Does Fake News Mislead the Public - Essay Example

Does Fake News Mislead the Public? Sometimes people’s reasoning is shaped by the type of news they receive from the media. The reception seems to trigger a point in the minds of the audience that determines many aspects of their behavior from that point forward, including their future reception. For instance, when news about a corrupt political leader are broadcast, people relate the subsequent bulletins to the same issue and end up confused. The situation is for this reason worsened if the original news was misguided or irrelevant.

Fake news can be said to be the information passed in the media that is misguided and has no basic elements of truth. It is distinguishable from pure rumors in that the fake news has additional hype that is unrelated to the rumor and relatively unjustified. Although this kind of news sometimes contain some factual and sometimes substantial information, the main ideas raised by the communicator are fake and undependable. The humor and the hype sometimes help to attract the viewers and a target audience, but the negative effects of fake news to the larger population should be considered.

In an era when there are a variety of sources for information, both credible and not so credible, the public is at risk of being misled. It is a notion currently held by many that the news websites previously used are difficult to access and obtain relevant information from. This makes many people, especially the young turn to new sources such as the social media. In these sources, what is most likely to be available, unless it is from media houses domains is comedic information. This the kind of information in which you can hardly tell the hype from the real news.

The audience for fake news often becomes the new sources of the news, which is in this case even more complicated and more hype added. The news spread and many people are made to believe in the fake news as if it was real. What then happens is that the general population lose interest in the real news and become so distracted that no new information can change the perception and point of view that the original fake news developed in them. The actual problem arises when the public depends more on the hype and fake news as the most easily accessible source of information.

The negative perception developed gain roots and becomes a norm. The mass is then utterly misled and tends to believe in the rumors to a point that every new piece of information is associated with the rumors. The rumors, being more enticing and easily accessible prevail over the genuine news.It is in my opinion, therefore, that despite the notion that the hype and rumors have some factual and substantial information base, they have a negative effect on the people. They change the public perception of the news and mislead them.

This makes the actual news be coldly accepted and not so well assimilated by the people.Works citedAlexander, Alison, and Jarice Hanson. Taking Sides: Clashing Views on Controversial Issues in Mass Media and Society. Guilford, Conn: Dushkin Pub. Group, 1995. Print.