Satire As News
Yesterday I sent the following e-mail to The Huffington Post…
Why is this entry filed under politics?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/billy-kimball/obama-team-mulls-role-for_b_145788.html
Several people I know thought this was real news and the quotes all valid and correct because they trust The Huffington Post and there is nothing on your site to convince them otherwise.
Those friends of mine who are smart enough not to believe this despite it appearing in Yahoo! News (http://news.yahoo.com/s/huffpost/20081123/cm_huffpost/145788?m) have lost faith in The Huffington Post to be a source of NEWS. Were this printed in a newspaper and not identified as satire the newspaper would no doubt be facing some lawsuits on all the false quotes and spreading false news. Satire is great, although in this instance not funny in my opinion, but if it fails to in any way identify itself as such it becomes a problem, particularly in the age of the “terrorist fist jab” in which one comment on a blog can hijack an entire news cycle from serious and pressing real issues.
I am sorely disappointed in your website regarding this and sincerely hope you take action to correct it.
Thank you for your time.
No reply yet. No sign of any corrective action either.
