The biggest challenge in today's social media environment is "Is this thing that I'm reading true?" and the biggest problem we have as consumers of this media is the false belief that it either is true, or it isn't. Facts don't give two shits what we think of them. They are true no matter what direction we try to come at them. If you have two apples and you grab two more apples, no matter how hungry you are that will never be more than 4 apples. The same can be said about the information that we find online which is why it is so important for us to be willing to do the leg work to come at what we see in multiple angles.
I'm not going to insult your intelligence by telling you that I don't suffer from bias or that I have never lashed out with an outright lie when overcome by emotion. I have suffered from both faults multiple times. However, the greatest lesson I have learned is when to take a step back and realize when my behavior is contributing to the problem that I'm trying to solve. When facts are presented to you take them in, examine them, understand WHY they are facts and accept them as such and your vision on social media will become much, much clearer.
The biggest obstacle to understanding is the phrase: "Don't listen to the liars." This phrase is almost universally spoken by those who want to foster an "us vs them" environment. Republicans can be and very often are right about things just as much as democrats. It's the underlying opinions that largely distinguish the two ideologies from one another. But as of late we have fallen into this trap of "which side right? Which ideology is based on truth?" The answers of course are both and neither, respectively. Ideologies, despite the name aren't based on objective truths, they're largely based upon the person's emotional state about the world and the priorities they have assigned for themselves. Republicans for example are largely pro-business and pro religion not because business and religion are fundamentally true but because they have chosen those facets of society as important for reasons that are largely their own. Democrats are very often pro labor and against laws that establish religion for many of the same kinds of reasons. Their life experiences, while vastly different contribute greatly to how each party expresses it's own priorities when it comes to making and enforcing policy decisions. This also informs how we collect information and most importantly, from whom.
Which brings me full circle to how we view the information that is being thrown at us every day. Our biases are the first things we need to push out of the way. Just because I'm an atheist doesn't mean I can't understand the fears of the church when it comes to certain laws and policies that conflict with their members belief systems. But I also can't ignore the facts that show certain policies prevent harm to individuals and groups outside the church. I'm also a blue collar worker but I can understand why a Fortune 500 corporation would be nervous about being forced to pay their employees a higher minimum wage. In the end it is my life experiences that help form the opinions that I have that make me support one group or the other. As a result I tend to gravitate towards news sources that present stories that align with my preferences and I'd be shocked if you didn't too.
This is why we have such a hard time discovering what the objective truth is about the world we live in. More and more news sources are guided by the biases of those that run them and present the news to us. Is COVID-19 a big deal or can we end shelter-in-place by Easter? Both of these questions have very different answers depending on which news outlet you choose to get your information from. This is why it so important to try examine this question from multiple angles. There's the business angle in which thousands of corporation in the U.S. are absolutely terrified their company will collapse if shelter in place is allowed to go on for much longer. Then there's the medical angle in which doctors and nurses all over the world are screaming for governments to do more to keep people isolated or this virus will continue to go out of control and even worse, could mutate rendering any progress towards treatment null and void. The objective truths are that many businesses will fail and be forced to close laying off millions or even tens of millions. However, thousands of have already died and that number is only going to climb higher and higher potentially reaching the millions. Whichever of these angles is more important to you largely depends on your own point of view. Both are problems and both are true and somehow we as a society have to deal with both simultaneously.
When we examine this from the business and the medical angle as well as take in other opinions such as the military and state and local governments we can sift through all the facts and find out that yes, this is really bad. Fox News, MSNBC, CNN, PBS Newshour are all gathering up what facts they can to try to and inform the public but the way they are informing is based on their biases. When we remove such biases and watch all forms of news media we see many of the same facts repeated over and over and over again. Companies closing their doors. Life savings and 401Ks drying up. Grandparents and spring breakers alike are being hospitalized all over the country the death toll is rising at an exponential pace. Those facts simply aren't in dispute, no matter what news outlet you choose to get your information from.
I didn't write this to tell you what the solution is. I didn't write this to scare you. I wrote this to inform you. We have tens of thousands of people working all over this country and many others trying to find a solution to this problem. The bottom line is as scary as the news may be we need to make sure we take in enough of it to keep ourselves informed. At times like this it is desperately important to keep ourselves informed and if up to now you've only trusted one news source then you only have a 10th of the story and that's if you're lucky. Practice gathering information from multiple sources and seeing what lines up between them. If multiple places are using the same source or repeating the same facts that's a pretty good indicator that what you're hearing is true and can be trusted. Is it fool proof? Of course not, nothing ever is but it is the best to stay on top of what's going on.
The greatest enemy to society is the power of an uninformed mind.