US President Barack Obama Criticizes Facebook of Spreading Fake Stories (www.bgr.in) 436
An anonymous reader writes:Concerned over the spread of fake news on the social networking giant, US President Barack Obama has criticized Facebook, saying fake stories on social networks are spreading lies this election. Speaking at a rally for Hillary Clinton at University of Michigan, Obama said: "The way campaigns have unfolded, we just start accepting crazy stuff as normal and people if they just repeat attacks enough and outright lies over and over again. As long as it's on Facebook, and people can see it, as long as it's on social media, people start believing it, and it creates this dust cloud of nonsense," he told the gathering. A recent BuzzFeed investigation found that 38 percent of posts shared from three large right-wing politics pages on Facebook included "false or misleading information."
Going by this logic (Score:2)
So going by this logic politicians should just shut up and let their record stand for itself.
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So going by this logic politicians should just shut up and let their record stand for itself.
Which shows the problem with news in this country: even if it were better, people are so damn lousy at thinking they'll believe any dichotomy no matter how ridiculous (e.g. either you promote false news stories or you give politicians a pass).
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It isn't lying if you don't tell the story at all. When you're in active collusion with a candidate's campaign and present yourself as "unbiased news source", be it from MSNBC/CBS/ABC/CNN or Fox News, you've lost whatever credibility you're trying to peddle. And if you're not credible news outlet, then what are you actually peddling?
It is so bad, they aren't even trying to hide it anymore.
Which leads to "fake news stories" on Facebook. When the people are desperate for REAL coverage, rather than reading Tal
Re:Going by this logic (Score:4, Insightful)
There are many kinds of lying. There is lying by commission and lying by omission. If you purport to tell the truth but only tell carefully selected truths, you are lying, even if what you say is completely factually accurate.
Now social media companies don't actually lie; what they do doesn't even rise to the standard of a lie. A liar tries to get you to believe a proposition he believes to be false. What social media companies want to do is provoke a reaction.
In other words the nearly half of adults who get their news from social media are getting their news from trolls and bullshitters.
Re:Going by this logic (Score:4, Interesting)
I am not a (R) or (D), and can actually see that there is collusion between campaigns and the MSM news outlets. They aren't even trying to hide it. It isn't even in question, except by people who are deliberately ignorant or just not paying attention.
As for the "Clinton's had someone killed" it is right up there with "Trump is a NAZI and a KKK Member" ... no actual proof is needed for a nice conspiracy.
BTW, both are awful candidates based not on what conspiracies say, but what they have actually said and done. The only explanation for their existence is that the MSM is actively participating in this debacle.
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He didn't say Facebook spread anything. He said, "Some people believe whatever they see on Facebook."
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He didn't say Facebook spread anything. He said, "Some people believe whatever they see on Facebook."
From TFA: "After fake stories made the rounds on Facebook during the US Presidential elections 2016, Barack Obama blamed the social media giant for spreading lies about the election season." So, blamed Facebook for spreading lies, but didn't say Facebook spread anything?
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1984 (Score:5, Insightful)
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In addition, propaganda also works when people choose to believe it over real world information.
Now I must go off to think about what real world information is. Maybe I'll know it when I see it. In any case, the internet allows people to believe their preconceived notions are true. I guess real world information, to count as information and not disinformation, must entail a web of consistent, interlocking facts. Hmmm...seems indiscernible from conspiracy "theories". Maybe real world information is a bit lik
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Note that Melania Trump has stated that her mission as First Lady will be to make the internet a "safe space" for children.
Anyway, Obama is right. This election went post-factual months ago, and as more and more people turn to social media for their "news" rumours and deliberate lies have become the new "facts" in their minds. That doesn't imply he wants censorship any more than I do when I point out how stupid this whole thing has become.
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Did he advocate government censorship of Facebook? Or did he just comment that people post a lot of nonsense on Facebook?
People are always confusing "freedom of speech" with "the right to say any stupid thing I want without anyone pointing out that I'm wrong."
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No. He's outsourcing the censoring to the government-aligned partisans that manage Facebook. His inner circle still gets to control what you see and what you don't, but he gets to pretend to have clean hands.
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I reread his quotes. I still can't find anywhere that Obama has even asked Facebook to filter misleading stories. He just comments that there's misleading/false stories being posted on Facebook.
But incidentally, Facebook does have the right to censor/filter content on their site. That still doesn't qualify as a violation of your freedom of speech. If you don't like Facebook's policies, you have the right and the ability to not-use Facebook, to use another service, or to create another service with diff
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This exactly. It's the "who will rid me of this troublesome priest" of online mass censorship by corporate cronies -- with the goal of further preserving and consolidating power in the hands of a very few, fabulously wealthy, unaccountable elites in Washington and the bay area.
