You can Google “how many toes does a two-toed sloth have,” and get answers such as, “Some are two-toed and some are three-toed. They’re all slow,” from a person named Fish Hat.
You can also seek information from municipal candidates on their Facebook pages, a closed special interest group’s page, or even from an online voting “fun” site.
All three of those are about as useful as Fish Hat’s response.
Instant experts are plentiful. Sourced stories by journalists aren’t.
Chatham Mazda from Chatham Voice on Vimeo.
You can go online and find anything to support any train of thought you want. Just check out Internet reviews – you can find that the resort or restaurant you’re considering is both the best and the worst of all time.
Despite the onslaught of data, we’re becoming more opinionated and less informed every day.
It has long been a newspaper’s job to draw attention to issues from a community-wide perspective.
We exist to provide a forum for information and a place to debate issues. We have opinions, not the only ones that matter of course, but they are ours and we stand behind them.
Our publicly stated goal is to inform. We aren’t running for election, we don’t have an agenda beyond giving you the facts by tracking down people and talking to them.
When we publish a story, it is as factual as we can provide, given the fact that we’re as susceptible to being lied to as anyone else.
When we write a story stating Brightenview’s view of its project, we don’t do it to back the mayor’s re-election campaign. We do it because it’s a topic people care about.
When we state that the mayor’s lengthy, campaign-style speech at Sunday’s Moraviantown event was greeted with rolled eyes and groans, it’s because we were there to see it.
We pride ourselves in what we do, but aren’t the only credible news outlet. We encourage you to seek out as much information as you can.
Just make sure you put a filter on and beware the source. Not all information is equal; too much of it is infused with opinion.
