Telling the Truth Online

One of the strangest of all the strange phenomena in our inter-connected new world is social media. According to Mr. Google, in January, 2022, Facebook had 2.912 BILLION users, with 1.929 MILLION Daily Users (I have to confess to being one). A quick check about Twitter shows 330 MILLION monthly active users. Then there are other portals, too many to track. You probably use one or more of them if you are reading this.

If you use social media, you are exposed daily to lies. Your friends send them to you. Maybe you send some back.

What lies am I talking about?

Well, they come in many shapes. Some of them are political lies. They puff up your guy, so you triumphantly tell lies to the world about him by sharing the lie. Or they tear down the other guy, so you gleefully spread that one around. Some are “shocking news of the day” lies. Someone sends around an amazing story about some news event, and you are so impressed you spread that lie around. Or you might have a quasi-news site you like that tells stories that fit your way of looking at the world, and you pass along their headlines. Then there are the heart-warming lies. Somehow, you run across a story that tugs at the heartstrings. It might make a point about character, self-sacrifice, even Christian virtues … it is written to really get you right there. And it does, so off it goes on your social media feed, and another lie wings its way around the inter-world.

A few days ago, someone mentioned a story that debunked a pernicious political lie a lot of Canadians of a certain political persuasion pass around. Actually, it’s my political persuasion, so I’ve seen this lie a lot. I thought about writing a P&D post about it, but hesitated. Checking the blog of another friend, I found he reposted an excellent article about the problem we have with lying on the internet. You can read “How to Avoid Misinformation and Disinformation Online” on the Gospel Coalition website, click the link. (HT Ken Brown, here.)¹

Reading that post, a portion of which I will excerpt below, prompted me to go ahead and write this piece.

The lie that got me going on this recently was about the Canadian Prime Minister, Justin Trudeau. I have to say that I strongly dislike PMJT (as we refer to him online). His politics are vile and there are many problems in his personal life that make him thoroughly off-putting. There are plenty of things to criticize him for. The lie that goes around not only slanders him but also his mother, Margaret Trudeau. The lie alleges that Justin is not the son of the former Prime Minister, Pierre Trudeau, but rather of Fidel Castro, the Cuban dictator. Though Margaret Trudeau lived a notorious life which she publicly confessed in her autobiography, I find it extremely wicked that people tell such a lie about her and her son. As noted, there are plenty of reasons to mount political attacks against Justin. Slandering him and his mother about his parentage isn’t one of them.

For the record, the story is a pure fabrication. Pierre Trudeau admired many dictators and Communists. In 1970, there was some correspondence between Pierre and Fidel, but they didn’t meet face-to-face until Pierre and Margaret visited Cuba in 1976, when Justin was 5 years old. The allegation is simply impossible. The story debunking the lie is here. You can find many others like it online, from other legitimate sources.

The thing that really bothers me about this is when Christians spread this story around. And then defend it when they are told the truth. Do we really have to make our political points with lies? What does that say about our political points? What does that say about our Christianity?

The trouble is that this is only one lie out of many that populate my Facebook feed every day. Most of my “Facebook friends”² are Christians. Why do you send along so many things that aren’t true? Why don’t you check things out?

We must really be careful about this. I am sure I’ve made the mistake of not checking a story out and passed on something I shouldn’t have at least once. If it’s too good to be true, it’s probably too good to share.

I said I would excerpt part of the Gospel Coalition article. The part I want to emphasize are author Patrick Miller’s “6 Principles for Resisting Disinformation and Misinformation,” but I recommend you read the whole post:

1. Corroborate sensational headlines. If a story or quote sounds outlandish, it probably is. Because we’re prone to believe headlines that demonize our enemies, show extra caution when you read takedowns of people you’re prone to dislike. The algorithm knows what you hate, and it’s happy to inflame your anger if it keeps you on the platform for a second longer.

2. Check the source before you click, comment, share, or like. When you engage with a post, you tell the algorithm, “Give me more stuff like this.” Protect yourself by looking at the source of the material before you click. Usually, the source website is visible below the picture. If it’s not a reputable, well-known institution, then google before you engage. This will protect your future feed from algorithm-generated falsehoods.

3. Seeing isn’t believing. Pictures can be doctored. Videos can be taken out of context. Deepfakes are a thing. By dragging and dropping a photo into Google Images, you can often find its original source and context. By searching for a speech on YouTube, you can find a quote’s original context.

4. Don’t believe it just because a Christian said it.Unfortunately, Christians are one of three groupsin the United States that foreign powers actively target with disinformation. According to the MIT Technology Review, 19 of the top 20 Christian Facebook pages are run by foreign troll farms. Their strategy—post 95 percent Christian content stolen from other pages and then slip in 5 percent insanity—is effective in making Christians the “useful idiots” spreading disinformation.

5. Read more than headlines.Marketers love clickbait. They put half-truths into headlines just to get you to click. However, many people don’t clickand instead operate under the assumption that the headline is entirely true. Even honest headlines rarely sum up the whole story. Make sure to read the whole thing.

6. Admit when you get it wrong.My friend Michael Graham shared the Flight 93 “transcript” I mentioned earlier. [link here] Then he did something shocking: he issued a mea culpa. Most people don’t have the honesty or courage to do this. But when we do it, we show that we care more about truth than our reputation. This lends tremendous credibility to our claims about Jesus.

All of this is good. We need to take these principles to heart.

We need to stop lying (albeit unintentionally) online.

Thou shalt not bear false witness.

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Don Johnson is the pastor of Grace Baptist Church of Victoria, Victoria, BC, Canada.

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Photo by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash

1. Lest someone mistake, I am not endorsing the Gospel Coalition. They publish a lot of good articles, but they often take positions which I can’t support. [↩]
2. what did I do for friends before Facebook? [↩]