Is silence the real fake news?

Withholding information can be just as bad as disseminating false information. Don’t be too confused. Let me explain.

I first became aware of the concept of fake news after Donald Trump won the American Presidential election and the UK Brexit vote. People, in denial about their own decision making ability found a convenient scapegoat in fake news being propagated by social media. Of course dissemination of fake news is deplorable because it is a deliberate attempt to mislead the public.

We talk much less, however, about the consequences of withheld information. Where instead of deliberately adding information, people simply remove access to information. This is censorship in the extreme form although there are more subtle ways that this is happening.

In Zimbabwe we went through an unprecedented period of an Internet shutdown at the beginning of 2019. While we have our fair dose of fake news and propaganda in the country I really felt like having no information at all was significantly worse. Communication between families became patchy at a time when we were all most worried about each others wellbeing. The vacuum in communication was soon filled up very quickly with conspiracy theories and more fake news.

In the corporate world the timing of activity is rarely related to the timing of the communication around it. Typically the decision to restructure an organisation is made way in advance of the communication to employees. Your CEO knew a year ago that you might not have a job. More nefarious is what we often see on the JSE of downward share price moves just before close of trade on the day the company announces bad news or poor results. Difficult to prove, but certainly I am suspicious of there being rampant insider trading happening.

Let’s go down one more level and look at interpersonal relationships. What people say is also less important than what they don’t say. Going to watch a game with the boys could simply be an event where a sports fixture is watched live in the company of male friends. Or it could be a convenient cover for said sports fixture as well as excessive alcohol consumption and pre-planned after party. With my kids any request for a new item of school stationery is a request and a hidden confession that the previous item has misplaced, destroyed or possibly even eaten.

I think we have become obsessed with the need to reduce the addition of false information. However, the real misinformation is happening from the removal of vital information. The nuance, the white lies and the framing of arguments. Very subtle, equally dishonest and potentially more damaging.