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Comment by slg | Hacker News Reader

The common refrain I hear from communities like HN seems to be that the way to fight disinformation is through education. However, what that looks like is never really explained in practical details. Is this just new curriculum that is taught to middle and high school students? Is there some course that all citizens have to take? If it is only taught to school age kids, what are we supposed to do for the next 30 or 40 years that the country is run by people who haven't had this training? What are we supposed to do when this disinformation education is corrupted by people who themselves have already fallen victim to disinformation because they haven't been educated properly?

I just don't see any practical solution that doesn't involve some type of restriction on disinformation.

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> Is this just new curriculum that is taught to middle and high school students? Is there some course that all citizens have to take?

Critical thinking skills should be taught and practiced at all levels of education. An online course available for everyone for free would nice too.

> what are we supposed to do for the next 30 or 40 years

Everything else we've been doing. Calling out bullshit when we see it, explaining why it's wrong and how it's being used to manipulate people.

> What are we supposed to do when this disinformation education is corrupted by people who themselves have already fallen victim to disinformation because they haven't been educated properly?

Isn't this is a risk with teaching anything anywhere? The good news is that it'll be a lot easier for students to catch issues with how they're being educated when they can think for themselves and are trained in how to catch bad arguments.

Everyone thinks that the other side of an issue is spreading disinformation. It's such a vague and ridiculous assertion to assume that any person, organization, entity, or any one side has the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Freedom of speech is a prerequisite for a society to arrive at anything close to resembling truth, because no one has a monopoly on truth. No one can adjudicate it. Ideas must compete. Perspectives must be entertained. Right now, in this very moment and in all moments in history, there are mainstream ideas that are thought to be absolute truths which are brazenly false.

Debate is how you get educated. Nothing else can suffice.

You can't really debate people that think every creditable source is mainstream media propaganda. I'm a debate bro ... I have decades of first-hand experience -_-

Do you think libel and defamation should be allowed? Those are restrictions on speech which rely on their being some identifiable truth.

I guess I just don't understand why saying "[individual X] is a criminal" is restricted but I can say "everyone in [group Y] is a criminal" without repercussion. Why does the broadening of the statement make it allowable? It seems just as easy to disprove and just as damaging to society.

Yes, it's hard and difficult work and it takes real effort, humility and cooperation from everyone including me and you. But it's work you gotta do if you want to avoid a slow slide down into totalitarian hellhole.

Well for starters schools are part of the issue. Having students being taught whitewashed history while pledging to a flag under God each day only reiterates cult like behavior. Our society is brainwashed from the time they are children to like certain things based on ads that use all manipulation techniques. Kids ask for things without even really knowing why they want them. In order to educate children to question things and keep an open mind would require big changes that I don't think society is willing to make. The best we can do is an open dialogue with children about there techniques and how they can recognize and empower themselves to be independent thinkers unwilling to succumb.

It is taught is Swedish middle school. Källkritik.

Do you think the same way about health issues, e.g. smoking, obesity etc etc?

> What are we supposed to do when this disinformation education is corrupted by people who themselves have already fallen victim to disinformation because they haven't been educated properly?

What are we supposed to when this disinformation censorship is corrupted by such people?

Maybe we could send them some kind of 'camp' where they 're-educated' on what they're allowed to say in public.

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