I have recently talked to a Chinese friend of mine who started talking about how smart Trump is etc. She previously only gained her knowledge through the Chinese media and not the “western propaganda”, so it was her first exposure to the non-CCP-controlled stuff. I told her “you sound like you read FOX news”. She replied with “hahah yes, how did you know?”
This made me realize that she is very prone to getting manipulated and not doing any fact-checking. However, this situation made me reflect on my own news-sourcing skills.
How do you deal with the issue and what can I do step-by-step to verify the news that I read myself and at the same time a way that I can recommend to my Chinese friend so that she doesn’t fall for the most obvious tricks so easily?
First, I pay attention to if an article references an original source. If not, see if they’re the only one reporting the events in question.
I also tend to look at community reactions a lot, see what other random people have to say. That’s a horrible way to verify truth, but on the other end, it’s the effect of the actions or events that will really matter.
And, yeah, I doubt Fox “News” has referenced an original source in decades, so I’m very skeptical of anything they report. And if they’re the only ones talking about something, I generally assume it’s completely false.