The Real Deal

The accusations of “Fake news!” abound with no one louder or more accusatory than the President.

Defined as untrue information presented as news, fake news often has the aim of damaging the reputation of a person or entity. It is also known as propaganda. The President often feels that his reputation is targeted by the purveyors of fake news and is compelled to call out those who perpetrate misinformation that many times shows him in a bad light. And he should. After all, a person’s reputation is his/her foundation. However, let’s not confuse “fake news” with “news I don’t like.”

In the last couple of weeks, CV Weekly has been accused of being purveyors of fake news. One accusation centered around a story written about the weekly protests (or demonstrations – I’m never quite sure how to refer to them) just west of Lowell Avenue and Foothill Boulevard. Originally billed as supporters of Blue Lives Matter across the boulevard from supporters of Black Lives Matter, after just a week or two it became obvious that the primary protestors (or demonstrators) on the north side of the street were supporters of President Trump. The south side was continuously populated by BLM supporters. Not surprising, arguments could be heard stemming from both sides where supporters were passionate about their positions. Unfortunately, sometimes these arguments devolved into violence; other times nothing more than fed-up attitudes dominated the afternoon.

The two or three times CV Weekly was at these events we reported what we saw – not something that appeared on social media or was rumored to have happened. That distinction – reporting on what we observed rather than what appeared on social media or was rumored to have happened – earned us catcalls of being writers of fake news.

While I understand that some readers may not have liked what we reported, their dislike does not mean we did not do our job or that we made up what was written. As the publisher of the Crescenta Valley Weekly, I take pride in the job that our reporters do. They report what they see, track down leads and present the facts – not opinion – to our readers. I stand by the position that our job is to present factual information to our readers so they can make up their minds; the news pages are not the place for opinion. This column and the Viewpoints section give plenty of opportunity to share opinions, which is a healthy exercise. The news pages inform and, perhaps, spark conversation. The two sections shouldn’t be confused.

Will we make mistakes? Without a doubt. The CV Weekly has been around 11 years and during that time I have had to write a correction (or two) and they’re hard to write. Imagine stepping up to thousands of people and saying, “Oops – we got that wrong.” But I’ve done it. And, as an aside to those people who question the positioning of the corrections we run, let me share that 1) I always place them in the section where the error was printed and 2) they’re so small because typically there are so few words used. I mean, how much room do you think one sentence takes? I do not try to hide our corrections.

Finally, to those who have taken up the torch of accusing news sources of promoting fake news I say be careful – just because you didn’t like what you read doesn’t mean that it’s not true. Saying that it is not true may make you a purveyor of fake news.

  robin goldsworthy