Conspiracy Myths (2) - Debunking

 


Debunking

It is worthwhile to inform / educate people about attempts and methods of planting something into their brain. This may make the recipients of such misinformation more aware of what is going on and what effect it could have on them. This is called: inoculation or pre-bunking, i.e., providing cognitive vaccines. This is why Twitter and Facebook use Fact Checking Warnings as their pre-bunking approach.

If the damage is already done: It is important to debunk and refute false statements as quickly and thoroughly as possible. Doing it with detailed facts can make such misinformation ‘unstuck’ (at least partially).

And, as you surely know: it is key to repeat your refutation many times and in different ways. This is part of the strategy to tackle the ‘illusory truth effect’ of Fake News, because they follow the Maxime: the often you hear it, the more it becomes true. Now, I don’t know if it is ethical to do it likewise (using the same method as the spreader of Disinformation and Fake News) – BUT - the tolerant cannot be tolerant to intolerance and may have to use similar approaches.

Debunking backfire effect

Backfire effect is when your efforts to debunk a myth leads to reinforcement of such myth. This could happen if you or your organization is not regarded as trustworthy (or even with malicious intent) leading to the belief that the contrary of what you say is true.

If someone tries to debunk a myth using wrong or oversimplified arguments, it may backfire as well.

The Debunking Handbook 2020 suggests the following steps of action (modified by me)

  • FACT: Present the facts in a concise, clear manner.
  • WARN ABOUT MYTH: warn beforehand that you are now going to repeat the myth. Note: If a debunker too often repeats the myth in the argumentation against it, it might continue sticking in people’s mind.
  • EXPLAIN FALLACY: provide good arguments in detail and do so multiple times. Point to inconsistencies and logical fallacies of the myth
  • FACT: repeat your statements and ask people to check out their sources of information

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