Earning Trust As If You Have No Reputation

Or: Fighting the Trump Administration propaganda machine with The Truth, The Whole Truth, and Nothing But The Truth

If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing but expects different results, then American mainstream media have really gone crazy, because they keep expecting a straightforward reporting of observations is enough to justify themselves to the American public, when the election of Trump shows that it isn’t enough.

Take the dispute on how big a crowd Trump attracted in his inauguration, in comparison to recent inaugurations. Most mainstream media reported that their estimates of the crowd is less than that of Obama, e.g. this and this. Trump, his staff Sean Spicer and Kellyanne Conway, on the other hand, disputed the crowd size.

For whatever reason, rightly or wrongly, some Americans refuse to believe what their mainstream media are saying. So now is time to go back to first principle. Show the American people how alternative interpretations cannot be justified, so the remaining justified claim should be considered as true. (Alternatively it is called Sherlock Holmes Theory of Truth.) It is hard work debunking alternatives interpretations. However if American mainstream media keep thinking that those people who do not trust them any more will somehow believe them now, then they have learned nothing from 2016.

Treat it like it is a maths problem: always show your working. Prove your assertion, rather than just assert.

I think PBS understand this. Because they took the time and effort to show beyond reasonable doubt that the peak in the crowd size during Trump’s inauguration never reached that of Obama’s on 2009. Keep repeating the proof rather than repeating the assertion. That is the only way to show one is telling the truth when one’s audience is very sceptical. Earn the trust of the people, and never take reputation for granted, because for some people, those reputation means nothing.