Additional Thoughts on “Fake News,” The Washington Post, and the Absence of Real Journalism

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The European Commission looked into whether the tech giants were meeting a pledge to remove hate speech within 24 hours of it being reported.

Only 40% of reports of hate speech are being removed within a day, it found. 

The pledge was made in May when the firms signed up to a “code of conduct” brokered by the Commission.

“The last weeks and months have shown that social media companies need to live up to their important role and take up their share of responsibility when it comes to phenomena like online radicalisation, illegal hate speech or fake news,” said Justice Commissioner Vera Jourova in a statement.

– From today’s BBC article: EU Criticizes Tech Firms for Slow Action on Hate Speech

On November 25, 2016, for the first time in my life, I became a part of the news as opposed to reporting on it. Of course, what I am referring to is the slanderous and amateurishly researched article published in The Washington Post claiming Russia used “fake news” websites to promote government propaganda during the U.S. Presidential election. The article was appropriately savaged by several of America’s leading political thinkers and writers, including Glenn Greenwald of The Intercept and Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone.

To his credit, Glenn has been particularly relentless in his criticism, focusing on the mind-boggling fact that the paper refuses to publicly address any of the myriad concerns raised regarding this defamatory hit-piece. Here are just a few examples:

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