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Fake Stories...about me! (Score:2, Insightful)
When they were spreading stuff against my political foes, it was cool. But now that my party is getting some bad press, it ain't cool no more. Need to stop this! Think of the children!!
Headline (Score:5, Informative)
"Obama criticizes Facebook of...
Perhaps you mean criticizes FB for spreading fake stories
Fact checking is bad (Score:2)
Facts can be used to lie. You can state things that are true and still make someone arrive at an incorrect conclusion or solution.
So 62 % of the posts are not false or misleading? (Score:4, Funny)
That implies two things:
1. The quality of Facebook has increased substantially.
2. We're screwed.
Go MSM! (Score:2, Insightful)
We were so much better off when all of our fake stories were carefully handcrafted by the propaganda wing of the Democrat party (CNN, MSN, CBS, FNC, etc.).
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Re:Go MSM! (Score:4, Insightful)
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Wait, Rush isn't attached to Trump's crotch?
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Don't forget Buzzfeed. I love how they are now suddenly a "legitimate news source" just because they've been pro-Hillary and anti-Trump.
People only want to hear the lies that suit their worldview. All that pretentious nonsense about morals, truth and objectivity is nothing but bullshit.
Re:Go MSM! (Score:4, Insightful)
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It's more like, Clinton has been doing politics for decades, so has her husband, both have held high office and over that time have developed connections and contacts in the media, as every other politician does. Trump doesn't have that and some of the people in his own party who would normally be helping him are kinda reluctant to.
This reminds me a lot of the stupid outrage over journalists being friends with various game developers that came out of GamerGate's "ethics" cover story. That's how journalism w
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The government is concerned about spreading lies.. (Score:5, Insightful)
Frame of reference (Score:3)
It's getting to the point where in the future, nobody will be able to tell what's true and what's false.
That's really problematic, because if two people who need to dialogue with each other don't have a 'frame of reference', how *can* they discuss anything?
Normal one-sided BS (Score:3)
A recent BuzzFeed investigation found that 38 percent of posts shared from three large right-wing politics pages on Facebook included "false or misleading information."
Yeah, but, let me guess, Media Matters, TPM, etc. were found to be bastions of honesty, right?
I had to hide all posts from about half my facebook "friends" on both sides of the political aisle because so much of it was just outright falsehoods. It was different kinds of falsehoods, but still lies.
OBAMA is mad about false and misleading... (Score:2)
That's rich.
Lies? You mean like Obama's lies? (Score:5, Interesting)
"My position hasn’t changed" on using executive authority to address immigration issues. ... Donald Trump is a small business."
Says his comment about extremists being a JV team "wasn’t specifically referring to" Islamic State.
"Most young Americans right now, they’re not covered" by health insurance.
"We’ve got close to 7 million Americans who have access to health care for the first time because of Medicaid expansion."
The "most realistic estimates" for jobs created by Keystone XL are "maybe 2,000 jobs during the construction of the pipeline."
"We have doubled the distance our cars will go on a gallon of gas."
"Under Gov. Romney's definition
Because of Obamacare, "over the last two years, health care premiums have gone up -- it's true -- but they've gone up slower than any time in the last 50 years." Obamacare hadn't been implemented yet.
"Fast and Furious" began under the Bush administration.
Says Mitt Romney would deny gay people the right to adopt children.
If the Supreme Court throws out the federal health care law, it "would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress."
"Thirty million Americans, including a lot of people in Florida, are going to be able to get healthcare next year because of that law."
Under President Barack Obama, the United States has "doubled our exports."
"I didn't raise taxes once."
"The vast majority of the money I got was from small donors all across the country.''
"We've excluded lobbyists from policy making jobs."
Insurers delayed an Illinois man's treatment, "and he died because of it."
Health reform will "give every American the same opportunity" to buy health insurance the way members of Congress do.
Preventive care "saves money."
"I have not said that I was a single-payer supporter."
Shovel-ready jobs
Keep your doctor
Foreign money in campaigns
The list goes on and on...
dead on (Score:2)
Dear Obama, Clinton, and Trump.... (Score:3)
Facebook is a SOCIAL NETWORK, NOT a news source.
Facebook is all about opinion and whatever people post. If you treat it a an actual source with journalistic integrity, you are a dumbass.
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Facebook needs to borrow the line that /b/ uses:
The stories and information posted here are artistic works of fiction and falsehood.
Only a fool would take anything posted here as fact.
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No. Facebook is an advertising platform. And a playground for silicon valley douchebags to run social experiments on people.
Obama Criticizes Facebook of Spreading Fake Storie (Score:2)
Is slashdot farming its editing out to China? Either that, or you misspelled "for". Bad grammar is fine in a comment, NOT in a story or headline.
Obama's Final Executive Order... (Score:3)
First and foremost... (Score:2)
Skip TFA, read the BuzzFeed article (Score:3)
38 percent of posts shared from three large right-wing politics pages on Facebook included "false or misleading information."
