Interesting questions from the ABS-CBN news team and anchor Ron Cruz in this afternoon’s interview at 5pm: “When the news subject like the President (in this case, Trump) is announcing false “data” as fact, e.g., “if you count legal votes, I win”, should the news media cut the President’s live news briefing and and fact-check? How should the local media see this (cutting the President’s live media briefing to fact-check)?” The answers i gave are… My answers were along the theme of the role and duty of the news media as purveyor of truth; that when the news media wittingly or unwittingly provides too much air time to any news subject disseminating falsehood without fact-checking, it is giving credence to the falsehood. Then i provided various production techniques of presenting the fact-check simultaneously (in case the news organization is “too shy” to interrupt), etc. Then I was asked whether our local news media does this, and should do this (should it interrupt the President in his live news briefing to fact-check) … My answer, referencing cutting the President live during his live news briefing is… our news media does not really do this (does not really INTERRUPT the President in his live news briefing by cutting it then fact-checking it), some news media organizations may be “too timid” to do this, and to be fair, the news media has been subjected to censorship such as the ABS-CBN shutdown, and to harassment such as baseless lawsuits against Rappler, etc. and that, we can follow the lead of fact-checking in this manner (of interrupting the President in his live news briefing by actually cutting it) or we can use other ways of presenting a live simultaneous or contemporaneous fact-check of the President ( such as the ones i suggested, aware of the struggles of news media organizations, i provided examples of production techniques as alternatives in presenting a simultaneous LIVE fact-check of a LIVE NEWS BRIEFING by the President), let me search for a video of this afternoon’s live interview.
Here is the position of colleagues on the matter whose views I share (on INTERRUPTING THE PRESIDENT IN HIS LIVE NEWS BRIEFING in order to fact-check)
To quote from the news article: “[J]ournalist-educator Danilo Arao […] shared the lessons […] from US coverage of elections. […] ‘[I]t is time to rethink the news media organizations’ live coverage of Duterte’s ramblings,’ Arao wrote.” https://t.co/yjoHLxf13L
— Danilo Arao (@dannyarao) November 6, 2020
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LESSON FROM US COVERAGE: When ABC, CBS and NBC decided to stop the live coverage of Trump’s press briefing, it was because of his baseless claims of voter fraud. In the Philippines, it is time to rethink the news media organizations’ live coverage of Duterte’s ramblings.
— Danilo Arao (@dannyarao) November 6, 2020
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“Our job is to spread truth – not unfounded conspiracies” https://t.co/jbqPusiUFx
— Karen Davila (@iamkarendavila) November 6, 2020
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