Combating misinformation and disinformation

The recent move of a Laoag councilor to give cash incentives to Laoag City’s elementary and high school students who participated in the Regional Schools Press Conference is a step in the right direction towards helping further development journalism locally.

But, as much as it is a needed boost to local campus journalists, the question is why only now? And the more curious thing is why at this juncture when the midterm elections is just a few months away?

Journalism has been dying a very slow death, not only here in our locality, but also around the world. The advent of social media has both sidelined and blindsided genuine journalism as everyone who has a camera phone and an internet connection can now become a “reporter” by posting what they can see and what they can hear. Unfortunately, this becomes more of misinformation and disinformation, as regular people not trained properly in the way of journalism often miss out on verification and analysis of issues and situations.

A video of a road accident becomes a source of more questions than answers, as uploaders or videographers do not bother to know who were involved in the accident and what caused the accident. And as they say, speculations often breed more misinformation and disinformation.

To combat these, real journalists need to step up and step out. But as all journalists know, reports need to be vetted and verified before they ever see the light of day. We can be faster but we should never sacrifice getting the facts rights over speed. It has been often said now that misinformation and disinformation are already halfway around the world while the facts are still putting on their shoes.

And in this regard, the Laoag lawmaker is on the right path to address this imbalance. Those successful elementary and high school students may not go on to pursue journalism in their latter lives but they would certainly know by then the basics of journalism; hopefully enough to both avoid misinformation, or worse, disinformation, and to combat them instead.

Yet, we can only hope that elected officials would do this not just because it is election season; but rather do it more regularly, or to be more helpful in this area, to institutionalize it so it would really help all budding journalists in the city—not just to win contests but more so to combat all the fake news that come our way.