Of course, the posts shared from left-wing pages were completely accurate. /sarc TFA is crap. It implies that the right-wing sites are unreliable, but ignores the negative information about the left-wing sites.
The BuzzFeed article is long, and gives lots of interesting detail [buzzfeed.com]. It even appears to be pretty balanced, not pushing any particular political agenda. No surprise, extremist sites on both sides make shit up to support their views. The site with the highest proportion of false content was right-wing, but it was also the site with the least content. The site with the most false content (in absolute numbers, more than all other sites combined) was a leftist site.
With that background,
I think the writer is naive (Score:2)
It's not the fault of FaceBook. It's the fault of people who WANT and NEED to believe the bullshit in order to prop up their otherwise unsustainable sense of white victimization. If FB did not exist, they'd still believe all of Trump's lies.
"Fake Stories" (Score:2)
WTF is a "fake story?" Is The Lord of the Rings one of the fake ones or one of the real ones?
People believe stupid shit, and they also believe plausible-but-incorrect shit. Just say that.
Implying that stories come in two categories sounds like something a media company would say, to make you think they are somehow better than everyone else. Oh wait .. turns out the bullshit words are from this "bgr.in" rather than Obama himself. Well, isn't that an amazing coincidence?
Maybe if all of them would stop lying... (Score:2)
> "we just start accepting crazy stuff as normal"
Maybe if all of them would stop lying and quit acting like the country is their personal playground/piggybank/etc, we wouldn't be "accepting crazy stuff as normal," and *some* sense of sanity could start coming back.
Maybe.
Re:BuzzFeed? (Score:4, Insightful)
A better question - what is this "Facebook of Spreading Fake Stories" that BO is criticizing?
Re:BuzzFeed? (Score:4, Funny)
I dunno.
BUT....everyone please remember, with the expected high voter turnouts this year, in order to endure everyone can cast their votes, THS year, we are having the Republicans vote today, and tomorrow is reserved for the Democrats to cast their ballots.
This is the best way to keep things fair, and ensure everyone gets to vote and have their vote counted.
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pissing off the mob == pageviews++ (Score:5, Insightful)
Myself, I wouldn't know.
But that's what they're saying on the Facebooks.
We just provide the lies, you pick which one fits your preconceived bias.
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I've been seriously entertaining the notion that Both Democratic and Republican minions have been planting false stories. It seems that if one party can bait the other parties followers into buying a false story, then they easily disprove the false story it hurts the opponents credibility. The hard part is to figure out if it's just a bunch of independent agents who happen to find a false story that fits their preconceived notion of the Evil(tm) other guys and throw out the bait or if there is some kind of
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that, Sir, is an insult to reptoids. They are not that cold blooded and heartless and they often consider what is good for the species before indulging in self gain.
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Lighten up Francis....
Geez, if you're stupid enough to believe a joke like this, you kinda deserve what you g
Re:BuzzFeed? (Score:4, Insightful)
If it's not this "joke" then it's some other "joke", a call to say there's no need to vote [campaignsa...ctions.com] or that you're guilty of a voting violation [newyorker.com].
It's all mean spirited, disrespectful and crooked and should be prosecuted whichever side is doing it.
Re:BuzzFeed? (Score:4, Informative)
And that's just the blatant stuff and excludes Breitbart.
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If Trump is wrong then you are just as wrong. There is zero evidence that illegal aliens commit crime at a lower rate than regular citizens. Zero.
There's some evidence that because illegal aliens are much harder to track that the crimes they commit are underreported and they are not properly prosecuted for their crimes. That's undeniable.
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Facts seem to disagree with your uninformed opinion.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/th... [wsj.com]
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Could you explain how the immigration status of a perpetrator could figure in to the crime statistics reported by police? Crime stats are not based on prosecutions, they are based on crimes reported to police. If a crime is committed and the perpetrator is not caught, it still figures in the statistics.
The only pos
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You don't generally know the immigration status of the perp when you report a crime. Even if you think you know (racist), they won't count it.
Based on standard lying with statistics methods. The % of crime the is attributed to illegal aliens is that for which they are convicted. All other crimes are not proven to be committed by illegals and are the denominator.
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They're just rubbing salt into the wound.
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It's a factually correct statement if by qualified he means experienced.
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Which is untrue. Bernie Sanders had more experience.
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Re:You mean like the story... (Score:4, Insightful)
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You say that what I posted is lies, period.
Maybe you are just a liar yourself and want to convince people that what I posted isn't true. But I'll give you the benefit of the doubt and say that maybe you are not a liar, maybe you just react to things that you don't like by calling other people liars and are too stupid to search this for yourself and see that Obama had very different things to say about Crooked Hillary 8 years ago.
