Denying the Undeniable
How climate skeptics spread half-truths
How to Create Fake News: A Satirical and Comprehensive Guide to Misinformation
Fake news is the craze of 2017 and it’s not too late to get in on the action. In this piece, you’ll learn a few easy tricks to create your own fake news! Today, we’ll create a piece of fake news step by step about climate change.
Step 1: Find Data from a Reputable Source
It is possible to use news stories, but those are heavily reported on. Scholarly publications and reports are great because the average person won’t read it. For this is example, we’ll use the National Aeronautics and Space Administration’s (NASA) data on sea levels from 1993 to 2017. As you can see, sea levels are rising at a relatively constant rate with some natural fluctuations.
Step 2: Find Tiny Bits of Data that Support Your Agenda
From the start of 2016 into 2017, sea levels fell by up to about 6 millimeters. That’s a small range in the timeline of the study, but it supports the narrative of climate change being a hoax, so we’ll use this tiny fact as the basis for our article.
Step 3: Add a sensationalist headline
Because this isn’t a real news story and will be circulated primarily on social media, you’ll need a great headline. Bonus points are awarded for intermixing all lowercase and uppercase words, using the words “SLAMS,” “DESTROYS,” or “SHOCKING.” Don’t forget to attack media, social movements, millennials, or the establishment. It’s particularly in style.
Step 4: Share on social media
Twitter and Facebook will be instrumental in your attempts to spread fake news. Each has their strengths and weaknesses. Facebook has a large audience. However, no character limits on post replies encourages fact-checking. Twitter benefits from hashtags to promote tweets and the simplistic nature of 140-character responses. Reddit and Tumblr can be used if you find the right communities that won’t scrutinize your work, but it is unlikely to spread on those platforms. Google+ isn’t worth your time.
Unfortunately, the images above are screenshots from a real example of fake news. Using those same techniques, Natural News, an online health publication, created an article intended to mislead the public about climate change. The article was shared over 20,000 times. Fake news is a very real issue. By knowing how to spot it, you can help stop the spread of misinformation.
TRUE, BUT…
Let’s call some of these “scientists” out.
True, but irrelevant. Instead of looking at the bigger picture, climate skeptics look at fluctuations and use them to denounce accurate claims about the growing climate change trend. Check it out here.
True, but not true. Sure, the earth’s temperature changes from season to season. But recently, the earth’s entire climate has been changing in an upward direction. Instead of looking at this overall upwards trend, climate change deniers look at smaller segments of leveled change. Check it out here.
True, but not true. From 1997 to 1998, we experienced a particularly strong El Niño, which is one of the factors that can cause an especially large upward fluctuation in temperatures. That is why climate change deniers refer to so many temperature graphs that start with 1997–98 — it’s the large upward fluctuation they need to give a false impression of trend. Check it out here.
True, but irrelevant. As NASA explains, “Sea ice increases in Antarctica do not make up for the accelerated Arctic sea ice loss of the last decades.” Check it out here.
References:
How to Create Fake News:
Mike Adams, Natural News:
Earth Science Communications Team, NASA:
True, But:
Earth Science Communications Team, NASA:
https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v3/Fig.A3.gif
Skeptical Science, Tamino Word Press:
https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2016/12/escalator500.gif
Dr. Amber Jenkins, NASA:
https://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/upsDownsGlobalWarming.html
Maria-Jose Vinas, NASA:
