Sustainability Corner: Ensuring your sources are factually, non-rhetorical based

Photo courtesy of Solen Feyissa / Wikimedia Commons

In a pivot of normal content produced in this column, today, we will be focusing on the issue of source credibility. In order to ensure the news information you receive is factually based, not based on presumptions and possible biases, you must undergo a diligent process that will involve you putting in effort. Particularly when it comes to issues regarding the environment or sustainability endeavors, it is best that you get your information from sources not intending to sensationalize or exaggerate their content. 

As security.org said, online channels and echo chambers have become increasingly easier to access and, by proxy, have “reshaped the informational environment. Where mass media operations once vetted and monopolized news coverage, anyone can instantly publish news today, as long as they have an internet connection. Whether this paradigm represents freedom or danger, it has undoubtedly proved popular.”

While this paradigm shift has benefitted sources like us here at The Lamron, as we can publish articles to the general public without necessarily having a background in journalism, this dual-edged sword has also caused many sources to shift their content to the more sensational. The main appeal of this, of course, being in the hopes that sensationalization will garner more readers rather than garnering viewers on the basis of the facts being produced; the result has been a lack of media literacy. 

According to the National Association for Media Literacy Education, media literacy refers to “The ability to access, analyze, evaluate, create, and act using all forms of communication.” The reason this is affected in the face of so many sensationalized avenues is because these sources obscure access to trustworthy reporting— making all reports, no matter their validity, be deemed “pseudo- journalism” unless they’re contemporarily considered a legacy media source (ie, The New York Times, the British Broadcasting Corporation, and the National Public Radio). 

This sensationalization and obscuration of news has resulted in what the International Council for Media Literacy deems “mak[ing] the most lackluster thing seem so extraordinary.” Whether that be through making hyperbole of small findings or obscuring entire peer-reviewed pieces, the way one addresses the news media they consume is curated through this tightrope of fact and dramatization. 

In order to bring some clarity to this issue, I will now pose to you the process of how articles for this column— The Sustainability Corner —are compiled. 

Firstly, as established in a past article in The Lamron, this process begins with “be[ing] aware of where your news sources fall on indexes like the quality index and bias chart.” Once sources meet the guidelines established in these documents, the next step is to find peer-reviewed studies that reaffirm the claim you are making— whether that be one published in a scientific journal, possibly online, or another official avenue —while keeping wary of not falling into absolutist verbiage. You should not be afraid of not relying solely on legacy media channels, but weigh information against other reports of the same content. 

One easy way for a college student on a budget to achieve this is through using Ground News— a site that compiles multiple news sources on the same topic and weighs them against one another. This is a way that can aid greatly in finding supporting or disagreeing claims across all topics; but note, this is only my methodology. After this, an article can be compiled easily, but the steps to get there are, again, time-consuming. Even so, this time is well-spent in the process of becoming better and more comprehensively informed. 

In a time when garnering trustworthy information is more important than ever, it is important to treat the news you consume with questioning. Never take something as absolute, and please do your own research into every statement you make— you never know when something that seems sensible is actually based on misinformation or a sensationalized finding. 

As always, please stay informed and up to date on all environmental topics, as it could change the course of tomorrow, but usually not in the apocalyptic way many articles have prescribed it to be.