Spiritual Response To Fake News

A disturbing news report is actually just the tip of an iceberg. Recently newspapers reported a study that    said that at least “265 fake news sites in more than 65 countries are managed by an ‘Indian influence network’, according to a study by EU DisinfoLab, an NGO that researches and tackles sophisticated disinformation campaigns targeting the EU, and its member states.

There many other sites and news agencies that peddle fake news but not have been reported for what they have been doing. In fact, now infamous WhatsApp University mostly thrives on fake news hungrily devoured by thousands of people who mostly give in to their prejudices while consuming content on social media. 

Another incident on fake news being shared disturbed me as it came not from unschooled and uninformed blokes, but a well-educated friend. “Gandhiji’s law practice failed, which is why he jumped into the Freedom struggle.” I winced! ‘Who told you that?’ I asked. He realised that he had said something that he shouldn’t have said. ‘Gandhiji had a flourishing practice and for 20 years he practised law, until his luggage was thrown out from the first class compartment of a train!’ I informed him. In the process, of course, I realised that he didn’t like being corrected.

But there was another realisation in it for me — that how deeply and quickly misinformation penetrates and some of us who may have the best defence in the form of education against it can’t do much to stop lies from spreading. The best way to stop fake news from spreading is that just don’t share anything that you see on internet without thinking. The mantra is to Stop, Look, See and Think. Take a moment to reflect. Memes are not history lessons, don’t see them as one.

Besides, Indic epistemology gives us tools to separate fake from real. With the help of pramanas, evidences, we can learn to discriminate between fake and real. So the first paramana is pratyaksha or direct. What you directly see and hear; what you are present to. Pratyaksha means you have to rely on your senses that give you the first hand information of goings-on. For instance, you know so and so is corrupt, because you experienced their corruption first hand or you have seen them exchanging dirty money. Your experience is based on the first-hand encounter. The second pramana is anumana, inference. The best example of this is that there is no smoke without fire. The moment you see smoke, you know that there is a fire burning somewhere. This paramana is developed in the form of syllogism that has five stages: (1) Pratijna, the proposition; (2) hetu, the ground; (3) udahrana, the illustration; (4) upanya; the application; (5) nigamana, the conclusion (nigamana).

The third pramana is Upmana, comparison or resemblance. Through upmana, one can have a valid perception of the world. For instance, if one asks, what are big cats? Then an example of a tiger can be given, similarity between cats can be pointed out and it can be established that they belong to one family. We learn most of what we know through the upamana pramana. 

The fourth major pramana is Shabda, that is verbal testimony of people in authority. So when you hear something or read something, you first establish that it is from a source of authority.

So if you come across a meme then then at least don’t take it for truth unless you corroborate its objectivity. If you hear something, then also check authenticity of information and its source before spreading it around, for that is the spiritual response to fake news.