• Home
  • Opinion
  • Quizzes
  • Redistricting
  • Sections
  • About Us
  • Voting
  • Independent Voter News
  • Campaign Finance
  • Civic Ed
  • Directory
  • Election Dissection
  • Events
  • Fact Check
  • Glossary
  • News
  • Analysis
  • Subscriptions
  • Log in
Leveraging Our Differences
  • news & opinion
    • Big Picture
      • Civic Ed
      • Ethics
      • Leadership
      • Leveraging big ideas
      • Media
    • Business & Democracy
      • Corporate Responsibility
      • Impact Investment
      • Innovation & Incubation
      • Small Businesses
      • Stakeholder Capitalism
    • Elections
      • Campaign Finance
      • Independent Voter News
      • Redistricting
      • Voting
    • Government
      • Balance of Power
      • Budgeting
      • Congress
      • Judicial
      • Local
      • State
      • White House
    • Justice
      • Accountability
      • Anti-corruption
      • Budget equity
    • Columns
      • Beyond Right and Left
      • Civic Soul
      • Congress at a Crossroads
      • Cross-Partisan Visions
      • Democracy Pie
      • Our Freedom
  • Pop Culture
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
      • American Heroes
      • Ask Joe
      • Celebrity News
      • Comedy
      • Dance, Theatre & Film
      • Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging
      • Faithful & Mindful Living
      • Music, Poetry & Arts
      • Sports
      • Technology
      • Your Take
  • events
  • About
      • Mission
      • Advisory Board
      • Staff
      • Contact Us
Sign Up
  1. Home>
  2. Big Picture>
  3. journalism>

Help lying go out of style

Jonathan Denn
February 20, 2023
Help lying go out of style
Arkadiusz Warguła/Getty Images

Denn is Founder & CEO of PolicyKeys™ Where Can We Agree?

The Fulcrum recently asked its readers to share their thoughts on the following question: What is your take on how we restore honor when lying has become fashionable? Below is a reader response.


There needs to be a recognized standard of journalistic fairness. If you trust the people who are watching the media, allsides.org, mediabiasfactcheck.com, and thefactual.com, pretty much every media outlet is spinning stories from their own point of view with a non-neutral tone.

There’s this thing called measuring, it’s used in science, baking, farming, cooking, home building, pumping gasoline, or metering electricity, you get the point. It’s 2023, and for some reason we have decided not to measure what “folk” who essentially are long on virtue, or so says Aristotle, have to say what they’re hearing—and their opinions in some sort of believable way, outside of polling Democrats and Republicans and their party lines—and trying to force independents into one of those molds. Well played, duopoly.

Instead of listening to your favorite echo chambers, who are telling you what you want to hear, why not strive to understand the subject first, and stop supporting outlets that don’t help you do that? The thing about finding out what it is we can actually agree on, after personally filtering out all the lies (thanks for wasting our time—media outlets) is that the solutions don’t look like anything you’ve heard before. Why? Because, no one covers that beat.

Sign up for The Fulcrum newsletter

Public policy is really, really complicated. There are thousands of variables, it’s impossible for anyone to be expected to scan through all that and look for patterns, throw out the lies, reconcile conflicting facts, sort the arguments fairly with a minimum of spin consider short-term and long-term goals, honor emotions, plan for unexpected outcomes, apply and measure probability to the various solutions, oh, and then repeat for the next subject. Everyone is conflicted with their points of view, but somehow we reflect on the mess, and try to make up our own minds. Kudos to those who really try, you are far and few between, and it’s almost an impossible task.

There’s this thing called the Wisdom of the Crowd, if that were ever harnessed, maybe with the help of a little AI, we might get commentary on public policy we can trust. Until then, same old same old.