Here are a few links to get you started, but don't take my word for this, G
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Re:Liar-In-Chief (Score:5, Insightful)
Of course, you would have all the -others- tossed out even if they are citizens. Xenophobes like you have no place in modern society. Either we learn to get along with each other (and we have been doing better lately even though the news makes you think otherwize), or we will wind up destroying ourselves, or that which makes us human.
Quit using your fear as a driver for your beliefs.
Re:Liar-In-Chief (Score:4, Informative)
Female host:
"Many of the millennials, dreamers, undocumented -- undocumented citizens, I call them citizens because they contribute to this country. Are fearful of voting, so if I vote will immigration know where I live, will they come for my family and deport us?"
Obama:
Not true. And the reason is, first of all ... when you vote, you are a citizen yourself and there is not a situation where the voting rules are somehow transferred over and people start investigating, and etc. The sanctity of the vote, is strictly confidential in terms of who you voted for. If you have a family member who is undocumented, you have an even greater reason to vote."
Seriously, fuck you. You can try and cut that anyway you want, but it doesn't get much clearer than that.
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"When you vote - you are a citizen yourself - and there is not a situation where the voting roles are transferred over [to immigration or anyone else]."
He's answering the question (which is not quite what she asked) "If I vote will immigration come for my undocumented family members", and the answer is no.
"Part of what is important for Latino Citizens, is to make your
Re:Liar-In-Chief (Score:4, Informative)
If you are undocumented, you cannot legally register to vote or vote. (FTFY) But go ahead. He says no one is checking or investigating. And he's got your back if anyone finds out.
Had Sanders been the nominee... (Score:3)
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Re:Had Sanders been the nominee... (Score:4, Interesting)
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Keeps trying to fix a broken system after the damage has already been done. If he wanted to fix this, he would need to restart the primaries.
Obama has no interest in fixing this, or even enforcing the laws. Hell he came right out the other day telling illegals and non-citizens to vote, and there would be no prosecution on it. [youtu.be]
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Re:Too late.... (Score:5, Informative)
he specifically said "If you are a Latino Citizen with undocumented family members... you have more reason to vote" He never encouraged illegals to vote.
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he specifically said "If you are a Latino Citizen with undocumented family members... you have more reason to vote" He never encouraged illegals to vote.
Unfortunately, you are mistaken.
As near as I can transcribe her exact line, with meaning and intent, Gina Rodriquez said:
Many of the millennials, dreamers, undocumented, uh, citizens - and I call them citizens 'cause they contribute to this country - are fearful of voting. So if I vote*, will Immigration know where I live, will they come for my family, and deport us?
*With the "I vote", she is putting herself in the role of a young illegal immigrant who wants to vote. She calls them 'citizens', just 'cause she wants to, not because they actually are. That is the situation President Obama is replying to.
You can make an argument on whether he refuted her application of "citizen" to illegal immigrants, and his response was only for US citizens. However,
Re:Too late.... (Score:5, Insightful)
Simple, because there are NOT FUCKING CITIZENS!!
Geez, how hard is that to get?
They came here illegally....they are disqualified from voting and they have started out their journey on US soil by committing a crime. If you don't like that, change the laws, but you can't change the fact that they are here by breaking immigration laws.
Ok..so, you say anyone here in the US during elections should be able to vote? Ok..are there other countries in the world that are so haphazard with their election laws?
By your logic, you'd be cool with other countries sending floods of folks here to try to sway elections. How about lots of Russians flooding in close swing states...they come here, overstay their visa...and keep doing this with more and more people coming over during the 4 years between elections and then they all get to vote and sway our elections based on what their mother country wants.
Far fetched? It could happen.
Ok, how long do you think you should have if you are in the US illegally before you can vote. 1 year? 5 years? 10 years? If you are here illegally, how can you prove it?
Those documents to prove how long you are here could easily be forged....
Again..there are rules and laws on the books. If you don't like them, vote to get representative that will change them, get involved...promote your cause.
But we can just ignore things we don't like, or it falls into anarchy.
And other external countries to the US do NOT have our best interest in mind, they have their best interest. That's what a countries government is supposed to do.
So, look. I don't think hardly anyone has a problem with immigrants. Legal immigrants.
Yes, come to the US...just sign the fucking guest book on the way in....
And one last hint..if you want to come here, be a citizen and contribute...quit waving other countries' flags when you're on TV protesting. It doesn't help your cause much.
If you wanted things like they were in your home country..stay there.
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Sanders is on record saying he supported Castro.
He went to the USSR for his honeymoon.
The lie is that he isn't a red.
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He didn't/doesn't support Castro?
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Yep, this G-d fellow's a bit weird. A country has some people who don't follow whatever holy book, so then S/He gets to whack the innocents that had nothing to do with the transgression. If it were a human doing the whacking, we'd call them a psycho-killer, but if it is a Deity, well, then any amount of violence is deemed acceptable.
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