,” Ingwerson emphasized that pausing to ask a simple question—“How do we know this?”—helps establish a factual basis, a common frame of reference, for sharing perspectives and understanding others’ storylines.
Both noted that the motive or mindset we bring to consuming news is all-important, since it governs what we choose to read and how we respond. “If we want to see a universe being governed by good, then we have to be looking for it,” Ingwerson said, citing the “fundamental Christian imperative to love our neighbor and to try to embrace other people in our communities and in our world with understanding and charity.” Approaching news with an attitude of problem-solving and gratitude helps us do this better, he noted.
And, always, the speakers concluded, check the facts! This graphic Germani shared—“Evaluating a News Article”—should help with that.