(88% of a Sample of) Republicans Helpfully Make it Clear That They Don’t Care About Accuracy

Jason Schwartz buries the lede in this genuinely alarming article in Politico “Study: Americans view media negatively, can’t agree on meaning of ‘fake news'”

I attempt to excavate it.

The study — the 2017 Gallup/Knight Foundation Survey on Trust, Media and Democracy, based on mailed-in responses from more than 19,000 Americans age 18 or older — asked people to rate whether four categories of information were “Always,” “Sometimes” or “Never” fake news.

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Asked to rate “Accurate news stories casting a politician or political group in a negative light,” Democrats said 26 percent always, 50 percent sometimes, 22 percent never, while Republicans replied 42 percent always, 46 percent sometimes, 10 percent never.

10% of Republicans agree that news stories can’t be both “accurate” and “fake”. I admit the views of Democrats are also alarming, but, as a resident of the rest of the world outside of the USA I sure am glad those US Republicans don’t control nukes.

Uh-oh.

Also Orwell had a bit to say about the political goals achieved through the destruction of language. Unlike this post
Politics and the English Language
and
1984
are worth reading.