The Improbable Truth and Impossible Lies of Donald Trump’s ‘Fake News’ Rhetoric
By: Ariana Aboulafia
Last week, Donald Trump decided to tweet again.
I know. Are you surprised?
This time, this tweet though, was special — to put it lightly. Trump posted a video (that looks like it was made by some 40-year old white dude who lives in his mom’s basement and wears #MAGA hats each and every day) of what appears to be Trump body-slamming a wrestler whose face has been covered with a huge CNN logo. Trump captioned the video “#FraudNewsCNN #FNN” (the latter hashtag which, I’m assuming, refers to “Fake News Network”, Trump’s special nickname for his most hated media group). The problems with this tweet are, I would hope, obvious.
First of all, this tweet is unprofessional and below the dignity of the office of the president of the United States. Second, the tweet encourages violence (on the part of Trump himself and, even worse, his supporters) against liberal-leaning journalists and reporters as well as against anyone who supports those journalists and reporters. But, these things are hardly anything new for Trump — in fact, this tweet fits so well into the pattern of things that Trump has already said and done that I wasn’t even surprised about it when I saw it. I mean, really: is there anything that is below Donald Trump at this point?
Other people, though, seemed to see it differently. Ana Navarro, a political strategist and commentator for several news networks including CNN, said that she thought the tweet could lead to the murder of reporters. Keith Olbermann, a commentator for MSNBC, wrote that he thought the tweet was enough for Trump to be impeached. For whatever reason (perhaps because this tweet was viewed as a more direct incitation of specific violence against journalists than previous messages from Trump) this tweet has sparked quite a reaction. In fact, after Trump posted this particular tweet and video, CNN ran a story in response stating that they had identified the creator of the video, who had also created several other anti-Semitic and anti-media memes and video clips and posted them on Reddit. Although CNN’s story allowed the video’s creator to remain anonymous (referring to him only as “a private citizen” and “a middle-aged man”, this story created backlash all of its own — several Twitter users (including Donald Trump Jr.) and news outlets stated that CNN’s story constituted journalistic blackmail and questioned the network’s ethics. Senator Ted Cruz even insinuated that the story constituted extortion. Trump, of course, is doubling down on his original tweet, essentially saying that it was all a joke that CNN took too seriously and that CNN deserved the tweet because, “They have been fake news for a long time…[and] we don’t want fake news.”
This entire controversy is absolutely ridiculous — to me, it seems like something that Trump did specifically to distract people from the current version of the AHCA that is going through the Senate right now, which will leave an additional 22 million people without healthcare by the year 2026. I have absolutely nothing to say about Trump’s ridiculous entitlement to say or do anything that he feels like doing, or the complete and total lack of respect that he has for this country or the vast majority of the people in it, reporters included. But, there is something about what Trump said — what he has been saying — that, I believe, is important to talk about. And, that is the idea of “fake news.”
Trump has attacked what he calls the “MSM” (or “mainstream media”) since he began his campaign for political office. Of course, his definition of what exactly constitutes mainstream media is selective at best — Trump, for whatever reason, has somehow begun to classify himself and his supporters as some sort of counter-cultural movement. And, as such, whichever media sources support him have also been painted as “other” or “fringe”, while those that do not have been considered “mainstream.” In any other world (one where Trump isn’t president, and where the phrase “alternative facts” has never been uttered) this line of reasoning makes absolutely no sense — after all, it’s pretty absurd to hear reporters working for Fox News talking about “mainstream media” as if it is a term that does not apply to them, as well — but, at this point it’s probably better to just accept that we are living in an alternate universe that not even Isaac Asimov or Kurt Vonnegut could have dreamt up and move on.
To quote Vonnegut: so it goes. In my opinion a lot (probably a majority) of what Trump says or tweets is utter nonsense. But, the issue with all of Trump’s blathering on about “fake news” is that there is a modicum of truth to it, and anyone who has ever been on Facebook knows it. There has, in all likelihood, always been some sort of “fake news”, or at least there have always been certain news sources that are more reputable than others — that’s why your parents always used to tell you to “look it up!” when you asked them a question that they weren’t sure how to answer. Certain people are experts on certain things, and not on others, and there’s nothing wrong with that; furthermore, there are certain “news” outlets (like the National Enquirer and The Onion) that are either admittedly satirical, or that post things that are so outlandish that almost no one believes them — there’s nothing wrong with that, either.
