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by dgellow 741 days ago
The majority doesn’t care, you can give the best tools to identify, they won’t trust them or ignore them
1 comments

You're being hyperbolic. Community Notes on X are an example of these tools, and they are not ignored or distrusted from what I've seen. If your tools are poor, make better tools. But also, as a first principle, accept that some people won't believe what you want them to believe, no matter what. That doesn't mean you get to start trying to control them, because you got frustrated.
Would you trust community Notes on Truth Social?

They aren't a tool to identify fake news just an additional information layer which you either trust or xou don't.

>If your tools are poor, make better tools

If you are a bad painter buy better brushes.

You solution doesn't give the people the tools you still have just a source which claims to show what's true.

The real tool is the user himself using his brain. But that's hard to achive.

If you trust community notes on Twitter, I have news for you (https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/news/5080048). Community notes are used as just another channel to spread misinformation, but this time under convenient guise of truth, and that is why it is a flawed design.
I know, but I needed an example where the tool as such is ca. 100% useless to show it's not a real tool but just a additional layer of some authority you need to trust.
Ah, perhaps I thought I was objecting to you though we were mostly in agreement.
Exactly, Twitter tends to be liberal and so their community responses also tend to be liberal.
They're still the wrong tools. "This is categorically untrue" will still be distrusted and ignored by the people it's meant to reach, because they're not looking for truth.

Most social media interactions about status plays, "buy my stuff" grifting, and - most of all - tribal identity politics and affirmations of belonging and identification.

With fake news there's also a fair amount of narcissistic contrarianism.

All of this passed through an online culture optimised for engagement through dopamine hits, rage, fear, and grudge farming, quick-hit entertainment, and other addictive mechanisms.

The real motivation in all of this is emotional self-soothing, not a desire for accurate facts.

So gluing "This isn't true" on any of that won't make a difference, because the problem is structural.

Fake News is a cultural and emotional exploit. It reflects cultural values, and it needs cultural and psychological defences.

Some options include better accountability for mainstream journalism; finding healthier income models that don't rely on addictions and ad tech; teaching media literacy in schools; and generally tidying up online media toxicity at all levels.

I don't think the poster is being too hyperbolic. A very large share of the most vocal on both sides of the political aisle prioritize narrative over truth. Literal truth is less important to these people than something that is maybe not 100% true but captures 100% of what they feel. Tools can help these stories spread less wide but they will not be able to prevent the most ardent from continuing to use these stories as cornerstones of their beliefs. This is probably a small fraction of the country overall but a large share of the active on political X/Twitter.