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The rise in false news shows that people are more interested in expressing their opinions than the truth, said communications strategist and writer Sheena Gurbakhash.

She cited the Google Trends chart for the word ‘truth’, saying that the word was most invoked in the 1840s, then suffered a huge decline and has since crept back up a little.

“From what I can see from this, we don’t care about the truth, we only care about what we believe in.

“We are living in silos, because all your Facebook friends think just like you.

“When something subscribes to what we believe in, we don't actually want to find out whether it's true,” Sheena said, during a seminar titled ‘Can Media and Law Co-Exist?’ in Kuala Lumpur today.

During her session, called ‘Fake News: Why I Worry About My Mother’, she said that living in echo chambers of our own beliefs and opinions are causing society to become more polarised.

Pointing to the last US elections which saw Donald Trump winning the presidency, she said, that society has become so polarised that the opposing factions “no longer talk to each other”.

“We are polarising and that is not how elections are won. Elections used to be based on something called swing votes.

“Those are the guys that the press and everyone in the mainstream media used to write for.

“They used to write for the guys in the middle. Now there is no common point of reference any more,” she said.

Such extreme polarising would lead to two possible options, she said. Either people become more polarised or they would disengage, which is very concerning, she said.

The youth nowadays, she said, would much rather read the news on the latest celebrity gossip than on current state affairs.

“Because they have been completely alienated by the issue writers (and) the lawmakers, they are no longer engaged. So what box are they going to tick?” she asked.

Sheena urged people to get out of their comfort zones and engage people, especially those in the middle ground, instead of continuing in their silos.

“Are we going to sit here and be unpleasantly surprised when those guys with those extremists long-term agendas have taken over while we were sitting there reading what our friends posted on Facebook?” she asked.

‘Still lines to be drawn’

Meanwhile, Bar Council's Continuing Professional Development department director Santhi Latha explained that while people are guaranteed certain rights in Malaysia, there are still lines to be drawn.

“The objective of having this event today is to create an awareness that there are lines that exists.

“Some are selective but what is important in this process is for you to realise that these laws exist,” she said.

She said most of the public does not understand that there might be a possibility of legal proceedings against them for what they say or do.

Using the recent WhatsApp administrator scare as an example, she said people who set themselves up as an administrator on the social messaging app have to recognise that they have certain responsibilities to bear.

It was reported last week that WhatsApp administrators will be held accountable for any false information spread in their groups, which caused concern among the public.

The Malaysian Communications and Multimedia Commission (MCMC) later clarified that they will only investigate WhatsApp groups based on complaints lodged and that the members of the group are just as accountable as the administrators.

The MCMC also released a set of guidelines for social messaging administrators earlier this week.

The event today is a full collaboration between the Bar Council’s Continuing Professional Development Department and Malaysiakini, and was held to mark World Press Freedom Day on May 3.

The line-up of speakers included representatives from the legal fraternity and media industry, who examined how Malaysian law regulates our constitutional right to freedom and expression.

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