The problem however, is that with the increasing accessibility of the Internet and spread of social networking, it has become easier for anyone and everyone to post their opinions and portray them as gospel truth. This, in turn, makes it more difficult for readers, viewers, and consumers to discern between fact and fiction — so difficult, in fact, that Facebook uses filters to minimize the presence of users who frequently post “clickbait, sensationalism, and misinformation” from your newsfeed everyday. But, there is still a significant amount of these types of links that we, as users of social media, stumble upon a few times per week, maybe more.
Trump is throwing traditionally and currently reputable news sources — like CNN and the New York Times — into the same “fake news” category as satire and sensationalist sites like The Onion and the National Enquirer, not because the things that they report are untrue but simply because he doesn’t like them. The issue with this, though, is twofold: one, the American people are conditioned to accept and believe the words of authorities, from teachers to our parents, and the greatest authority figure in the US is the president. So, when Trump says things — even when they are ridiculous, or patently untrue — it takes a significant amount of time, energy, awareness and mindfulness to refute them. Taking this into account, the other issue with Trump’s continuous spouting of “fake news” rhetoric is the way that it has eroded and will continue to erode the public’s trust in not only our media sources but in other traditionally respected organizations and institutions as well.
Trust is one of, if not the, most important aspects of a functional society — it is the bedrock upon which everything else is built. Consider, for a moment, how many times per day your actions are dictated by basic trust. Of course, you trust a doctor when he tells you that you’re sick or not sick; you trust that your accountant will do your taxes in a way that won’t land you in jail; and you trust your lawyer to defend you if you do get into trouble. You trust every single time you go grocery shopping that the food you’re buying is safe, and you trust every time you pick up your medication from the pharmacy that it is, in fact, the correct medicine. You trust the police to serve and protect and not to hurt or shoot you. You trust that pilots and train conductors will get you to your destination without crashing, and every single time you go through an intersection you trust that following the stoplights will get you from one side to the other safely. Our trust in so many basic institutions is already being eroded each day — every time there is a police shooting or a drug recall, they are called into question. Learning to question institutions is, in and of itself, not actually a bad thing (particularly when those institutions are inherently flawed, and when that questioning leads to protest or action that eventually addresses those flaws). But, there needs to be a carefully crafted and navigated balance, here, between faith and doubt — and, Trump very clearly does not care about this in the slightest.
On a recent trip to Nashville, Tennessee, I had the opportunity to have a conversation with a wonderfully sweet old couple who spoke in southern drawls about Memphis and their many grandchildren. During that conversation, the woman asked me what my career aspirations were — when I told her that I wasn’t sure, but that I liked to write, she nodded.
“So,” she said to me, “Do you think you would ever want to be a reporter one day?”
I said that that was definitely a possibility, and her kind face scrunched up with thought and concern.
“Well then,” she said, her accent long and thick, “Are you gonna report fake news?”
I don’t remember how I responded — how I responded isn’t really important, anyway. The thing that is important, here, is the simple fact that she felt the need to ask this question, the fact that Trump’s rhetoric has already had so much negative influence in the hearts and minds of the American people that it affects the way that many of us approach not only current journalists and reports but also even potentially aspiring ones. Trump is not unaware of the far-reaching power of his words, actions and tweets — he knows that he frequently encourages the American people to be suspicious of members of the media, of liberals, of the Clintons, of Mexicans, of Muslims, and on and on, because he is painting them as not only his enemies but also enemies of our entire nation and all of its most important ideals. He also knows that he encourages violence against these populations, because they are the enemy that must be destroyed and the threat that must be neutralized. He does these things purposefully — so many of his words, his actions and his tweets are done deliberately, with specific goals in mind.
Trump’s continuous banter about “fake news” isn’t complete fiction per se; there are undeniable elements of truth to it. But, then again, isn’t that how all of the best lies are created, then continued — by first carefully straddling and then, little by little, pushing and finally disregarding, the line between fact and myth?
At this point, Trump has made it clear to all but his most-devoted supporters that he absolutely cannot be trusted; even the things that he says that are established fact should be questioned. And, perhaps this is the deepest reason that Trump continues to throw the line of “fake news” whenever he has the chance — he points the finger at others so that they do not point their fingers at him, and takes continuous advantage of the fact that he is in a position of power to intimidate and bully all of those who he considers to be “beneath” him, including the American people. Now, I’m not saying that every single thing published by CNN or the New York Times (or any other news source, actually) should be blindly believed. But, I will say this: if you still believe that Trump, as president of the United States, is a more reputable source than almost any established news network, then I have a few rooms in the Trump Taj Mahal (with a few free Trump Steaks thrown in for good measure) to sell you.
