So I use Reddit. And like any typical Reddit user, I think I'm a more "informed" person because I get my information from it. I'm not like those "savage" Facebook users that consume content that has been regurgitated to them or those on Twitter that are just in there "for the drama and the laughs". My content on Reddit is the "truth", it has been "carefully researched" by the mods of the subreddit and the people in the comment section, who are "intellectual" people just like me, all believe that the content is true.
One day scrolling down through my feed I saw a video posted on r\videos about people breaking into a warehouse in Puerto Rico that had tons of supplies and expired food dating back to hurricane Maria in 2017. It was later discovered that the supplies were to be used during the days after the hurricane when several people around the island were in need of them. People literally slept without a roof over their heads to get through the night, but there were several tents available in this place just being stockpiled for who knows what. This provoked quite an interesting set of comments on the Reddit post that I was very shocked to see. There was a lot of misinformation, like this person who had 1.6k upvotes for making up a conspiracy theory that the Puerto Rican government hid those supplies to make the US look bad and promote the ideals for the independence of the island. Sadly the post and video were deleted from Reddit and the face of the internet, but there exists this other video available that shows part of the warehouse which can be found below.
As a Puerto Rican who's lived his whole life on the island and knows the structure of the political system, I believed that I could shed some light on the situation by explaining to the OP why his idea might be wrong. I went on to say, given that the majority of the government is controlled by the statehood party; including the governor at the time, the director of emergency management, and the mayor of the city where the warehouse is located then their claim didn't make any sense. They do not have any motivation to promote the narrative for independence. They could want to make Trump look bad but that is just speculation. And as any person who tries to contradict a top-rated comment, I got down-voted.
This, in turn, made me reflect on all the times I have believed a Reddit comment on the basis that it just looked true. The situation reminds me of the article written by Eli Saslow "How Lies Become Truth in Online America". It talks about this page on Facebook that was started with the intention of mocking right-wing politics by posting sarcastic memes, but the sarcasm wasn't well understood by several conservatives on the page, so they thought the messages were true. You essentially start believing in things since everyone is believing them without fact-checking and this is the sad reality of misinformation we live in today where the truth becomes harder and harder to find.
Going from your original post I can see several points of improvement, I see you took Sam Lu's advice to display the comedic tone of the first part of the first paragraph in a more obvious way. I'd have to agree with Sam's original point that some readers may not perceive the comedic tone and your revision does fix that. The addition of the embedded video is a nice touch and helps to draw the reader in.
ReplyDeleteI feel connecting Saslow's article to your theme was a good fit, but there are a couple of points that I noticed could be improved upon. You quote and name Eli Saslow, but who is Saslow? You might want to add sentence explaining who Saslow is or what he has done. It might also help to introduce Saslow's ideas earlier in the post, as by the time he is introduced the reader is finishing the blogpost and Saslow's themes and ideas aren't really able to meshed with your own points.
Overall I enjoyed the read. 5/7.
Hey Jusa, I think one major point of improvement was your incorporation of the relevant video to make things much clearer to the reader of your post on the exact situation going down. As an avid Reddit user, I agree that detecting what's right or wrong is becoming tougher and tougher as there is a certain momentum of "truth" in these posts. I think that a way to improve this post would be to break it down into smaller chunks. It can be tiring to go through a whole block of text that contains your narrative and analysis at once. I would suggest you break off the analytical portion of your text so that there is more clarity. Also, the article on Eli Saslow is relevant but perhaps slightly too rushed. I would suggest spending more time outlining how relevant his case is to this particular context and how Reddit is not as off-meta as it brands itself to be in terms of falling for fake news. Otherwise, great job!
ReplyDeleteHi Jusa, I thoroughly enjoyed reading your post as I am someone who does not use reddit, but I have been curious about how it compares to other social media platforms. It interests me that many users believe it to be a better "truth" than other social media platforms. The way you wrote this leads well into the connection with Saslow's article. I also think you did a good job of connecting your personal life to a topic we worked on in the class. However, I do think that you could expand more on the political trickery that you mention a couple times. This could further deepen the connection to Saslow's article. Overall, I found this to be a very interesting read, and it is a solid blog post.
ReplyDeleteHi Jusa, I really enjoyed reading this article, I think it was very well written and informative. Reading me made me think of the landscape of 2020 and how the credibility of information on the internet can be taken for granted. A site like Reddit is interesting because you can find both a "safer" and "darker" side of it, with regards to things like the accuracy of information and things like that. Reading this reminded me not to take certain credibility stances for granted. Really great read!
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