Should the schools teach about deceptive news?

I'm just about ready to bring my series of posts regarding deceptive news to an end. One thing that I wanted to make sure I discussed was a proposed solution to the problem. A lot of people want the schools to teach what they call digital literacy.


Usually, I would post something like this on my education blog. More than likely, I already have. In this case, I wanted to tie this to the other posts I have made about deceptive news.

The schools embraced physical education just to see the emergence of an obesity crisis. What ended the peak of children's reputations as technology experts? The introduction of computer classes. The schools have even gotten into teaching creativity. Look at all the remakes and reboots coming out of Hollywood.

The schools destroy just about everything they touch. That alone should have us second guessing our insistence on using the schools as a solution. You could argue that digital literacy could be an exception, but have you read what they have been saying?

I read an article from the AFT in how to teach children not to fall for fake news. They provided two big examples. One was an organization of restaurants claiming that a higher minimum wage would increase prices. The argument made in the article was that the organization in question was biased. That's fair enough, but there are signs that businesses do pass expenses on to the consumer. The other example was a biased organization promoting GMO's. Again, this makes sense even though most articles I have read from the scientific community defend GMO's.

Did you notice something about these two examples? In both cases, teachers were fighting arguments that go against the liberal narrative. In neither example was there an attempt to convince children to look for the truth. In neither example did they even acknowledge that liberals also resort to deception. They were using digital literacy as an excuse to push an agenda.

This shouldn't be too surprising. Most teachers who talk about fake news focus on source. It's true that people shouldn't just assume that content on social media is true. The problem here is that even mainstream sources are known to lie in order to push an agenda. Teachers keep insisting that children should turn to liberal mainstream media sources. They have even insisted that the decline of newspapers are partially to blame, even though newspaper have been among the biggest contributors to fake and deceptive news.

I can't support digital literacy programs. If you listen to teachers describing their tactics, something becomes clear. Teachers do not want to keep children from falling for fake news. They want to make sure children are falling for the right fake news. Just like physical education, computers, and screenplay writing, digital literacy appears to be designed in a counterproductive manner.