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The Big Threat: The Enemy Within
In the second episode of our new News Club series ‘The Big Threat’, I travelled to Washington and New York on the eve of a Presidential inauguration to interview the Financial Times’ US Correspondent for a stocktake on Trump 2.0, and visited a classroom where primary school kids are being taught to spot misinformation online. The words: “this is an existential moment for democracy in the US” are still ringing in my ears…
The enemy within…
Welcome to Episode 2 of The Big Threat - our 8-part special News Club series based on my Churchill Fellowship travels earlier this year to the US, UK, Estonia, France, and Finland, where I met experts engaged in the global information wars, taking up the fight against fake news and misinformation.
In this episode, I travel to Washington and New York as Donald Trump prepares to take office again in the White House - and find a community of concerned journalists, educators and media literacy advocates worried at the havoc that’s about to be wreaked.
In the days before Silicon Valley’s finest took up front row seats at the Presidential Inauguration ceremony, I sat down with the Financial Times’ US Correspondent Andrew Jack who warned American democracy was at a crossroads.
It’s a situation, according to Andrew, made more febrile by the administration’s determination to confuse the electorate with the spreading of misinformation and a corresponding news avoidance by the wider public - a tactic he’s seen employed elsewhere, having spent 10 years in Moscow as his paper’s Russia correspondent.
But all is not lost. At least not as long as Megan Kiefer is around. In New York, I visited a Manhattan classroom with Megan to watch her teach kids how to spot fake news when they come across it online. And happily, her program has echoes of our own Newshounds media literacy program for primary school kids.
You can listen to the podcast here or tune in on YouTube - and hit subscribe while you’re at it. And scroll on for my highlights of our conversation.
Interview Highlights
Highlight 1: The impact of Trump 2.0
Andrew Jack, Financial Times correspondent: “We're in a very delicate moment in American democracy. And while many think that the pain that's already being seen economically - and that being translated into a drop in Trump's ratings - could lead to a rebalancing at the midterm elections in a couple of years, there are others who are asking whether will we have midterm elections? Or could we really be going in a much more authoritarian direction instead - could there be a state of emergency?”
Highlight 2: On parental phone addiction
Megan Kiefer, media literacy educator: “These kids were brought up with parents that have their faces in their phones all the time. If your attention - which is something your kids want so badly - has been taken up by this rectangular square, then of course your kids are going to think: “This must be so important. If it's more important than I am, it's more important than anything else that's going on.”
Highlight 3: The Russian propaganda playbook
Andrew Jack: “Since the election of Donald Trump, there’s been an absolute explosion of flooding the zone with shit. Now, of course that presents a big journalistic challenge in terms of deciding what to prioritise, what to write about, how to verify the information, and it creates a huge degree of noise and confusion for consumers of news. And the whole idea of spreading a vast amount of information and disinformation and rumour is also, in many ways, the playbook that the Soviets developed for propaganda - this idea that there is no truth and everything can be doubted. Therefore, everything is of equal value - or lack of value.”
What are we doing about it?
That would be our world-leading daily news podcast for 7-12yos, Squiz Kids, and our media literacy program Newshounds…
Since 2020, our investment in ensuring Australia’s next generations become critical consumers of news and information online has been significant, and we’re committed to the cause.
How can you help? Recommend Squiz Kids to the parents, carers and teachers in your life - and if you fall into one of those categories yourself, dive in. We’re in more than 6,000 classrooms and many more family homes around the country, fuelling kids’ interest in the news every day.
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