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by tinfoilhatter 29 days ago
https://www.dailymail.com/news/article-4730092/Snopes-brink-...

https://foodbabe.com/do-you-trust-snopes-you-wont-after-read...

There's a plethora of examples on the internet of Snopes engaging in this type of behavior, if you're actually interested in learning about their problematic approach to their work.

1 comments

Your links are mostly about ownership, supposed sources of bias, and internal politics. I want to know what they've actually gotten wrong. The only example I'm seeing there is a claim about glyphosate, and the article is by the person Snopes said got it wrong, definitely no axe to grind there.

That example seems extremely weak. Is that all there is?

Think about what you're asking me for here - you're asking me to produce examples of claims Snopes has made that are factually incorrect, when the results of search engines are curated by companies that pay the salaries of Snopes employees (through donations) and lobby whatever side of the political aisle whose narrative they want to see prevail.

I could give plenty of examples, but you'd likely turn around and visit your favorite re-affirming search engine or fact-checker to refute them. You're claiming that there is some arbiter of truth out there that is immune to bias, which is completely nonsensical. Bias creeps in everywhere because at the end of the day someone has to pay the salaries of these "fact-checkers" and the people paying them want to see a certain narrative upheld. Pretending that isn't the case is absurd.

The internet isn't some place where all perspectives on an issue are weighed against one another and the truthful ones are the ones that prevail and are returned by search engines. It was developed by DARPA and is effectively controlled by corporations like Google and Meta that partner with / receive funding from intelligence agencies and the military industrial complex.

I could share sources with you like these -

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PolitiFact#Funding

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/FactCheck.org

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Snopes#Funding

Which demonstrate that these organizations receive funding from the organizations and people whose claims they are propping up as truth, but you'd readily dismiss that connection. You're not here to debate in good faith, and that's quite obvious.

I already shared a link that proves the founder of Snopes is a liar and fraudster and engaged in rampant plagiarism. You're still going to trust the company he founded to tell you the truth about the world. Engaging with you in this back and forth is asinine. You're obviously not after the truth, otherwise you'd do your own research into Snopes and other fact-checking organizations, instead of asking me to do it for you. Have a nice day.

>You're claiming that there is some arbiter of truth out there that is immune to bias, which is completely nonsensical. Bias creeps in everywhere because at the end of the day someone has to pay the salaries of these "fact-checkers" and the people paying them want to see a certain narrative upheld. Pretending that isn't the case is absurd.

This is just epistemological nihilsm.

Maybe it should've been clear from your username, but it doesn't seem like you believe in the concept of truth itself in any useful way.

Consider: perhaps this is the product of your own biases? What then? Does that invalidate or prove your theory of the world? Or is it impossible to tell once you've adopted the notion that nothing can be verified (because that includes the claim that nothing can be verified)?

In any case, I'm sorry. That sounds like a really stressful way to live a life.

Where did I say nothing can be verified? I'm strictly talking about the internet, which is a curated source of information. Are we going to pretend that search results Google doesn't like aren't returned by a query? Why can I go to an alternate search engine like Yandex and get completely different results? Which set of results holds the truth?

I don't need your pity - I'd much rather be a discerning individual that questions mainstream narratives than one who blindly accept what some "fact-checker" tells me is true because they've been deemed reputable by the organizations that pay their salaries, and provide the propaganda to them that will reaffirm the narrative they want to be perceived as true.

As Gerald Massey said -

They must find it difficult... those who have taken authority as the truth, rather than the truth as authority.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34SiUXZxUWQ

I don't know what you expect from me. You're saying I can't trust anything online because bias creeps in. Then you're saying I should trust your links that say that Snopes isn't trustworthy. Huh?

So far what you've provided me has zero informational content. You've given me links, but you've also said that none of that stuff is believable, so all that's left is a puddle of goo.

I never said you should trust my links, you should do your own research. What I did say is that bias is impossible to avoid and I implied that believing that there's a source of objective truth on the internet because it's been deemed to be so by some authority, is misguided.
Oh, please. You gave me links you said would “demonstrate” your claims. Then you preemptively attacked me for not buying it.

Meanwhile, all I said about these sites is that they have a good track record and that they give you enough information to do your own research to check their conclusions. But apparently you’re opposed to that when I’m doing it and not reaching the conclusions you want me to reach.

Where did I attack you lol? The only time I said the word demonstrate, which you put quotes around, is when I said that I could demonstrate they receive funding from big / tech and philanthropic organizations whose narratives they promote.

They only have a good track record if you believe in the lies peddled by the groups and people they receive funding from. If you can't perceive a conflict of interest that exists between a fact-checking company receiving funding from Zuckerberg that is employed on a social-media network he owns, I don't know what to tell you.