> I think it's useful to just see the news for what it is: a timely first rough draft of history.
Only, it's not what "the news" are. One can reconstruct the history using "the news" as source material, but it's a grave error to think that "the news" are "a first draft of history."
Try to find how the media covered the claimed "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq in 2003, and how they wrote many years later about the same events. What you believe to be a "first draft" was historically completely false. But it was at the time used as an excuse to start the war, which are both now verified historical facts -- both the fake "news" in the major media and the start of the war.
If you are interested in the topic you can even read how the local pressure on journalists makes them "following the editorial policy" even when they know that what they write about is false.
In short, there's no substitute for treating the news as only "pieces of information" which have to be verified, behind which could be different interests and which surely don't have to be true at all.
>> I think it's useful to just see the news for what it is: a timely first rough draft of history. First rough drafts are always going to have errors, but you'll be the last to know if you wait for those to be corrected before reading. If you keep up with the rough drafts, you'll see the corrections as the stories unfold.
> Only, it's not what "the news" are. One can reconstruct the history using "the news" as source material, but it's a grave error to think that "the news" are "a first draft of history."
> Try to find how the media covered the claimed "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq in 2003, and how they wrote many years later about the same events. What you believe to be a "first draft" was historically completely false. But it was at the time used as an excuse to start the war, which are both now verified historical facts -- both the fake "news" in the major media and the start of the war.
I don't really see how that contradicts the idea that the news is a rough first draft of history at all. First drafts have errors, and you've pointed out some errors. Similar things could even happen with established history (for instance a later discovery proving some document that the old history relied on was a forgery or some account unreliable, etc.). You shouldn't expect perfect accuracy with the news, and to criticize it for not being perfectly accurate is to misunderstand what it is.
> to criticize it for not being perfectly accurate is to misunderstand what it is.
I gave example where the news were completely and utterly false compared to what the real truth was -- that's not just "not perfectly accurate" but completely opposite of the truth.
> Try to find how the media covered the claimed "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq in 2003, and how they wrote many years later about the same events. What you believe to be a "first draft" was historically completely false. But it was at the time used as an excuse to start the war, which are both now verified historical facts -- both the fake "news" in the major media and the start of the war.
Really? My memory is that the media reports made it very clear that the "weapons of mass destruction" narrative was false; that was what the whole David Kelly affair was about.
The way I remember, the major media in the US claimed WMDs existed until the war progressed and nothing was found. Then, what you remember regarding Kelly you probably have read only later, that is, only after the start of the war, 19 March 2003.
Only, it's not what "the news" are. One can reconstruct the history using "the news" as source material, but it's a grave error to think that "the news" are "a first draft of history."
Try to find how the media covered the claimed "weapons of mass destruction" in Iraq in 2003, and how they wrote many years later about the same events. What you believe to be a "first draft" was historically completely false. But it was at the time used as an excuse to start the war, which are both now verified historical facts -- both the fake "news" in the major media and the start of the war.
If you are interested in the topic you can even read how the local pressure on journalists makes them "following the editorial policy" even when they know that what they write about is false.
In short, there's no substitute for treating the news as only "pieces of information" which have to be verified, behind which could be different interests and which surely don't have to be true at all.