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How to Beat Misinformation ?


Who doesn't like a good story ? When you are a child you get stories from your grand parents, in your boyhood you get stories from Television & in your adolescence you are literally bombarded with Movies & TV series. I myself watched around 700 films only in engineering & I have heard people who have crossed 2000 mark too. So what's so special about stories that resonates so well with everyone despite all our differences ?

Flavour. In desi language, Masala. Only a handful of people truly knew what happened to Sanjay Dutt untill "Sanju" released in theaters & whole India started googling about the Incident. I doubt even our parents knew about Titanic. But now that James Cameron directed "Titanic" with pitch perfect fictionalization, whole world knows the what, when & how related to that incident. 

Nobody is a fan of Doordarshan when it comes to news. Because it only presents news but we want entertainment too. So to meet our demand news channels started using background music & catchy graphics. Even in the early days Facebook was not much of an interesting place untill "Memes" was invented & people went Gaga over it. So what exactly we are looking for in a piece of news ? A gentle touch of story & a whole lot of entertainment. 

But this scenario was different back in the 90's or early 2000's. We used to sit in front of Television for "Information" not for "Entertainment". We valued "Truth" of the event rather than the "Dramatization" of reality. We were much more interested in "Listening" news instead of "Creating" funny news through Memes. As you can see, our expectation from news has gone wild. But is there any hope that we can get back those years ? 

My answer is "No". Yes, I am a little pessimistic in this regard. We are never going to get back those years. Currently, our whole news broadcasting industry is a hub of business. Competition for TRP is sky high. If your news is not spicy enough you are dead. So I don't see there is any collective solution for this problem unless some strict guidelines or censorship is established through government interference. But I do have a solution on a personal level. We, as a receiver of polarised news, can use few techniques to shield ourselves against misinformation. 

i) Stop watching news for an entertaining story. Watch them to find Truth. 

ii) Don't expect anything from Memes other than Entertainment. 

iii) Use your "Logical Brain" instead of your "Emotional Heart" while watching news. 

iv) Lastly, follow "WHO" instead of "YouTubers" or "Facebookers" when it comes to Covid-19.


Thank You!

Comments

  1. Unknown27 May 2021 at 09:28

    You forgot to mention about Shaktiman, Aryaman and the 12 PM retro hindi movies and 3 Pm odia movies like Pua mora bhola shankara, Ki haba sua poshile, Bhai hela bhagari. Doordarshan was the only treasure of happiness with so much masterpiece movies.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Jyotiranjan Nayak27 May 2021 at 23:40

      Actually what I was trying to say is that "Dordarshan presents only news; not entertainment through news." And you are right in saying that it also presents a lot of entertaining serials & films too...Shaktiman being my favourite .

      Delete

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