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Category: Facts and Fact Checking

Fake news: “COVID-19, shootings: Is mass death now tolerated in America?”

Fake news: “COVID-19, shootings: Is mass death now tolerated in America?”

Reporter asserts all Covid deaths in the U.S. were preventable. My pointing out that Covid was not controlled anywhere in the world (having accurate data collection and reporting), and my pointing out that 27 other countries had worse outcomes than the U.S. is “denying that the deaths were preventable”. Therefore, you are cautioned that my inconvenient questions and observations are official disinformation, as determined by the Associated Press. Also, remember Betteridge’s Law – any headline that ends in a question mark means the story is bull shit.

“Fact check” Telegram channel is itself fake, used to spread “misinformation”

“Fact check” Telegram channel is itself fake, used to spread “misinformation”

A Russian Telegram channel purporting to “fact check” reports about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is itself a fake operation used to spread misleading propaganda messaging. Unfortunately, many “fact check” operations, including from professional Western media, are propaganda messaging in a new form. Read this for some background on that.

Public health pandemic communications has been a disaster

Public health pandemic communications has been a disaster

A public communications expert critiques the public health communication during the pandemic – and finds it to have been a total failure, and along the way, destroying trust and credibility in public health. The long-term consequence is few believe public health, with good reasons. This is not how it should have been done.

Ouch: Science communicators assume you are stupid

Ouch: Science communicators assume you are stupid

Science communications is performed precisely as a propaganda function: “The first is what science communicators call “the deficit model,” which assumes the public is deficient in their understanding of science and need scientists as the learned elites to help the benighted masses.” and “The second limitation is that the goal of health communication is not to inform others, but to change their behavior.”