Introduction
When the pandemic began, many mainstream media sources used the words "misinformation" and "disinformation" interchangeably. This was wildly inappropriate and has been toned down immensely in the last few months. I suspect the fact that accusing someone of spreading "disinformation" opens the author to legal liability has much to do with this retreat from using the "disinformation" label.
"Misinformation" refers to the spreading of false or out of context information without regard to whether the author knows the information is wrong or misleading.
"Disinformation" which is a much younger word than "misinformation," refers to the spreading of false or misleading information with the explicit intent to mislead. The author knows what he is saying is wrong, and that is why he says it.
I'll give an example of each. I was going to use a Joe Rogan podcast quote about myocarditis rates as an example of misinformation, but it turns out that he may have been correct, so I need a different example. Dwelling for a moment on that Rogan statement, however, the fact that he was willing to fact-check live certainly suggests that, if he was wrong, it was a case of misinformation, not disinformation.
Donald Trump provides some interesting examples of each. I think that Trump actually believed there was "something" to hydroxychloroquine, so his touting of HCL was more misinformation than disinformation. And touting bleach on live television was not something one would do unless he thought there was some research supporting it, so I'm guessing that the "bleach speech" was more misinformation than disinformation. However, when it came to Trump's repeated low ball Covid death projections, Trump had to have known he was way, way off. Those would have been examples of disinformation in the service of the economy and Trump's re-election.
While I love Dr. Fauci, his pushing of gloves as opposed to masks during the first month of the pandemic was disinformation in the service of preventing the general public from buying up all of the masks, which Fauci wanted to hoard for health care workers. Fauci and international infectious disease experts all knew that masks were more important than gloves, but Fauci and the CDC went with the disinformation campaign.
What's misinformation versus disinformation, then, boils down largely to intent. Are you sharing what you think to be true or are you sharing what you think to be false?
Issues with CNN
The problem with authors labeling what others say as "misinformation" or "disinformation" is that the authors are usually not experts and not qualified to judge misinformation or disinformation. This includes me, of course.
For example, when Dean Obeidallah of CNN says that Aaron Rodgers is misinforming people about Covid, the question becomes, "Who is Dean Obeidallah to make that statement?" Obeidallah is an attorney. When Peniel Joseph, also for CNN, says that Joe Rogan is misinforming the public about Covid, who is Peniel Joseph? He's a political science academic specializing in Black Power Studies. Why should readers trust Obeidallah's scholarship over Rodgers' or Joseph's knowledge over Rogan's?
That leads me to the question, of course, "Who am I to expound about anything?" Well, I have severe limitations, but as far as Obeidallah and Joseph are concerned, I guarantee that I would score better on a Covid-19 history test than either of them.
For now, my point is that these authors are slapping a "misinformation" label on people, and the authors are not expert in any way. When social media pokes fun at Rodgers and Rogan for "doing their own research," shouldn't it also be poking fun at Obeidallah and Joseph for both "doing their own research" and assuming that "their own research" is better than Rodgers' or Rogan's?
True Experts and Problems with CNN
I have great respect for CNN standouts Dr. Sanjay Gupta and Dr. Leana Wen, who are true experts. The problem with their presentations on CNN is that they are almost never placed in unscripted environments to face actual adversarial questions.
Propaganda is as much about what is purposefully omitted as what is purposefully said. Neither Gupta nor Wen expose themselves to much of anything outside of narrow scripted "interviews," and neither does much in terms of facing cross-examination by people outside of the CNN silo. When Gupta, who I believe to be an honest, talented scientist, ventured onto a Rogan podcast, cracks in the CNN narratives were exposed.
If honest scientists are never asked those questions that would undermine scripted storylines, are they still honest scientists? Should they be speaking out about what isn't said? Should they be exposing some of the purposeful CNN nonsense, like the August 24, 2021 CNN Ivermectin hit piece? If they don't point out the flaws in CNN's presentations, are they still honest scientists?
Conclusion
If CNN allows non-experts to label other non-experts as "misinforming," what is the justification? Are those employed or featured by CNN presumed to somehow absorb expertise from the ether by dint of their CNN affiliation? And if CNN experts avoid any kind of adversarial public cross-examinations, what does that say about the network's confidence in the positions taken?
If CNN felt their positions and their experts could hold up in the court of public judgement, they would allow Gupta and Wen to field adversarial questions all day, every day. It is frightening that CNN has so little confidence in the narratives they project.
I don't know about anyone else, but at those few things I am truly expert, I could pontificate and field questions all day long. At those things at which I'm expert, I also have no qualms saying "I don't know" when confronted with questions for which I have no answers. For those things at which I'm expert, I would be insulted if I were fed only those questions to which I had a scripted answer.
It pains me to say all of this, because for more than 30 years I considered CNN the best objective source for objective news. But they have gone off the Cronkite rails.
Scripted questions and coddled experts don't produce journalism's finest moments, and this is why the "Fake News" moniker stuck. If the outcome of an "interview" is known before the interview takes place, it's not really much of an interview. It's scripted and it's fake. That's what makes it propaganda.
Bob Dietz
February 17, 2022
