While our last piece on women and fake news is still doing rounds on social media, Fake News strikes again this time, targeting Faye D’Souza. The journalist revealed in a tweet, how fake news was being used to incite aggression and outrage against her, by colouring her opinion.
As D’Souza points out, the trolls who created these photo-shopped tweets, have even shown the temerity of writing “fictional tweet” at the bottom of their “piece of work” to avoid any legal troubles. But will that make any difference? Will it make people think twice before sharing it?
Most important question however is, how many people will actually understand that this is a fictional tweet, despite it being written so, clear and bold. Faye D'Souza noticed it but how many of us do?
Blinded by hatred.
Even the trolls know how blinded our countrymen are with hatred right now. They brazenly write “fictional tweet” below the photo-shopped image, as if to tease us. We will not get into trouble with this, but we will still manage to make your life miserable. It’s no fun to have an opinion in our country it seems. Because every opinion - left, right or center, will automatically put you in a category. And obviously there will be people with itchy fingers, who want to punish you for having a stand.
THE MENACE OF FAKE NEWS
- Journalist Sagarika Ghose has also born the brunt of Fake News being circulated in her name for her opinion.
- Priyanka Chaturvedi had to endure rape threats against her minor daughter, because of a photoshopped image of her supporting the Mandsaur rapist was doing rounds on social media.
- A transgender woman lost her life at hands of agitated mob, which was result of a fake WhatsApp forward claiming that a gang of transgender people are out in the city to kidnap children.
If an image with “fictional tweet” is able to rile us up, then what does it say about our society?
How acrid and irritable are we right now, to conveniently just read what we want to. At the end of the day, it is the women who dare to speak their minds who have to bear the cost of our selective and ignorant vision.
These photo-shopped fake pieces are a tight slap to our faces. They are the mirror showing us the ugly reality which we do not want to see. We still have time, let’s initiate a drive to purge our digital lives of fake news. Its adversities are seeping into our real lives and swallowing our morality whole. Today we are unable to separate fact from fiction. Tomorrow the truth will be staring right into our eyes, but our vision will never make past the shroud of lies we are letting pass unchecked on our smart phone screens. Today it is the women who are suffering its consequences. Tomorrow it could be any of us.
Picture Credit: flickr.com
Also Read : Fake news is a menace in India, women victims of digital abuse
Yamini Pustake Bhalerao is a writer with the SheThePeople team, in the Opinions section. The views expressed are the author’s own.
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