Sifting through facts and fiction
Fact checkers have kept very busy during the recent political debates. According to the New York Times, in the second presidential debate, Donald Trump made more than twenty two comments that were either lies or mis-statements. Hillary Clinton, by comparison, was tagged with four. We relied on fact checkers to seek and correct false information we are fed during the debates and clear up all the lies and mis-statements.
It’s truly a shame we aren’t able to have our own personal fact checkers to look into everything we hear throughout our day; high school can get pretty nasty with rumours flying around, and it’s not like we all have time to investigate every piece of gossip we hear.
There is nothing I hate more than being a topic of conversation. The thought of people talking about me, good or bad, just makes me uncomfortable. However, recently, I got to be center stage of a conversation that my friend was listening to in which untrue rumours were being spread about me.
Questioning the validity of these rumours, instead of instantly taking them for fact, my friend texted me and asked me what was up with those comments. My friend gave me a chance to explain myself and shoot all the rumours down, the way it should be.
I had a similar experience my freshman year with Yik-Yak, the anonymous app that was super popular for about a month. It was so terrible that even crazy high schoolers like us figured out it was awful and stopped using it, which just goes to show you how bad it really was…
My name tended to pop up on the feed and I got quite a bit of attention for a little freshman. People really took the time to discuss rumours about my personal life, which surprised me since my life is pretty boring and I was a pretty insignificant freshman.
The experience was wild, however it taught me some great lessons about life. I learned to appreciate and respect the people who took the time to come to me and get the truth straight from the source. I also realized that I should do some fact checking as well before I believe everything I hear.
Those two epiphanies still influence me today. When rumours spread like wildfire and I find myself accepting them as true, I have to try to remember what I learned, choose to ignore the gossip, and pick a better topic for conversation. But, I’m not gonna lie, I sometimes catch myself being part of the problem, and when I realize it, I am embarrassed.
High school is absolutely crazy, and it’s easy to get caught up in the recklessness of gossip and whatnot. However, what is truly important is to strive to be the type of person you would respect. We may be in high school but the golden rule still applies: treat others the way you want to be treated.
Whether you are watching a presidential debate, browsing your Twitter feed or listening to stories around the lunch table in the quad, take everything you hear with a grain of salt. Do your own fact checking, because if we have a presidential candidate lying over twenty two times on national television, you probably can’t completely trust what the people sitting behind you in Spanish class are saying either.
