Ryan Graham
Dr. Grapsy
Persuasion
Febuary 22,2017
A news story that was reported on a few weeks ago brought up quite a bit of discussion when Mike Hager (a U.S. citizen from Iraq) blamed the death of his mother on President Trump’s immigration ban. He had traveled to Iraq to bring his sick mother back to the United States to seek treatment for an illness she contracted while visiting Iraq. Hager’s mom was a U.S. resident for 22 years, however, when Hager arrived at the airport in Iraq, she was reportedly turned away presumably by Trump’s immigration ban in that country. She died the following day. This news story seems to be truly heartbreaking and is a story that resonates with all of us who care for our family members.
However, this story by Hager is actually false. After this story aired on Fox 2 Detroit the news station received many emails asking about the validity of Hager’s claims. Shortly after that, a leader of the Karballa Islamic Educational Center in Dearborn confirmed that Hager’s mother actually died before the executive order took place. His mother died five days before the order was confirmed. A mosque in Detroit actually held a prayer service to remember her.
I originally heard about this news story from a post on Reddit. This was back before the story was confirmed as fake. The original article I read was posted by the Huffington post and seemed to be targeted towards the more left-leaning audience since it included emotion quote from Hager himself. The story was constructed to get that emotional response from the reader and make them relate and feel remorse for Hager’s situation. Multiple news publications have reported on this story and had to all update and rewrite their stories to report that the story was false. These mistakes and not fact checking sources can be very dangerous for these news stations. Especially with the topic of fake news being in large debate right now.
Fox 2 news first reported on the story when it was revealed to be false. Their article seemed to be quite detailed and showed several pieces of evidence to prove that Hager’s statement was false. Their article did not rely on emotions as much as the Huffington post article did. However, I did notice something odd about Fox News article towards the end. Out of nowhere, they bring up the fact that the leader of the mosque that confirmed Hager’s mother's death is a Trump supporter. This didn’t seem to add anything to the actual story and I was confused as to what purpose that information added to his story. Fox news is generally a right leaning news stations. So I wondered if this was them (Fox) telling its viewers “don’t worry this guy is on our side”; however, it can also be taken as something to discredit the mosque leader. If that is the cause then why does the article include a segment where they show that Hager was actually under heavy medication and still believed that everything he told Fox about his mother was true. Perhaps this is the news stations way of writing off Hager as a crazy guy. These two separate news stations have a very different way of reporting on the same story. I should also add that none of the articles that I have seen took a long time discussing the fact that this article was fake other than Fox news. Take that, as you will. The state of our media is in a very concerning place. Reporting the news is no longer the primary goal for many of these outlets. Pushing their own views seems to be more important sadly.
This is an interesting example of how a "piece of evidence" can be manufactured and publicized in order to engender public outrage. Unfortunately, if you look hard enough you would likely be able to find many stories like this one - exaggerations of events or reports that contain much more conjecture and speculation than fact. The goal of your term paper here is a broader examination of competing narratives that emerge from public controversies (such as President Trump's executive orders on immigration) rather than an effort to investigate the validity of one particular story.
ReplyDeleteYou suggest that the professional media seeks to push "their own views," but that is not entirely accurate. Instead, consider that the professional media are, at the bottom line, a profit-driven industry - they are professionals. The way media outlets can command dollars for their advertising space is to attract public attention. Spectacular stories ("My mother died because of Trump's policy") fuel online attention - which then becomes magnified and distributed through Reddit (Or Twitter, or Facebook, or any other SNM distribution hub). Stories like these are what helps build the divisive "echo chambers" that stand as obstacles to citizens learning the reality.
I had not heard of this particular "hoax" (although the phrase "death hoax" is a bit hyperbolic). This seems more like a case where a story seems to fit the exact narrative desired and so the outlet runs with it before verifying any of the relevant facts. Remember that the focus of your term paper is not any single example of "fake news," but rather a broader comparison of the narratives which emerge from it.
This post represents an interesting discussion of a particular story which appears to have been overblown when first reported. Did this story get picked up beyond that local Fox affiliate? Did this exaggeration become part of the larger debate over the "fairness" of this administration's efforts to place a moratorium on immigration from the six countries named in the executive order?
Good start here - but don't get too preoccupied with a specific local story. Remember that our class is designed to help you develop your capacity to recognize persuasive strategies and tactics. Please let me know how I can help!