From Your Site Articles
  • Partisan bias divides news consumption for Americans ›
  • News media's vital to democracy, Americans say; then a partisan divide yawns ›
  • Is there a solution to the news problem from hell? ›
  • New platforms help overcome biased news reporting ›
Related Articles Around the Web
  • PolicyKeys | ›
journalism

Join an Upcoming Event

Relationships First Conversation

Living Room Conversations
Sep 28, 2023 at 9:00 am MDT
Read More

Creating New American Stories of Us

USC Center for the Political Future
Sep 28, 2023 at 2:00 pm PDT
Read More

National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation

National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation
Oct 13, 2023 at 8:00 am EDT
Read More

National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation

National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation
Oct 14, 2023 at 8:00 am EDT
Read More

National Conference on Dialogue & Deliberation

National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation
Oct 15, 2023 at 8:00 am EDT
Read More

2023 Bridge-Building Innovation Showcase

Urban Rural Action
Oct 19, 2023 at 6:00 pm CDT
Read More
View All Events

Want to write
for The Fulcrum?

If you have something to say about ways to protect or repair our American democracy, we want to hear from you.

Submit
Get some Leverage Sign up for The Fulcrum Newsletter
Confirm that you are not a bot.
×
Follow

Support Democracy Journalism; Join The Fulcrum

The Fulcrum daily platform is where insiders and outsiders to politics are informed, meet, talk, and act to repair our democracy and make it live and work in our everyday lives. Now more than ever our democracy needs a trustworthy outlet

Contribute
Contributors

To advance racial equity, policy makers must move away from the "Black and Brown" discourse

Julio A. Alicea

Policymakers must address worsening civil unrest post Roe

Sarah K. Burke

Video: How to salvage U.S. democracy from the "tyranny of the minority"

Our Staff

What "Progress" should look like, and what we get wrong

Damien De Pyle

The long kiss goodnight: Nancy Pelosi and the protracted decay of public office

Kevin Frazier

Demanding corporate responsibility for food system challenges

C.Anne Long
latest News

Societal disruption: Artificial intelligence

Kevin Frazier
3h

The “United” States aren’t any more

James C. Nelson
3h

Video: The dire roles Congress, White House play in addressing migrants

Our Staff
4h

Ask Joe: Warring with AI is warring with ourselves

Joe Weston
22 September

Prioritizing the grand challenges

Leland R. Beaumont
22 September

Podcast: All politics is local

Our Staff
22 September
Videos
Video: Expert baffled by Trump contradicting legal team

Video: Expert baffled by Trump contradicting legal team

Our Staff
Video: Do white leaders hinder black aspirations?

Video: Do white leaders hinder black aspirations?

Our Staff
Video: How to prepare for student loan repayments returning

Video: How to prepare for student loan repayments returning

Our Staff
Video: The history of Labor Day

Video: The history of Labor Day

Our Staff
Video: Trump allies begin to flip as prosecutions move forward

Video: Trump allies begin to flip as prosecutions move forward

Our Staff
Video Rewind: Trans-partisan practices and the "superpower of respect"

Video Rewind: Trans-partisan practices and the "superpower of respect"

Our Staff
Podcasts

Podcast: All politics is local

Our Staff
22 September

Podcast: How states hold fair elections

Our Staff
14 September

Podcast: The MAGA Bubble, Bidenonmics and Playing the Victim

Debilyn Molineaux
David Riordan
12 September

Podcast: Defending the founding principles of our government

Our Staff
07 September
Recommended
Societal disruption: Artificial intelligence

Societal disruption: Artificial intelligence

Contributors
The “United” States aren’t any more

The “United” States aren’t any more

Big Picture
Video: The dire roles Congress, White House play in addressing migrants

Video: The dire roles Congress, White House play in addressing migrants

Big Picture
Ask Joe: Warring with AI is warring with ourselves

Ask Joe: Warring with AI is warring with ourselves

Pop Culture
Prioritizing the grand challenges

Prioritizing the grand challenges

Big Picture
Podcast: All politics is local

Podcast: All politics is local

Big Picture